Bauchi State Governor, Senator Bala Muhammed, has read the riot act to local government chairmen over a surge in the activities of miscreants and bandits in some parts of the state.
Governor Bala stated this on Monday at the new banquet hall government house, Bauchi when he led an extraordinary stakeholder meeting with council chairmen and some members of the State Executive Council.
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He expressed worry that despite the state being the most peaceful in the North East, in recent times, it has been experiencing a surge in the activities of miscreants and bandits, leading to abductions, loss of lives and properties.
He listed the affected LGs to include Alkaleri, Toro, Dass, Ningi, Ganjuwa, to some extent and Tafawa Balewa.
He accused the council chairmen of not holding weekly security meetings as earlier agreed since they are the chief security officers in their LGs.
Governor Bala 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, pointing out that if insecurity continues to thrive in the rural areas, it will definitely pose as a threat to the state
He said in some areas there are allegations that some traditional rulers, forestry officers and local government officials connive with bandits to shortchange the people of the state and any convince caught will be punish.
“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.
“This insecurity is not happening in the vacuum, 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 rights of way by you because the local government authorities are under you”, the governor said.
