The Senate has urged the Federal Government to urgently send
fighter jets to flush out terrorists behind the kidnappings and killings of
Nigerians from their hideouts.
The call was made on Tuesday during plenary in resolutions
reached following a point of order raised on the “Urgent need for the Federal
Government to take drastic actions to bring to an end the act of banditry and
kidnapping in Faskari Local Government Area.”
A statement by Senate President Ahmed Lawan’s spokesman,
Ezrel Tabiowo, said Senator Bello Mandiya raised the point of order.
Relying on Orders 41 and 51 of the Senate Rules, Mandiya
noted that the act of banditry and kidnapping has become a daily incidence in
Katsina with the huge consequences of loss of lives, means of livelihood and
displacement of communities.
The lawmaker recalled that “on Sunday, 31st January 2022,
gunmen struck Ruwan Godiya a Community in Faskari Local Government Area of
Katsina State where 38 members of the community were kidnapped.
He stated that the Federal Government had made frantic
efforts in curbing the menace by setting up Operation Sharan Daji and
Inter-Agency Task Force to tackle cases of banditry, cattle rustling and
kidnapping in Katsina state.
“Worried that the continuous security challenges and related
attacks by bandits on towns, villages and communities in Faskari Local
Government Area have meted untold hardship on the people and have subjected the
affected areas under serious survival threat.
“Further worried that if this menace is not drastically and
promptly addressed, the consequence is going to be huge on food sufficiency
since the affected communities are mostly farmers”, Mandiya said.
Contributing, Senator Kabir Abdullahi Barkiya, faulted the
inability of the military to contain the situation despite several calls for it
to act.
The Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, in his remarks, said the
repeated cases of kidnappings and killings makes it imperative for the military
to “wake up” to protect Nigerians.
He wondered why a full-scale action was yet to be carried
out by the military in spite of increased funding for security in the 2022
budget by the Executive and National Assembly.
He said, “The expectation of their Senate is that there is
supposed to be a remarkable difference in success in terms of the fight against
insurgence, banditry and militancy in Nigeria.
“The military is getting better funding from the government
and what we expect is to see an improvement in output.
“I know the resources are not enough, but recently for one
and a half years, the government has upscaled the level of funding for our
military.
“Secondly, when we declared the bandits as terrorists, my
understanding was they are going to be dealt with ruthlessly now. I wonder
whether that is the case.
“The military, like some of our colleagues, I have said,
need to wake up. We want to see a difference because we have made a difference
in terms of funding.
“I know funding alone will not be enough, but funding can
make a difference and we expect a difference in the outcome.
“Thirdly, we need to mobilise our citizens, because when a
hundred people are kidnapped and abducted, they are not taken by aircraft, they
are taken by motorbikes, pass through the villages and possibly towns, how come
do we then say that nobody has seen something?
“We need our citizens to be part and parcel of our security
architecture. In fact, there’s no way we can achieve better security for this
country without the participation of the citizens in the fight against
Insecurity.”
Accordingly, the Senate urged the security agencies to comb
all known hideouts of the kidnappers in a bid to rescue the 38 persons abducted
by the gunmen in Ruwan Godiya.
It also called on the Federal Government to send enough
military personnel and fighter jets to apprehend the bandits and restore
normalcy in the affected areas.
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