Political science graduate and former military intelligence officer has a refreshingly different view pint….
Soldiering runs deep in the family of Umar Aliyu who is endearingly referred to as “blade.” The native of Bida local government of Niger State was born in 1971; he comes from a long line of warriors and took to the family tradition. The Air Force military school, Jos was followed by the Nigerian Defense Academy where he majored in Political Science and defence studies. He is a member of the 40th regular combatant course, class of 1993.
Post Nigerian Army, he has pursued a career in Security Consulting, becoming a certified Protection Officer (CPO) in the process. Blade is no run of the mill former Army brass; he has had time to reflect on what has become of the nation’s armed forces and not unnaturally on what might have been. He straddles two perspectives. On the one hand, there is an unfailing loyalty to the traditions of an institution he was socialised to revere. On the other, he would be less than human if he did not share in today’s deep sense of unease.
Marrying the two requires a balancing act. Umar has the intellectual honesty to do so. His assessment of the Army today is that in the scheme of things the institution remains solid with a willing soul to serve. Nevertheless, he adds the caveat, “…but the body is weak by design.”
He is not oblivious to the fact that there has been a critical juncture. Obviously given the political inversion of the professional ethos due to the military interregnum something must have gone awry? So how are these to be reversed and the professional ethos reinstated? He admits that there was a juncture, as opposed to we suppose, a rupture. In his opinion an historical opportunity presented itself at the point when the country returned to civil rule in 1999.
The moment however passed without the “…robust and deliberate move to reinvigorate our Army…” had this been done, he is convinced that it would have made a crucial difference. From his perspective it would have paid off handsomely. There, “would have been the best time to debrief a force that largely served military regimes, while aligning her to the anticipated challenges of democratic governance and co-existence not only within our national borders, but across the sub-region.”
The situation he admits was fluid. This should not be taken as pleading in mitigation. He is convinced that the nature of the intelligence reports that informed an analysis of the socio-political and religious trends in the country and the West African region portrayed a state of flux .Moving forward Umar accepts that there is a need for the Army to reinvent itself. In addition, there must be a national consensus to facilitate this vitally needed process. This is of great importance to Umar. After all some of intelligence report were in themselves not as prescient as they ought to have been. “…these may not have elicited the kind and quality of response required at the strategic levels of our military and defense policy formulators hence the insurgency as it erupted in the North-East took us by surprise, regardless of the fact that the indicators had been there and rife for quite a while.”
His observations are important. For Umar clearly represents a lost generation who by training, comportment and intellectual preparation should still have been contributing to the set-up. To reinvent the Army from perspectives such as his requires achieving a consensus involving drawing up justification, benchmarks as well as measures of success and ownership from the institutions it is given to. In this way the entire permanent process which has now become a liability can be revamped.
For there should be no mistake about it, the misapplication of the procurement system lies at the heart of today’s problem. It is obvious that the National Assembly in approving the recent one billion dollar loan request from the Presidency did not take the issue of the cost\benefit of a skewed procurement system as a critical factor in operational efficiency. A new stream lined process will ensure that “…fiscal or monetary investments can be tracked, with results delivered to time, budget and specification.” The emphasis is important: “Any other way will more likely than not perpetuate the Armed forces and Security agencies as sunk cost accruals to our national balance sheets.”
Today he lives quite fulfilled consulting for a myriad of corporate organisations on security matters. Post Nigerian Army, he has pursued a Security Career, and still does, which has seen him holding numerous appointments as a Business Security Officer/Manager in quite a Number of Private Organisations, some of which are Victoria Garden City Lekki, Lagos; Dangote Industries Limited (Sugar Refinery) Apapa; British America Tobacco Nigeria, to mention but a few. A Security enthusiast, Umar has a passion for Security Journalism, Executive Protection, and Business Security Solutions. A Certified Protection Officer (CPO), Aliyu is Projects Management Certified, a Member of the International Foundation of Protection Officers (IFPO); The American Society for Industrial Security (ASIS); The Nigerian Institute for Industrial Security (NIIS); The Association of Industrial Security and Safety Operators of Nigeria (AISSON), amongst others. But that deep environmentally induced commitment to the ethos of the nation continues to shine through. Married with children, he is a voracious reader and a golf enthusiast. Umar has a profound sense of gratitude to the very essence of the Nigerian nation.
He is eternally grateful to a Nigeria which saw him through secondary school and university and “even paid me a salary while I was at cadet earned a monthly stipend.’’ He is unrepentantly die – hard in his allegiance to the concept of Nigeria. This defines his belief system. He has lived all his life through a microcosm of Nigeria, which is the reality in any barrack or cantonment. The critical issue he is at pains to point out is that, “…the only difference being in the barracks, we do not see religion, nor ethnicity, nor politics, nor regionalism. We lived and died if need be for one another…”
Relating to this engagingly charming, sharp-as-nails ex-officer can be quite unsettling if one still believes in the concept of Nigeria. How many of his intellect and patriotism have prematurely left our armed forces? The answer is disturbing.
