A scheduled meeting between the Presidency and the South-West Governors on the Western Nigeria Security Network, Operation Amotekun, was called off on Tuesday.
The South-West launched operation Amotekun on January 9, in Ibadan, Oyo State, to help address the rising security challenges, particularly kidnapping and banditry, in Ogun, Osun, Oyo, Lagos, Ekiti, and Ondo States.
The South-West Governors, who made 120 patrol vehicles available to the Security outfit, had said that it would complement the Police and the Military, in terms of intelligence gathering.
However on Tuesday, last week, the Attorney-General of the Federation, AGF, Abubakar Malami, SAN, declared Operation Amotekun “illegal”,
He stated: “The setting up of the paramilitary organisation called Amotekun is illegal, and runs contrary to the provisions of the Nigerian law.”
A few days later, the Chairman of the South-West Governors Forum, Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN, said that the South-West would go ahead with the Security outfit.
Akeredolu, who is also the Ondo State Governor, revealed that the South-West would first seek a political solution to the problem, then go to court, if the first step fails.
However, Legal Luminary and Founder of Afe Babalola University, Ado Ekiti, Chief Afe Babalola, on Sunday, advised the South-West Governors to proceed with the implementation of Amotekun, and leave the Federal Government to challenge the matter in court.
