The United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Terence McCulley, has urged the Federal Government to change tactics in its fight against terrorism.
McCulley said this while declaring the Distinguished Public Lecture organised as one of the activities to mark the 50th anniversary of the University of Lagos on Thursday.
He advised that security personnel should stop being heavy-handed in their approach to the fight against terrorism.
He advised Nigerians to cooperate with the government by becoming their own security agents through the establishment of community policing units across the country.
The envoy said, "I see some similarities between New York in the 1980s and northern Nigeria today. Whenever and wherever a population feels like its government is not providing an adequate quality of life, it becomes complacent to criminals, whether they are vandals or terrorists
"The media previously reported that the US government believes that poverty causes terrorism, which is not precisely accurate. Nor was deindustrialisation or urban flight the sole reason for New York's decline to crime.
"The underlying cause in both cases was subtly different: New Yorkers in the 1980s and Nigerians in the North today felt betrayed by their governments, who had failed to provide the things they needed, like good schools and adequate infrastructure. Criminals and terrorists exploited these sentiments and took advantage of a dearth of government presence to grow their organisations."
Mc Culley added, "It is also a reason that the US objects to the use of heavy-handed tactics by security forces taking on those challenges. Nigeria's government needs friends in the North and a more targeted approach to tackling Boko Haram combined with better services for northern citizens can help it to attract those friends."
He also called for urban revitalisation and sustained efforts at mitigating the effects of rural/urban migration.
He said, "If a city fixes its transportation links but is still ridden with criminals, shoppers will not visit. Likewise, if a city fixes a crime problem, but has no easy means for residents to visit the safe downtown area and no businesses to develop there, it remains at risk of falling back into decline."
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Nigeria should change her anti-terrorism tactics - US
Nigeria should change her anti-terrorism tactics - US
NigerianEye
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Friday, July 06, 2012
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LIKE the comments made by the envoy, you can not ignore the facts that northerners are backward in term of development, the fed govt should consider facts raise by the envoy from USA
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