Presidential Villa security: Soldiers take over from DSS

Kunle Awosiyan |

The Nigerian Army has taken over the security of the inner perimeter of Presidential Villa, Abuja from the Department of State Security Service, DSS.

This was revealed on Wednesday when the Aide de Camp to the President, Lt. Col Abubakar Lawal ordered personnel of the DSS out of the villa.

However the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, described the development as realignment of security around the President which entailed that members of the armed forces would man the inner perimeter of the President security while operatives of the DSS would man the outer perimeter.

To this effect, Hallmark Newspaper learnt that some members of the armed forces had been drafted from the Infantry Corps to the villa to man all the strategic points.

“The president prefers the soldiers to provide security rather than DSS. That is why men of the DSS have been directed to handover to the soldiers and move to outside perimeter,” a source said.

The directive, however, almost caused an altercation between the army and men of the DSS whose chain of command is different.

It took the intervention of the Chief Security Officer who directed his men to “stand down,” a euphemism for complying with the directive of the ADC.

According to a soldier who was present at the incidence, “the ADC directed that they should hand over to us and leave the villa. We have now taken over fully as directed by the ADC and we are in charge.”

Already, military personnel have taken over all the strategic points at the villa with a firm instruction that no DSS personnel should be allowed into the villa.