The Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, has charged the new commandant of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps in the State, Samuel Dan Okon, on the urgent need to protect farmers in the State through the deployment of the Agro Ranger Unit of the agency.
Obaseki gave the charge on Wednesday while receiving the new State Commandant of NSCDC in Government House, Benin City, the Edo State capital.
He urged the new commandant to immediately key into the existing security architecture in the State, collaborate extensively with other security agencies, local communities to ensure that adequate security is guaranteed in areas that are prone to crisis in the State.
The Governor said: “Your agro ranger service that was introduced, unfortunately, we have not collaborated enough; it is what we would like to change. When they post you to Edo State, your first responsibility is to the people of Edo State. In terms of maintaining critical national assets, we need to sit and work together.
“You will be evaluated based on how good Edo is doing, but if you come and just want to do it on your own, and say that is what headquarters said, then there will be the likelihood that they will be looking at you and headquarters until you go.
“You have an agro Ranger Unit but you have to understand what else we are doing on ground and the role of local communities, including hunters. You just can’t say you are doing agro ranger and train just your men; they will need to work closely with the establishments on ground.
“We need support in dealing with the incidents we are seeing particularly in areas that are prone to crises. Your success will largely depend on how quickly you key into what is on ground.”
He further said: “Given where we are in terms of security in the country, this is not a time of experimenting; it is a time to join forces and understand the nature of the threats we face and also key into an action plan that is geared for success.
“You are coming into an Edo State with a security architecture that is already set, it is bottom-up; at the base we have our vigilante teams, our public works volunteers, the police constabulary arrangement, NSCDC, the Nigeria Police Force and then we have the military.
“We are a data-driven government and we work with information and analyze the information before taking action. We analyze data regularly at our security council meetings and we review all the incidents and trends we receive from all the agencies regularly.
“You need to quickly understand this system and key into it. We know your men are limited, one of the things that will lead to success is collaboration and being able to work with the locals, people who understand the terrain for quality intelligence.
“You have just come into the state and you need to work with the people who have been here, were born here and know all the terrain. For you to work with them, that mutual respect must be there for the people you have come to meet and that trust has to be quickly built.”
Obaseki advised: “Any sense of rivalry will not help. We enjoy a very good collaborative relationship with all the agencies; the DSS, Police, NSCDC, which explains our success in stabilizing security in the state. We will like that to continue and will like you to be a key component of that plank.”
In his response, the new NSCDC State Commandant assured that he would commit resources to building the capacity of the NSDC personnel to respond to threats of any kind, and added: “We will relate with other security agencies in the state and collaborate meaningfully to protect life and property of Edo people.”
