The Governors of the troubled states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe have called on President Goodluck Jonathan to order deployment of more troops to the states ahead of the February general elections.
Despite the ongoing insurgency, the governors also insisted that elections must hold in the three states as scheduled.
Governor Kashim Shetimma spoke after a meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan at the state House on Tuesday.
Shetimma told State House correspondents, “Well, my take on this is simple, we are facing real extinct threat to our culture, to our people and to our civilization.
“Elections are for the living but elections are being conducted in war torn Afghanistan, elections was conducted recently in Iraq, in Syria and so many other places,” he said.
“Honestly I don’t want to dwell on the politics behind the counter-insurgency operations because we are one people with a common destiny.
“And this is the time for all of us irrespective of differences in political affiliations, religious persuasions, tribal or sectional background to collapse into a single course and bring about this madness to an end”
Governor Ibrahim Geidam of Yobe also had this to say, “We have come to brief the President on the security features of our various states, we have come to greet him and we told him of the challenges we have been facing.
“We are appealing to the Federal Government to deploy more troops in addition to what we have on ground to arrest the situation in our various states.
“We need more troops, the troops that we have on ground in our various states are not enough to contain the situation, so we have appealed to the Federal Government to deploy additional troops with full equipment to tame the situation.
“Elections will hold in the states. Election will hold, that is the position of the electoral commission and definitely in all those areas where insurgency exists, elections will hold,” he argued.
Present at the meeting were Vice President Namadi Sambo, Governors of Adamawa, Bala Ngileri; Kaduna State Governor, Ramalan Yero; the National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki, Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Air Chief Marshal Alex Bade, Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. Gen. Kenneth Minimah, Chief of Naval Staff (CNS), Vice Admiral Usman Jibrin, Chief of Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal Adesola Amosu, Director General State Security Service (SSS), Ekpenyong Ita, Inspector General of Police, Sulieman Abba, and DG National Intelligence Agency , Ayo Oke
Others were Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, Minister of Defence, Mohammed Aliyu Gusau and Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Amyim.
