Presidency to Obasanjo: Terrorism Took Root on Your Watch

The Presidency has issued a sharp rebuke to former President Olusegun Obasanjo, asserting that the roots of Nigeria’s current security crisis were allowed to grow during his tenure, and declaring him unfit to critique President Bola Tinubu’s handling of the nation’s turmoil.

In a statement posted on the verified X account of the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Public Communication, Sunday Dare, the government responded to Obasanjo’s recent remarks in Jos, where he expressed deep concern over escalating insecurity and suggested Nigerians might seek foreign intervention.

The Presidency condemned this suggestion as “capitulation” and an abdication of leadership, emphasizing that Nigeria “will not raise a white flag” or outsource its sovereignty.

“Before recommending surrender, the former President should reflect on what he failed to do when these terrorists first began organising under his watch,” the statement read. It accused Obasanjo’s administration of allowing the ideological seeds and early cells of what became Boko Haram to be nurtured, recruit, and establish camps without the “necessary urgency.”

“It is a historical fact… What began as a preventable extremist sect transformed into a violent insurgency, a cross-border terrorist franchise, and a regional menace,” the statement asserted, adding that for Obasanjo to now “issue public lectures is not just ironic, it is reckless.”

The government described current critics as “hypocritical and ignoble,” arguing they “ignore the hard truth” that Nigeria faces a multilayered terrorist ecosystem. This ecosystem, it detailed, includes internationally designated groups, ISIS and al-Qaeda-linked franchises, local violent extremists, and criminal-terror hybrids who collaborate across borders.

While firmly rejecting the notion of subcontracting security, the Presidency affirmed its commitment to international cooperation, noting existing collaboration with the United States and other allies is crucial to confronting the transnational nature of the threat.

“Nigeria will cooperate internationally, yes, but it will not surrender its sovereignty because someone who once had the chance lost his nerve,” the statement concluded, framing the current administration’s struggle as confronting a legacy of past inaction.