Dare Babalola
Former Vice President of Nigeria and a chieftain of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar has voiced alarm over the growing brazenness of bandits in the country, who allegedly continue to carry out attacks without facing consequences.
Atiku, who was reacting to the latest attack on the Kurmin Wali community of Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna State, spoke on Wednesday through his media aide, Paul Ibe
Atiku noted that it’s worrying that some states claim to have made peace deals with bandits, yet these criminals continue to attack communities and take hostages, showing no signs of abating.
According to him, “it’s colossally embarrassing to see non-state actors holding the country hostage and attacking people and taking hostages again and again unchallenged.”
He remarked that achieving deterrence is challenging when governors are resorting to negotiating with bandits, effectively begging for peace.
The former Vice President clarified that he’s not opposed to negotiations to end the violence, but won’t accept deals where bandits set the terms.
“Those peace deals always favour the bandits more than their victims and they have always fooled the government’s negotiators,” he said.
Furthermore, Atiku advised that the government does not have to wait until the bandits launch attacks before it responds to those attacks.
“Nigerians are no longer impressed by the powerful language of condemnation by the government. They’re more interested in results than rhetoric. Experience has shown that if rhetoric were enough to deter the bandits, the menace would have ended a long time ago,” he bemoaned.
The ADC chieftain stressed that the Tinubu-led APC administration must be held accountable for its own campaign promises to end insecurity in the country.
“Nigerians cannot be comforted by excuses. As a former opposition party, the APC held the then government in power to the harshest and merciless standards and therefore, the Tinubu administration must be held to the same standards,” he said.
