Insecurity: Zulum meets with foreign governors in Cameroon
Borno governor Babagana Zulum, on Monday, met with seven governors from Lake Chad Basin.
The meeting which was held Younde, Cameroon, focused on regional security cooperation and a path to improve stability.
The meeting had six governors in attendance: Zulum from Borno, Issa Lamine of Diffa in Niger Republic; Midjiyawa Bakari of Far North of Cameroon; Abate Edii Jean from North Region of Cameroon; Mahamat Fadoul Mackaye from Lac Province of Chad and Amina Kodjyana Agnes-Hadjer Lami also from Chad.
Governors from Adamawa and Yobe sent representatives.
In a statement signed by Borno governor’s spokesperson, Isa Gusau, on Tuesday, the meeting was organized by the Lake Chad Basin Commission, with technical support from the African Union, United Nations Development Programme and Crisis Management Initiative.
The meeting was hosted by the Cameroonian government in collaboration with the Lake Chad Governors’ Forum.
According to Isa Gusau, the meeting which was declared open by the Cameroonian Prime Minister, Joseph Dion Ngute, accompanied by the Mayor of Younde, Mr Luc Messi Atangana, discussed security issues with a focus on terror attacks and humanitarian impacts in the region.
The meeting also reviewed the implementation of strategies for regional stabilization, which were adopted in 2019, during a similar meeting in Niamey, Niger Republic.
Governor Zulum in his contributions, tabled Borno’s position, calling on the need to drastically raise the level of trans border cooperation on security before strategic and territorial action plans can work.
“All these territorial action plans can never be feasible without security, the first thing that we need in the entire region is to address security issues. Especially on the shores of Lake Chad.
“It is necessary to undertake holistic security operations in the shores of Lake Chad in order to clear the insurgents, otherwise, we are not going anywhere”, Zulum noted.
Zulum expressed great concern over the non-utilization of Lake Chad Basin’s shore which he noted, can provide huge economic potentials to benefit the people of the region.
The governor called on member states to engage in identifying and addressing the root causes of the Boko Haram crisis and combine measures other than military operations.
