Insecurity: APM Accuses Tinubu Govt Of Downplaying Killings, Kidnappings

The Allied Peoples Movement (APM) has accused the Federal Government of living in denial over its claim that insecurity has improved across Nigeria.

The opposition party said the reality on the ground was different, arguing that Nigeria’s security situation had worsened under President Bola Tinubu.

The APM National Publicity Secretary, Abubakar Yusuf, made the position known in a statement on Friday while reacting to comments by the Minister of Defence, General Christopher Musa (retd.), that security had improved in the country, Naija News reports.

The party described the minister’s claim as a dangerous distortion of reality, stressing that Nigeria was now ranked the fourth most insecure country in the world in the 2026 Global Terrorism Index (GTI).

According to the APM, Nigeria moved two places from sixth position in the 2025 index to fourth in the 2026 ranking.

Yusuf said it was ‘deeply disappointing’ that a minister of the Federal Republic would make such claims at a time when Nigerians were being killed, kidnapped, displaced and terrorized across different parts of the country.

He accused the Tinubu administration of being insensitive to the suffering of Nigerians facing killings, maiming, rape, abduction for ransom and detention by bandits in what he described as dehumanizing conditions.

The party claimed that more than 600,000 Nigerians had been killed, while no fewer than 2.2 million others, including women and children, had been abducted in the last three years of the Tinubu administration.

The APM also cited the recent abduction of about 600 Nigerians, mostly women, children and elderly people, from Dekera, Gidan-Zana and Sabon Gida communities in Niger State.

According to the party, the victims were still in captivity.

It further cited data from SBM Intelligence which, it said, showed that kidnapping for ransom had grown into a highly monetized criminal industry under the Tinubu administration.

The party said more than ₦7.78 billion was paid as ransom between July 2025 and June 2026.

“Our party is disturbed that the administration is either dangerously disconnected from reality or is deliberately attempting to manipulate public perception by denying the actual situation in the country,” Yusuf said.

The APM also accused the government of downplaying the seriousness of abductions, alleging that the administration had treated an act of terrorism as a family affair while affected families continued to suffer.

The party challenged President Tinubu, the Defence Minister and other senior officials in the Presidency to test their claim of improved security by travelling on Nigerian roads without armed security escorts.

“If the security situation has truly improved as the administration claims, the APM challenges the President, the Minister of Defence, and other senior officials of the Tinubu Presidency to travel by road without armed security details as other Nigerians must do,” the party said.

The opposition party maintained that insecurity was still worsening under the Tinubu administration, accusing the government of lacking the capacity to develop and implement a clear plan to tackle the crisis.

It said Nigeria could not afford another four years under what it described as a “hopeless and incompetent administration.”

The APM, however, urged Nigerians not to give up hope, asking them to remain committed to supporting its presidential candidate, Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde, in the 2027 election.

The party said Makinde was ready with a blueprint to tackle insecurity and other challenges facing the country.

The APM added that the lifespan of the Tinubu administration would end on May 29, 2027.