Social media activist Martins Vincent Otse, popularly known as VeryDarkMan, has apologised to members of the military, police, Nigeria Customs Service and Nigeria Immigration Service over comments he made at the Nigerian Bar Association’s 66th Annual General Conference.
Otse offered the apology in a video posted on Friday, saying he had reflected on his remarks at the conference and acknowledged that they could have been unfair to security personnel risking their lives to protect Nigerians.
The activist had generated controversy during a discussion on insecurity at the NBA conference in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, after referring to military, police, immigration and customs personnel as “unknown gunmen”.
In his latest statement, however, Otse said he was not suggesting that all personnel within the security agencies were involved in criminal activities.
“I don’t think I was fair to a lot of people, particularly the speech where I said that the military are the unknown gunmen, the police are the unknown gunmen, you know, the immigration, the customs,” he said.
Otse explained that his comments were intended to draw attention to alleged corruption, information leaks and sabotage involving some individuals within the security agencies.
He said his remarks were particularly unfair to soldiers deployed to remote areas to combat Boko Haram and other security threats.
“That speech was not fair, especially to the soldiers that are in the bushes fighting Boko Haram to protect our lands, to protect our lives, and to protect our families,” he said.
According to the activist, his criticism was aimed at what he described as the “bad eggs” within the security forces, rather than the agencies as a whole.
He said he wanted the leadership of the various security agencies to pay greater attention to alleged internal sabotage and the leakage of sensitive information.
“My speech was not to discourage you. My speech was entirely to talk about the bad eggs in our security operative, our security forces, to put attention on the bad eggs, so that the leaders in these security settings will look inward and see that sometimes information are being leaked and their own people are sabotaging them,” Otse said.
He nevertheless acknowledged that his choice of words could have been interpreted as a blanket condemnation of security personnel.
“But by passing that speech, like I said, it seems like I was generalising and it’s not fair to the fallen soldiers,” he said.
Otse subsequently apologised to the Chief of Defence Staff and the leadership of the security agencies, asking that his message be conveyed to personnel serving in conflict-affected and remote areas.
“I really want to apologise for that speech, and I don’t want to discourage your boys. Please extend my apologies to your boys, to the ones that are in the bush protecting our lands,” he said.
He also extended the apology to police officers, customs and immigration personnel, as well as families of security officers who had died in the line of duty.
“To the families of these heroes that might have also felt offended by this speech, knowing fully well that their brother, their sister, their son, their husband fought and died for this country, I am really, really sorry,” he said.
Despite the apology, Otse maintained that corruption remains a problem within some security agencies. He stressed, however, that the agencies comprise both individuals he described as “bad eggs” and personnel who remain committed to protecting the country.
He added that corruption could be found among both senior and junior officers, while acknowledging the contribution of what he described as the many dedicated personnel serving Nigeria.
