Governor Aminu Bello Masari of Katsina state has voiced his apprehension over the workability of the Amotekun styled security arrangement in the North West because according to him it is difficult to replicate a uniformed security arrangement such as obtainable in the south west ,in the region, adding that security is a ‘’federal responsibility’’, which only the federal Government can effectively handle
Masari who spoke in an interview at his Government House residence in Katsina further argued that no one state in the region can make a law for another adding that each state must make its own law, hence there is lack of uniformity of laws in the area.
He said ’’here, we have each state government incorporating its peculiar state security arrangement s of which in Katsina, we already had KATROTA which the state house of Assembly has passed into law but the need for a structure made us to send it back for amendment because what we had on ground as the structure was too ambiguous.
‘’So also kano has a security outfit, same goes for Kaduna and other states having one form of security structure in their states or the other, rarely there is no independent security outfit for the entire North West, because you know security is under exclusive list, it’s totally a federal reserve but we are coming out with laws creating some form of security structure at the state level but in reality it is a federal responsibility.”
On the present state of insecurity in Katsina State, the Governor identified the missing link to be poor security architecture particularly at the grassroots in terms of having regular Policing or 24 hour security presence, in the rural communities and the villages that will readily confront the bandit whenever they strike at whatever time of the day in the rural area.
He added; ‘’an average Local Government Area have 28-38 policeman and there are 100 villages, and how do we police this local governments in terms of security presence. The security architecture we use to have in the villages then was championed by the traditional institution, then they were very strong and the villagers were cooperating, but are they strong now?”
He further traced the current weak security infrastructure at local levels to poor implementation of past Local government reforms, where advocates of Local Government reforms incorporated expected roles by villagers and ward heads, in the provision of local security.
