Abductions: Some sub-regional forces conspiring against Nigeria’s stability — Presidency

The Presidency has fingered some sub-regional forces for the escalating incidents of kidnapping of students and other security glitches in Nigeria.

Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, alleged that some sub-regional forces were “actively conspiring” against the stability of the country during an interview on TVC news late Sunday.

He, however, assured that the Federal Government is “responding” to the conspiracy of these sub-regional forces.Recall that last Thursday, bandits abducted no fewer than 287 pupils/students from a primary and secondary school at Kuriga, a community in Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna State.

Days later, bandits also abducted some Tsangaya students at Gidan Bakuso in Gada LGA of Sokoto State. Tsangaya is a school that combines Islamic and Western education.

Speaking on the spate of kidnappings in the country, Ngelale said President Bola Tinubu is working hard to secure all parts of the country, noting that the US government had promised to provide assistance for the release of the abducted Kaduna school children.

The Presidency spoke as the Pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, urged President Tinubu to go after sponsors of terror.

Also, experts against financial crimes drawn from Anglophone member states of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, and the Intergovernmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa, GIABA, yesterday, called for concerted efforts against terrorism financing and money laundering.

Meanwhile, on a day bandits demanded N40trillion ransom for 16 abducted Kaduna residents, one of the kidnapped students in Kuriga, Mustapha Abubakar, who escaped, narrated his ordeal in the hands of their captors, saying he stealthily hid in a shrub like a snake and escaped, while they were being moved by the bandits.Sub-regional forces conspiring against Nigeria’s stability

Speaking on the conspiracy against Nigeria, Ngelale said: “Across the North, we understand that some of the sub-regional geographical forces are actively conspiring against the stability of the Nigerian nation.

We are responding to it. We are doing it in a way that is concerted with our neighbours.

“It is worth noting that the United States government has also pledged its assistance to ensure that there is a full return of all school children, who were kidnapped recently in Kaduna.

“We will continue to intensify our collaboration not only within the region but internationally to make sure that some of the regional actors that are conspiring against our nation are brought to justice and ultimately silenced for the future of our country.”

Go after sponsors of terror, Afenifere tells Tinubu

Reacting to the recent kidnapping of school children in Kaduna and Sokoto states, Afenifere, in a statement by its Publicity Secretary and Deputy National Publicity Secretary, Mogaji Gboyega Adejumo and Prince Justice Faloye, asked the President not to leave room for excuses.

Lamenting the rising wave of insecurity, Afenifere said: “The recrudescence of this human tragedy is as clear to the Afenifere as the daylight is distinct from the eventide.

“Since democracy took off, this pattern remains constant, ever present; create chaos, destabilize the government, embarrass the President, finally, and disgrace the President out of office.‘’

No president since 1999 has escaped this scourge, coming with the political Sharia against Obasanjo, the Niger Delta violent political agitation of Obasanjo and Yar’Adua and cleverly solved by the duo; the Boko Haram religion-later-turned-political instrument to embarrass a sitting Southern Christian president as it was with Jonathan, who was told to convert to Islam, followed by the kidnapping extraordinaire of the Chibok girls’ type, the final straw that shocked Jonathan out of office.

“The Abikus, coming once a regime and for repeated times from as far back as the Zango-Kataf crisis, come with land-grabbing, human displacement and subjugation of a people over another, often planned, aided, lauded and prompted by those self-styled as owners of Nigeria.“

They were terrorists; Buhari curiously preferred to call them bandits. Their acts as aggressors, killing farmers, destroying their produce, and stealing indigenous peoples’ lands, clearly marked them as terrorists.

“Buhari’s government would rather term these acts as farmers/herders clashes. The most disturbing expository, elucidatory, explicative reality about the whole saga is that these terrorists are known to the government.