After several weeks of speculation about the possible sacking of Abdullahi Sarki Muktar, national security adviser, NSA, to the president, the retired army general was kicked out of the job Monday, March 8. Goodluck Jonathan, Nigeria’s acting president, removed him after a marathon meeting with service chiefs in Abuja. Muktar has been succeeded by Aliyu Gusau, another retired general.
Ima Niboro, special assistant to the acting president on media, who announced this development in a terse statement immediately after Jonathan’s meeting with the service chiefs did not give reasons. The meeting was the first between the service chiefs and Jonathan since he was made the acting president by the National Assembly via the doctrine of necessity.
The day’s meeting with the service chiefs was necessitated by the rising wave of insecurity and the unending Jos crisis which has defiled all efforts to halt it. The crisis has claimed several lives and property over the years, the recent being the sacking of some villages in Jos south local government on Sunday, March 7, during which hundreds of people were killed and property destroyed in what is believed to be reprisal attack.
The federal government was disturbed by the latest mayhem in some villages just a few kilometres away from Jos town barely a month after the January 2010 crisis in the city when hundreds were killed.
Particularly worrisome to the government was the fact that the attackers were able to beat the security checks put in place by the government in the Jos metropolis, including the dusk to dawn curfew imposed by the government in the city since January, this year. It was therefore a surprise to many that rather than make a definite pronouncement on this, the only outcome of the meeting was the removal of the NSA.
But there was more to Muktar’s removal. According to a source, his removal was indicative of the Jonathan’s gradual hold on power. Muktar is seen as the engine room of what some have come to regard as President Umaru Yar’Adua’s kitchen cabinet controlling the affairs of the nation which must be dismembered by Jonathan in order to be in firm control of the affairs of the nation.
Also, since the return of President Yar’Adua to Nigeria from a three-month medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, Jonathan and his loyalists have been unhappy with the former NSA. Jonathan and his loyalists accused the former NSA of complicity in the mobilisation and deployment of soldiers during the return of the president without the knowledge of the acting president and commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces.
The former NSA is also believed to have been the mastermind of the return of the president to the country in the early hours of Wednesday, February 24, in the manner in which it was done. The Executive Council of the Federation was planning to declare the President incapacitated during its meeting of Wednesday, February 24. To beat that declaration which if done would have led to an eventual removal of Yar’Adua from office, Muktar alongside Turai, wife of the ailing president and some select members of the Yar’Adua’s cabinet, arranged the return of the president. This pre-emptive action has also not gone down well with the acting president and his loyalists.
Given the above, one could easily dismiss the notion that Muktar’s removal was due to insecurity in the country and the recent continued crisis in Jos which many blame on security lapses. His replacement with Gusau is enough evidence that the Jos crisis is not a factor. “This is not the first time Gusau is made NSA. He was NSA during the Olusegun Obasanjo regime from 1999 to 2006. During all that period, ethnic and religious crisis were witnessed in Jos. There was high level insecurity in the country resulting in the murder of prominent Nigerians. He couldn’t stop it then. What makes anyone think that he will stop it now? There is more to this removal and appointment,” a source said.
The decision to sack Muktar was taken a week before it was actually announced. The delay was to ensure that Gusau made a firm commitment that he would accept the offer. Sources said he was not keen on the job because of his presidential ambition. He had said he did not want the job to tie him down. It took the intervention of Theophilus Danjuma, former minister of defence for Gusau to accept the job. Danjuma had told him that national security was in jeopardy and urged him to return to the beat to help sort things out in the interest of the nation.
Gusau accepted but gave a condition that he should be allowed to quit whenever he decides to do so in order to be able to pursue his presidential aspiration. Jonathan, sources said, accepted the condition.
Muktar’s exit did not come to those conversant with events at the Presidential Villa as a surprise. He and other Yar’Adua loyalists in the presidency never actually respected Jonathan even after he became acting president. They still referred to him as “Mr. Vice President.” Jonathan also became suspicious of their loyalty. Some of those who knew what was happening advised the acting president to sack him
