While upholding the constitutional legitimacy of the state of emergency declared in three terrorism flashpoints of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, Human Rights Writers’ Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has canvassed the immediate introduction of compulsory military training for all Nigerian citizens as a permanent and most effective way of preserving the country’s territorial integrity.

The rights group in a statement issued in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, urged the government to convert the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme into a compulsory one-year military training and service and to use facilities and training camps of the NYSC as facilities for the implementation of the compulsory military training programme.

In the statement signed by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and National Media Director, Miss Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA said it is convinced that the proposed compulsory military training would inculcate genuine patriotic love of Nigeria in Nigerians. It also said the scheme would make it almost impossible for armed hoodlums to keep slaughtering Nigerians being currently witnessed.

HURIWA argued that the Nigerian Constitution supports the proposal, noting that great nations such as Israel are reaping abundantly from compulsory military training of their citizenry.

“Compulsory military training will help to energise and equip Nigerians with the requisite combat skills to protect their right to life as enshrined in chapter four of the constitution of Nigeria of 1999 (as amended),” HURIWA said.

“We believe that a better and more sustainable approach to reducing the large scale slaughter by armed non-state actors of Nigerians, is the commencement of compulsory military training,” the group further said, adding:

“Recall vividly that section 220(1) of the constitution provides that ‘the Federation shall establish and maintain adequate facilities for carrying into effect any Act of the National Assembly providing for compulsory military training or military service for citizens of Nigeria,’ even as sub-section two provides that “until an Act of the National Assembly is made in that behalf, the President may maintain adequate facilities in any secondary or post-secondary educational institution in Nigeria for giving military training in any such institution which desires to have the training.”

The rights group therefore appealed to President Goodluck Jonathan “to activate a mechanism to enforce the provisions of the constitution which allows for compulsory military training to check the ugly trend of mass slaughter by machete/gun-bearing hoodlums.”

*Photo shows HURIWA National Coordinator, Onwubiko.

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