Banner Online News

There is something deeply troubling; indeed alarming about a nation where those charged with protecting lives and property become obstacles to security itself. The continued sealing of Amotekun in Osun State by the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Kayode Egbetokun, is one such troubling contradiction, and it deserves the strongest condemnation.

Governor Ademola Adeleke’s public plea is not political theatre. It is a cry of alarm from a state under siege. At a time when insecurity is metastasizing across Nigeria, when forests have become safe havens for kidnappers, bandits, and terror gangs, Osun State has been deliberately denied the services of a tested, homegrown, and effective security outfit. This is not just insensitive; it is reckless.

Amotekun was not created on a whim. It was a collective response by South West states to the glaring failure of centralized policing to protect local communities. It has proven its worth in Ondo and Oyo States, disrupting criminal networks, securing forests, and restoring confidence among citizens abandoned by an overstretched federal security system. Why, then, is Osun being treated as an exception? What logic, legal, moral, or operational, justifies this selective suffocation of security?

Governors are constitutionally regarded as the Chief Security Officers of their states. They are closest to the people. They understand the terrain, the threat patterns, and the urgency on the ground. For the IGP to override a governor’s informed security judgment and effectively paralyze a state’s local defense mechanism is to mock the very idea of federalism and shared responsibility.

Mr. Egbetokun’s posture reeks of bureaucratic arrogance and dangerous detachment from reality. Rural and border communities in Osun are exposed. Criminals know it. They are exploiting the vacuum. Yet Amotekun offices remain sealed, and some of its officers languish in detention for months without trial. This is not law enforcement; it is institutional sabotage.

If there are allegations against Amotekun operatives, the law is clear: charge them to court or release them. Justice does not thrive in prolonged detention, and security does not survive in a vacuum. Punishing an entire state by shutting down a critical security outfit over unresolved allegations is collective endangerment.

Nigeria has seen this movie before. Kwara State’s Woro community paid a horrific price when security failed; innocent citizens slaughtered in a mindless attack by Fulani expansionist jihadists. Must Osun wait for a similar tragedy before common sense prevails? Must blood be spilled before Amotekun is “allowed” to do the job it was created to do?

Banneronlinenews considers this situation immoral, indefensible, and dangerous. Security must never be politicised. It must never be centralized to the point of paralysis. And it must never be held hostage by the whims of one office holder while citizens sleep with one eye open.

We call, unequivocally, on Inspector-General Kayode Egbetokun to unseal Amotekun in Osun State without further delay. History will not be kind to indifference in the face of preventable danger.

We also call on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to rein in the IGP and do the needful. The safety of Nigerians is non-negotiable. Osun deserves protection. Amotekun deserves to operate. And Nigeria deserves better than security by obstruction.