The Federal Government laboured on Monday to reassure Nigerians and the international community that it had the security situation under control following a new travel advisory by the United States government. While Washington had in a November 3 memo advised American citizens to be wary of lodging at “major hotels” in Nigeria based on security threats, Abuja organised an interactive media session to allay public apprehension, and reel out ongoing security measures and successes. The government needs to do more to secure the country.

The government’s stock response to foreign countries alerting their nationals to possible threats in Nigeria is denial. Though the response by President Bola Tinubu’s media team has been more mature than the combative stance of the immediate past administration, it still needs to take such alerts with all seriousness.

The US urged its citizens in Nigeria or intending to travel there to be vigilant at major hotels, be watchful of their surroundings, and keep a low profile.

It added, “The US government is aware of credible information that there is an elevated threat to major hotels in Nigeria’s larger cities.”

But at the media roundtable, the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, heads of some government information agencies, and the President’s media aides, assured Nigerians of the country’s safety.

According to Idris, such travel advisories achieved nothing “other than needless panic,” that he added could also have “severe adverse economic impact,” and undermine efforts to attract investments. He implied that the US was generalising “isolated incidents across the entire hospitality industry.”

But serious security threats persist. Though the country has been spared terror bombings or attacks in the major cities in recent times, the Islamist insurgency started by Boko Haram 14 years ago is thriving. Terrorists and bandits are active in the hinterland, killing scores of people, and kidnapping many others. Kidnapping is also rampant in the cities.

In the past, Boko Haram had bombed motor parks in Kano, the UN complex in Abuja, and markets in Borno and Yobe states. Attacking hotels, especially ones frequented by international tourists, is part of the Salafist terrorist playbook. In January 2016, Islamists aligned with al-Qaeda in the Maghreb attacked the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, killing 30 persons, wounding 56 others, and taking 176 hostages.

Two terrorist attacks in succession on hotels in Tunis, in which 59 tourists were killed forced about 70 Tunisian hotels to close and the country’s hotel occupation rate down to 20 per cent.

The government’s spokesmen reeled out a slew of recent measures and successes in securing Nigeria, including acquisition and deployment of additional weapons platforms, intelligence-gathering, as well as foiling threats, neutralising terrorists, bandits, kidnappers, and bandits, and deploying several task forces.

But real threats remain, and eternal vigilance remains the price of liberty. The government should drop its reflexive hostility to international travel advisories. Governments elsewhere accord top priority to the wellbeing of their citizens abroad.

First launched in 1978 and revised in 2018, the US travel warning system for instance, is designed to give “clear, timely, and reliable information about every country in the world so they can make informed travel decisions.” The US News & World Report said it issues advisories on 200 countries and territories. The United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia also regularly issue such advisories in response to security, health, and weather/climatic concerns.

Significantly, the US statement acknowledged that Nigeria’s security agencies were aware of and working “diligently” to neutralise the threat.

The provision of an additional N552.6 billion for security in the recently approved 2023 N2.18 trillion supplementary budget is an acknowledgement of Nigeria’s security challenge.

Therefore, Tinubu should not dismiss the advisory; he should rather do everything possible to stamp out insecurity.

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