‘Terrorists Are Learning, Why Isn’t Your Government?’ — Atiku Faults Tinubu’s Security Strategy

Former Vice President and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, has challenged President Bola Tinubu’s administration over what he described as its failure to proactively confront Nigeria’s evolving security threats, asking why terrorists appeared to be learning and improving their methods while the government remained stuck in outdated approaches.

Atiku made the remarks in a statement titled ‘Atiku Lectures Tinubu: Terrorists Are Learning. Why Isn’t Your Government?’ issued on Thursday, and signed by the former Vice President’s Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu.

The opposition leader warned that the growing spread of terrorism, banditry and kidnapping from northern Nigeria to other parts of the country demonstrated that the nation’s current counterterrorism framework was failing to evolve at the same pace as the threats confronting it.

According to him, Nigeria can no longer afford a business-as-usual approach to security, insisting that the country’s security architecture must be urgently recalibrated to address a threat environment that has become more sophisticated, decentralised and geographically expansive.

“The terrorists are learning from every attack. They study their successes and failures. They refine their tactics. They identify vulnerabilities. They adapt and strike again,” Atiku said.

“The question Nigerians must ask is simple: Why isn’t the government doing the same?

“From Chibok to Oyo, from countless villages in the North-West to communities across the Middle Belt and beyond, the pattern has become tragically familiar. An attack occurs. The nation mourns. Promises are made. Committees are announced. Then another attack follows.”

He lamented that successive attacks across the country have revealed an inability by government institutions to draw lessons from previous incidents and use them to prevent future occurrences.

“A nation that refuses to learn from its tragedies is condemned to relive them,” he stated.

“The disturbing expansion of banditry, terrorism, and kidnapping across different parts of the country clearly demonstrates that our current counterterrorism framework is no longer adequate for the scale and complexity of the challenge before us.”

Atiku argued that Nigeria’s security efforts have relied excessively on centrally designed and often imported frameworks that pay little attention to the experiences of communities that have directly suffered terrorist violence.

He stressed the need for an immediate review of the National Counterterrorism Policy, saying any review must be rooted in Nigeria’s unique realities and experiences.

“It is now imperative that the Federal Government immediately initiates a comprehensive review of Nigeria’s National Counterterrorism Policy. Such a review must be rooted in Nigeria’s own experiences, drawing lessons from communities that have suffered attacks and developing context-specific, adaptive, and community-driven solutions rather than depending largely on foreign templates,” he said.

Recalling the 2014 abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls in Borno State, Atiku argued that Nigeria had failed to adequately learn from one of its darkest security crises.

“We went through the harrowing tragedy of the Chibok schoolgirls’ abduction. The pain of that national trauma remains etched permanently in our collective memory. Yet years later, schoolchildren and teachers are still being abducted in different parts of the country.

“We ought to have drawn critical lessons and early warning indicators from Chibok and other similar incidents to ensure that what recently happened in Oyo State and elsewhere never happened again.”

The ADC presidential candidate proposed the establishment of a Terrorism Violence Peer Review Mechanism, which he said would provide a platform for affected communities, local leaders, security personnel and other stakeholders to exchange experiences and contribute practical solutions to national security planning.

According to him, such a mechanism would strengthen grassroots intelligence gathering, improve early warning systems, enhance community resilience and deepen collaboration between citizens and security agencies.

Atiku also called for a fundamental restructuring of Nigeria’s security architecture, advocating a multi-layered counterterrorism strategy driven by intelligence, technology, community participation and the disruption of terror financing networks.

“The battle against terrorism cannot be won solely through military deployments. While kinetic operations remain necessary, the government must aggressively target the financial lifelines of terrorist groups. We must identify and dismantle the networks that fund, equip, transport, and shelter these criminal elements,” he said.