Governance and reconstruction of the North – East: The role of security volunteers in Borno State, Nigeria

Abstract

The research work evaluates the Governance and Reconstruction of the North – East via the Role of Security Volunteers in Borno State, Nigeria. The security system in Nigeria has recently gained increased attention in the international scene, following the glaring weakness in the security system and flaws in the policy formulation among nation state. Nigeria has over the years experienced serious reoccurrence of insurgency thereby undermining its security governance and reconstruction. In the North- Easter region, Borno State has been the epicenter of the conflict that has been the worst hit. More so, the response strategies of the security forces in Borno State, especially the approach employed by the military, has largely been viewed by the citizens of Nigeria as defective, inefficient and counterintuitive. Therefore, this study adopts qualitative method in the generation of data from both primary and secondary sources. The instrument used for the data collection was semi-structured interview and data collected were content analyzed. The study found that, several security volunteers group like: The Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF), Vigilante Groups, Danga Security, Borno state hunters’ association played significant roles in security control and peace building in the State especially in curbing out the menace of Boko Haram insurgency. Thus, the study suggests wider enlistment of civilian
volunteers into the armed services, and that members of these groups (CJTF), who are qualified in line with the principles of federal character be absorbed into the Nigerian military.