The Global Awareness for Public Safety Foundation has advised ECOWAS against the use of the military to return Mohammed Bazoum, the democratically elected President of the Republic of Niger.
The Director-General of the group, Chuks Alozie, said in Abuja on Friday, that the use of military action would result in a breakdown of regional peace, law, and order in the country which would be detrimental to the people and other surrounding countries.
“As an organization interested in the objective to create public awareness of the need for public safety, which guarantees peace, progress, and prosperity, the Global Awareness for Public Safety Foundation has carefully followed the call by ECOWAS for military action in the Niger Republic to return the country to civilian rule.
“GAPSF believes that the foremost concern for ECOWAS should be to promote a peaceful resolution of perceived discord between ECOWAS and Niger Republic.
“The Niger Republic is a sovereign nation, Nigeriens are at liberty to determine the type of government they want, and except for a case of internal strife or Civil War, ECOWAS is not to intrude on their process of regime change,” he said.
Alozie condemned the coup and added that it was pertinent to bear in mind the fragile peace in Niger and how war should not be an option in an attempt to return the country to a form of government acceptable to the West.
He advised ECOWAS to tread with caution on its intended forceful action in the Niger Republic, lest it would be seen as acting out of character of its status.
“Specifically, the Statute and Convention signed by members of ECOWAS are purely on cultural and economic integration and not political integration.
“Hence, the commission does not hold the power to insist and enforce democracy among its member states.
“As it stands, all the region along the Nigerian border with Niger are experiencing one form of insecurity, be it militant insurgency in the North-East and wanton banditry in the North-West with tens of thousands of Nigerian refugees being harboured in Niger.
“Adding war to this mix would only escalate and worsen the situation,” he said.
Alozie said beyond the lack of endorsement on the force action, Niger’s interlocked relationship and strategic location in the Sahel and Savannah regions, revealed any war-executed outbreak would be detrimental to others.
According to him, war will cause huge damage to human resources and the economic systems of the related regions, thereby introducing a situation of hunger and poverty for the Savannah and Sahel Regions of Africa.
“Northern Nigeria and other bordering nations around Niger will suffer great and devastating setbacks, socially, economically, infrastructurally and health-wise.
“It is our opinion that the present situation requires some element of public safety models that must be used to achieve order, primarily to restore peace, law, and order in that country.
“Caution is required to bring back peace in Niger, no war prosecuted anywhere in the world is cheap, when it starts those that fan the embers of the war will now realize that other international interests will come to play out.
“And it will enter into dimensions not earlier envisaged and the war will increase fire for a truce and peaceful negotiations will become difficult, while lives and property would have been wasted,” he said.
He advised ECOWAS to understudy the Ukraine and Russian Wars and see the economic damage it had caused globally, and the tragedy of wasting human resources that had been witnessed in the war.
Alozie said that the issue in Niger was internal strife which necessitated a condemnable coup d’état, however, it was still solvable using the right approaches.
He cautioned ECOWAS leadership not to create more problems in the region, but to rethink and redraw a strategy that would make the Sahel and Savannah safe and peaceful.
