PROFESSOR Jibrin Ibrahim’s column, “Nigeria in Trump World: The Dangers Ahead,” published on Friday, January 9, 2026 by National Record, presents a passionate critique of Nigeria’s recent security collaboration with the United States. Prof. Ibrahim frames the collaboration as an abdication of sovereignty and a dangerous submission to a neo-imperialist order.
While Ibrahim’s concerns over sovereignty, transparency, and the potential risks of foreign military intervention are legitimate and widely shared, his analysis, in my view, overlooks a fundamental and painful reality: the progressive failure of the Nigerian state to fulfil the most basic duty of any government, the protection of the lives and security of its citizens.
Prof. Ibrahim rightly questions why, if Nigeria possessed actionable intelligence, it did not act independently. The uncomfortable answer may lie in the well-documented limitations of our military: chronic under-resourcing, logistical failures, and, in some cases, compromised operational security. The choice may have been between allowing a critical terrorist target to exploit these vulnerabilities or accepting a time-sensitive, externally executed strike. This does not justify the lack of transparency or oversight, which remain severe and valid criticisms, but it helps explain the possible calculus of a government confronting relentless security failures found in systemic compromise.
For almost two decades, Nigeria has faced escalating internal terrorism, particularly in the North-East, with periodic outbreaks of devastating violence across the North-Central and other geopolitical zones. The response, as noted by Ibrahim, has too often been characterised by official condemnations, promises of action, and deployments of forces that have repeatedly proven unable to secure vulnerable communities.
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The social contract enshrined in Section 14(2)(b) of the Constitution, that “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government”, has been rendered tragically abstract for millions of Nigerians – those who have been slaughtered like animals, those in perpetual trauma, as well as the displaced and impoverished – by these mindless terrorist groups.
When a state cannot, over such an extended period, exercise its sovereign responsibility to protect its citizens, the very logic of that sovereignty is called into question. Therefore, Ibrahim, as an intellectual giant and professor of political science, ought to appreciate that sovereignty is not merely a legal principle to be asserted by a state or its citizens; it is a functional capacity to be demonstrated.
In this context, the Federal Government’s decision to seek and accept targeted external assistance, however fraught with risks, for the sole objective of eliminating forces that have relentlessly violated Nigeria’s territorial integrity may be viewed not as a casual abdication of sovereignty, but as a desperate acknowledgment of a severe capability gap.
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Prof. Ibrahim rightly questions why, if Nigeria possessed actionable intelligence, it did not act independently. The uncomfortable answer may lie in the well-documented limitations of our military: chronic under-resourcing, logistical failures, and, in some cases, compromised operational security. The choice may have been between allowing a critical terrorist target to exploit these vulnerabilities or accepting a time-sensitive, externally executed strike. This does not justify the lack of transparency or oversight, which remain severe and valid criticisms, but it helps explain the possible calculus of a government confronting relentless security failures found in systemic compromise.
Ibrahim’s historical analogies, while powerful, are not perfectly aligned with the present case. The situations in Venezuela, Iraq, or Libya involved overt regime change or large-scale invasion, fundamentally different from a targeted counter-terrorism strike reportedly requested by a sovereign government. A more relevant comparison may be the limited, intelligence-driven cooperation that has occurred elsewhere in the Sahel, where states with constrained air or precision-strike capabilities have partnered with external actors to degrade immediate threats.
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The core failure in the Nigerian case is not necessarily the act of cooperation itself, but the stunning absence of democratic governance surrounding it: no clear legal framework communicated to the public, no evident legislative oversight, and a deafening silence from the highest levels of political and military leadership. This governance vacuum is what truly “undermines Nigeria’s constitutional order,” as Ibrahim argues, and it predates this incident.
Additionally, Ibrahim’s nostalgic invocation of General Murtala Mohammed’s 1976 speech, while stirring, must be reconciled with the pragmatism that has always underpinned international relations.
Asserting independence has never precluded strategic partnerships. Even the “proud and assertive Nigeria” of that era engaged global powers based on national interest. The critical question today is whether such partnerships are structured on clear, mutually agreed terms that preserve Nigeria’s agency and prioritise the protection of its citizens, or whether they are entered into from a position of weakness and opacity.
Ultimately, Prof. Ibrahim’s greatest service lies in highlighting the profound crisis of accountability and strategic clarity in Nigeria’s security governance. However, to dismiss all foreign security cooperation as inherently “neo-imperialist” is to ignore the grim reality of a sovereignty that has, for many Nigerians, already failed in its primary duty of ensuring “the security and welfare of the people.” This is the lived reality of Nigerians residing in, or conducting legitimate business across, the North-East, North-West, and North-Central regions of the country.
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The path forward must involve a ruthless and transparent rebuilding of Nigeria’s security institutions to regain, or perhaps truly attain, autonomous sovereign capacity. Until that goal is achieved, while external cooperation must be rigorously scrutinised and legally constrained through transparency, civilian safeguards, and legislative oversight, it cannot be dogmatically rejected if it offers even imperfect protection of Nigerian lives in the immediate term.
For me, and for many vulnerable Nigerians who constitute the silent majority, the true danger ahead lies not only in external actors or “interesting times,” but in a Nigerian ruling elite that fails to either protect its people or honestly account for its choices to them.
Aar writes from Makurdi, Benue State capital, and can be contacted via ternaamos1984@gmail.com.
