By OLA AJAYI

IBADAN—IMMEDIATE past Chief of Army Staff,COAS, General AbdulRahaman Dambazau (rtd), said, yesterday, in Ibadan, that it was not possible for democracy to be successful in the country without good governance.

The ex-army chief said this in a keynote address  at the ”Round Table on Security, Good Governance and Sustainable Development” organised by Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, CEPACS, University of Ibadan.

Describing the two phenomena as siamese twins that are not easily separated, he said, “Good governance and democracy are inseparable to the extent that the latter cannot be successful without the former.”

By implications, he said, “good governance is what fertilises the growth of democracy because all the democratic ingredients of transparency, accountability, public and civil society participation among others are found in it.”

To him, there cannot be sustainable human development without good governance and neither can security be guaranteed without sustainable human development which are all by-products of good governance.”

According to him, good governance requires strong democratic institutions and democracy survives on strong institutions, therefore the need for it to be well institutionalized.

It is when democracy is well entrenched with strong institutions, that there can be likelihood for effective, efficient and sustainable policies.

Earlier, in his opening remark, the University of Ibadan Vice-Chancellor, Isaac Folorunso Adewole who was the chairman of the occasion lamented about the level of insecurity in the country and said that unless poverty is tackled, solution to the problem may nt be easily achievable.

The don said, “we must collectively offer hope to the youths and Nigerians in general to make people live and not die for Nigeria”.

Apparently saying hopeless youth would not think twice before taking up arms, he noted, “when there is no hope, it is not difficult to become suicide bombers as we presently have in some of our youths in some parts in the Northern area of the country”.