States shouldn’t be treated as FG’s departments – Wike

Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Ezenwo Wike has called for immediate reforms where states in the fed­eration will be seen as federating units and not as departments of the Federal Government.

He said that Nigeria will only experience peace and develop­ment when the several lies affect­ing her functionality are disman­tled.

Governor Wike, while declar­ing the position in his acceptance speech after receiving the award as the Sun Governor of the Year, 2016 in Lagos at the weekend, said that efforts must be targeted at in­clusive governance, which will ca­ter for all sections of the country.

Wike said: “There are too many lies in Nigeria’s structural arrangement that we must dis­mantle, including the over-con­centration of absolute power and resources at the centre in order to guarantee sustainable peace, good governance and development.

“For heaven’s sake, we must come to terms with the fact that states are federating units and not departments of the Feder­al Government. State governors are elected by their people, and therefore superior in every re­spect to appointed officers of the Federal Government.

“It is a constitutional fiction to refer to governors as chief security officers. But, even at that, nobody can claim to be more concerned about insecurity in our states than the governors,” he said.

According to the governor, despite the challenges posed by the imbalances, he has worked deliberately to support security agencies and improve security in Rivers State.

“In Rivers State, our admin­istration treats security as num­ber one priority. We have invest­ed millions of naira to provide support for the security agencies, including patrol vehicles, com­munication and surveillance equipment, gun boats and other logistics.

“Even as I speak, we have pro­cured six Armoured Personnel Carriers to be delivered to the po­lice force. You must also be aware of the two armoured helicopters partly funded by the previous ad­ministration, which we brought into the country and voluntarily offered to the Nigerian Air Force to use in providing aerial security surveillance for the State.

“Unfortunately, our commit­ments and support for the secu­rity agencies, especially the Po­lice and the DSS appear fruitless, given the prevailing disenchant­ments over their poor operations and relationship with the govern­ment and our people.

“Worse still, the politicisa­tion of security agencies and ser­vices in Rivers State, which started with the frequent and impulsive replacement of Police and DSS bosses, is becoming entrenched and even taken to irrational lev­els.”

On his award, Governor Wike explained that he will re­main committed to the delivery of quality projects and programmes across the state for the good of the people.

Source – The Authority