Kaduna, Nigeria – December 1, 2025 – Governors from Nigeria’s 19 northern states and prominent traditional rulers on Monday held a crucial meeting in Kaduna, issuing a strong, unified demand for the immediate establishment of state police to combat the region’s spiraling insecurity.
The high-level summit, hosted by Kaduna State Governor Uba Sani and chaired by Gombe State Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya, brought together all 19 northern governors (or their deputies), the Sultan of Sokoto, Muhammadu Sa’ad Abubakar III, who heads the Northern Traditional Rulers’ Council, and chairmen of the 19 state traditional councils.
In a detailed communiqué released at the end of the closed-door session, the leaders declared that Nigeria’s centralized policing system has completely failed to protect citizens in a country whose population is projected to exceed 237 million by the end of 2025. They described vast rural areas across the North as “ungoverned spaces” where bandits, kidnappers, and insurgents operate with near-total impunity.
Governor Uba Sani, in his opening remarks, said the creation of state police is no longer negotiable. He highlighted the acute shortage of personnel in the Nigeria Police Force, which has only about 371,800 officers nationwide — resulting in a police-to-citizen ratio far worse than the United Nations’ recommended standard of one officer to 400 citizens. “Many of our rural communities have no police presence at all,” he said, adding that the current structure cannot respond quickly or effectively to local threats.
Sani also pushed back strongly against critics who accuse northern governors of complacency. “Nothing could be further from the truth,” he stated. “We have been working day and night, but the tools at our disposal are inadequate. State police will give us the agility and local intelligence we desperately need.”
Governor Inuwa Yahaya echoed the sentiment, stressing that insecurity in the North affects every community regardless of religion or ethnicity. He praised President Bola Tinubu for recent successes, including the rescue of over 200 abducted schoolchildren in Niger State, but insisted that long-term stability can only be achieved through decentralized, community-responsive policing.
The leaders identified deep-rooted socioeconomic factors fueling the crisis: extreme poverty (affecting over 70% of the population in many northern states), widespread illiteracy, the presence of more than 10 million out-of-school Almajiri children, youth unemployment approaching 40%, and climate change-driven resource conflicts that have shrunk arable land and intensified farmer-herder clashes.
A particularly bold proposal in the communiqué called on President Tinubu to direct the Minister of Solid Minerals Development to impose an immediate six-month suspension of all mining activities across northern Nigeria. The leaders described illegal and unregulated mining — especially of gold and other high-value minerals — as a major funding source for armed bandits and terrorist groups. They demanded a comprehensive audit and revalidation of all mining licenses to break the financial backbone of criminal networks.
The meeting condemned the continuing wave of mass abductions, bandit attacks, and killings in states including Zamfara, Katsina, Sokoto, Niger, Kebbi, and Borno. The leaders extended condolences to victims and commended security forces for their sacrifices, while reiterating that military operations alone cannot substitute for proactive, intelligence-led policing at the state and local levels.
Traditional rulers pledged to deepen community engagement and use their moral authority to mediate disputes, promote peace education, and support deradicalization efforts. The forum committed to regular peer-review mechanisms among governors and closer collaboration between political and traditional institutions.
Insecurity, the communiqué concluded, is an existential threat that requires urgent, decisive, and collective action.
The northern leaders directed all federal and state lawmakers from the region to prioritize constitutional and legislative amendments needed to establish state police without further delay. They warned that history will judge the current generation of leaders not by roads or hospitals built, but by whether they succeeded in restoring peace and security to the people.
As the meeting ended, the sense of urgency was unmistakable: the North, long described as Nigeria’s food basket and demographic heartbeat, is at a breaking point. The governors and emirs left Kaduna with a shared resolve to transform words into swift, tangible action — beginning with the rapid creation of state police forces across the federation.
