The Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, has debunked the recent reports claiming that 100 people were killed in one of the FCT area councils in Abuja, describing it as false and exaggerated.
Wike stated this during his recent live broadcast with selected reporters in his office.
He said, “We had our security council meeting where the Area Council chairman where they are members of the FCT security Council.
“Let me say something here. The security situation is not peculiar to FCT. Before now you are aware that some many states are aware that there are security challenges and they have complained about kidnappings and banditry, infact, i still don’t know where we have this report where over 100 people have been killed. That is not a tenable report.
“When you say 100 people, who are these 100 people that were killed? Some people exaggerate. I’m not saying that one or two persons were killed. To say that 100 people were killed, that is not possible. We must have to publish the information with facts and figures. As I came on board and as you know one of the priorities of Tinubu’s administration is security, protection of lives and property.
“No government can be serious if you cannot protect lives and property. And that is why for us we have to key in and reduce the level of insecurity in FCT”.
Fear has continued to grip many residents over the activities of criminals who disguise as commercial vehicle operators to attack and rob unsuspecting victims.
There have been reported cases of ‘one-chance’ robbery and kidnapping in Abuja for weeks.
A joint task force on cross-border crimes was set up last week to tackle the security menace called ‘one-chance’ robbery, with the involvement of all security operatives in the FCT.
The taskforce was constituted after a security meeting chaired by Wike.
The Minister attributed the rising crime in the capital city to illegal motor parks and uncompleted buildings used as dens by criminals.
He said, “We’re getting a lot of reports about kidnappings here, about one-chance there.
“In most cases we don’t even let the public to know what has been done. I can tell you the security agencies have done quite a lot. If not, by now, the FCT would have been a different thing.
“One of the areas we identified is that the FCT is at the centre – we have Niger State, we have Kogi State, we have Nasarawa State, we have Kaduna State. And if you check these four states, these four states are states that (experience) from time to time, banditry, kidnapping.
“And we discovered that most of the areas that they (criminals) stay are shanties and uncompleted buildings and that is why we say we cannot allow these uncompleted buildings where criminals have made their place of abode. Bring down all these uncompleted buildings which have turned to shanties and they will have nowhere to hide.”
The Minister added, “Just last week, we set up a task force on those states that we have borders with and one-chance. Joint security task force including the SSS, the police, the army, the navy, and they have identified the way they will operate.
“To tell you that we are concerned that is why we have to set up this joint task force for the one-chance and the border control.
“Again, you see a lot of illegal motor parks. When we come up with a policy that we can’t allow these illegal motor parks, people will come up to say the economy is hard, things are tough but nobody wants to look at it from the security implication.
“We are also planning to shut down some of these illegal motor parks.”
