Governor Aminu Masari has revealed that the security forces in the state are outnumbered by the number of bandits in the North West region of the country.
According to him, the Federal Government is not helping them enough in their fight against insurgency as the number of security operatives is quite underwhelming. He added that the state is planning on employing 3,000 trained vigilantes.
He made the disclosure while he received the Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed in the state to inspect the progress of the army against the bandits.
He said: “All the northern state governors intended to employ 3,000 trained vigilantes with the help of police, to arm them, but from the report I’m receiving from the current operations in Katsina State, the needed support is not given to the vigilantes.
“Let me digress a bit to address the military and the police. We’re trying to bring in vigilantes, trained by them, but they’re not giving them the necessary support.
“We have a situation in which these bandits are out numbering the security forces, when you have volunteer forces that you’ve trained, that are willing to assist you, but the support and response by the military and the police are not encouraging.
“Now, we’re recruiting additional 500 and the emirate council is recruiting 250, if they don’t have the conducive atmosphere to operate side by side with the military and the police, how can we succeed?”
Masari also spoke on the suspension of GSM networks in the State and had this to say.
“The suspension of GSM services, because the informants that invite bandits for kidnap or inform bandits to ambush military or police officers have been cut off.
“And also the demand for ransom normally through the GSM has drastically reduced. The banning of sales of petroleum products, along the border local governments in particular, except to designated filling stations which are allowed to sell a maximum of N5,000 to vehicles and to only operate in the day time.
“So, Honourable Minister, yes, we’ve closed markets, especially the selling of animals, banning of sales of second hand motorcycles in particular to some markets, and I think we’ll move further to all the markets in the state because we understand that it’s one source they use to buy motorcycles for their banditry and other insurgency activities.”
Source; Ghgossip.com
