Governor Bala Abdulkadir Mohammed of Bauchi state has accused some local government officials of conniving with bandits to shortchange the people of the state, saying that anybody caught will face the full wrath of the law.
The Governor disclosed this at the new banquet hall government house Bauchi on Monday
According to the Governor, in recent times, there have been a surge in the activities of miscreants and bandits in some of the local government areas of the state, that has led to abductions, loss of lives and properties.
He said that the security situation in the state was becoming very worrisome as majority of the population of the state live in the rural areas, adding that if insecurity continues to thrives in the rural areas, it will definitely pose as a threat to the state.
According to him, “the chairmen of the local governments are the chief executives of their respective local governments. This insecurity, it would appear we have told them to be holding weekly meetings with their security agencies in their local governments, but they are not doing that and if they are not doing that, it has not been brought to my knowledge.I said that when I met with you, that I have been meeting with security agencies in the security council, you should also do that”
“We have been lending you support to run your security challenges, you are supposed to work with the security heads,Emirs, village heads, the vigilantes and the security agencies in your local governments, but you are not doing that.It is very unfortunate that the situation is deteriorating and everybody is looking up to the governor or the federal government,
“The Community engagement is the most important thing in this, most especially when there is a lot of incidence of connivance between local government officials, even state ministry officials and traditional institutions with the bandits to shortchange our people at the local level, this is unacceptable.
” We will no longer tolerate this, because there is nothing that is happening that we are not getting report from the DSS.It is either you are non-challant or sometimes forestry officers and those ministries responsible for settlements for forest reserves, they connive. I am letting you know that today, whoever connive and shortchange, will face the music.We are not going to allow this thing to continue.
He added, ” this insecurity is not happening in the vaccum, somebody will not just come from somewhere to insecure us. We have been adjourned as the secured state, but this is just a gimmick, we will no longer tolerate this. So, we are going to discuss on all these issues such as land speculations in the areas where our forest reserves are being destroyed, bandits come and take territorial possession, after being provided the right of way by you because the local government authorities are under you
