There’s a lot we don’t know about the State Security Service. They don’t call them secret police for nothing. Our changing clime, however, with the advent of social media is beaming light on aspects of their operations, which doesn’t reveal the full story enough for conclusion.

Growing up, I can’t but notice some fathers of my peers who goes away for months at intervals & occasionally spend weeks at home. They are mostly in jackets & even the family rarely talk about what they do. It is not until their full retirement that we hear they’re secret police.

These set of people hardly have friends that hangs around them. There is nothing like work colleagues at least from the few family events I have attended with these select families in review. Their career path hardly find them in touch with colleague let alone discuss operations.

In Secret Policing there is no such thing as quota system. It just doesn’t exist for obvious reasons. The DSS has many operational layers & employment is most often based on operational requirement which has nothing to do with federal character but mission specific needs.

I was privy to an enrollment of majorly Niger Delta operatives at some point & one could have thought the south was being rigged against itself but that was based on necessity as informed by requirement at the material time. There are other operations that focus on just women.

These are the last line of defense of our state. Our watchers on the wall if you like. Enrollment is not cast in stone or limited to book smart people or certain tribes. Security matters cover many parts of human endeavor in the bid to stop crime before they manifest.

There are students enrolled in universities like everyone else whose mission are State Security Service specific but you’ll never know this. There are traders in the market who don’t speak a word of English with specific assignment for state security. It’s deeper than it seems.

We can not endanger lives, compromise missions and expose our states to threats all in the name of appearing politically correct. It will be disingenuous for the SSS to have a skewed enrollment as this will be operationally disastrous. They’ve been losing operatives for a while.

It also goes without saying that the North is a hotbed of terror activities especially with the growing trend of banditry et al which must be understood beyond the physical engagement in order to operationally curb the proliferation. There’re several interventions under the radar

I will tell you for free that not many people who went for recruitment together eventually know who succeeded and who didn’t. It’s a difficult place to keep in touch or even understand how things run. I have a few juniors & even former school mates in the service. They’re ghosts!

Years back I had an opportunity to be a guest at the Presidential Villa. The team that received me was led by my secondary school colleague. This was in 2014/15. I never heard from him nor see him again until 2019 on a different assignment. He received me as well & disappeared.

His phone number is never available if he keeps them beyond each assignment. I don’t know if he is living or dead until fate brings us together again. There are others like that in the NE, who you can never track. So life within the SSS is not as plain as our press portrays.

Not withstanding, I believe the SSS can do better in press relations. The United State Department of State have social media handles and aspect of their operations involve citizens interaction. You can’t police people you don’t engage to an extent. We can do better.

The deficiencies in the bureaucratic layout of our DSS operations need fixing. They need public trust & the efficiency of their service is contingent on public perception. This is not to say that they’re immune to political influence in terms of leadership which is a handicap.

I believe things will change going forward & they’ll be more press friendly because this is essential to the protection of people, property & the state as a whole. They are not operating in the confines of the constabulary or protecting rulers from the ruled. They’re for us all.

I need to stress also that the DSS don’t recruit like the Police. Definitely not in hundreds but in thousands based on the requirement. Trainings are on all year round and units are being initiated and flagged off at different intervals. There’re sides to every story.

Not every DSS operatives wear black uniforms and carry scary weapons. The units are multilayered with counterintelligence, training, information distribution, and rewards to deter, detect, and neutralize threats to the State Department and related National interests.