The Kogi West Senator, Sunday Karimi, is confident that the upsurge in insurgency and banditry across the country is nothing but a passing phase in the nation’s evolution.
Receiving his constituents from the seven Local Government Areas (LGAs) that make up his district, who had visited him at the weekend in his Abuja home on the occasion of his third year in office, Karimi said he believed that the situation would blow over and become a footnote in the nation’s history, adding that efforts to destabilise the country and unsettle its democracy would fail.
The Senator, who is the Senate Committee Chairman on Services, observed that what Nigeria was experiencing was ‘orchestrated and targeted embarrassment to unsettle the administration of President Bola Tinubu and distract it from its set objectives’.
According to him, local miscreants and their foreign collaborators are intent on bringing the administration to its knees. This, he noted, has informed simultaneous, sporadic, and asymmetric assaults on the country from different parts of the country, precipitating fear.
About three weeks ago, schoolchildren and teachers numbering 45 were kidnapped in Esinele and Yawota in Ori-Ire LGA of Oyo State, while a former Director of Defence Information, Major General Rabe Abubakar (rtd.) and his wife were abducted in Matazu LGA of Katsina State.
In recent weeks, security breaches have also been reported in Benue, Plateau, Kogi, Kwara and Ogun, among other states, heightening apprehension. Security personnel have risen to the occasion in several instances to repel such attacks and neutralise the vagrants.
In the evening of Saturday, 6 June 2026, Mrs Olaide John-Paul, younger sister of a former Minister of Power, Chief Adebayo Adelabu, and her twin sons, who were kidnapped in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, 72 hours earlier, were rescued by the police. Two of their abductors were neutralised in the operation.
Also, a combined operation between the Nigerian Army and their Beninese counterparts routed a platoon of insurgents terrorising parts of Niger State during the week, and impounded many of their weapons and operational equipment.
This is as Nigerian and United States troops sustain the decimation and degradation of Boko Haram elements, and fighters of the Islamic State of West Africa Province, and that of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
Karimi commended President Tinubu for maintaining focus on rooting out insecurity from the country, and alluded to efforts to fast-track the establishment of state police. He equally applauded the President for his sensitivity towards ensuring a broader spread of the nation’s security and defence forces to ensure adequate coverage.
‘Our security services deserve every commendation. Enemies of the country are getting more wily, more daring, more ruthless by the day, but our compatriots at arms are spreading thin to protect our country. And Mr President is giving every possible support in the national interest’, he said.
Karimi expressed optimism that the schoolchildren abducted in Oyo State, and Mussa in Borno State, which happened almost concurrently, would be rescued and reunited with their families. He further said: ‘We are all pained and agonised by the unfortunate development. Those of us in government are parents, and we feel the sleeplessness of parents and families involved. Government is on top of the situation and every effort will be made to safeguard every Nigerian’.
He applauded the synergy between the various arms of the security and defence architecture, which he acknowledged is directly proportionate to the successes recorded in national efforts to ensure security.
The leader of the visiting delegation, Hon. Abdulganiyu Salaudeen, commended Karimi for his efforts in the development of the senatorial district over the past three years.
A former council chairman and member in the state House of Assembly, Salaudeen observed that Karimi had acquitted himself creditably over the last three years of representing Kogi West in the Senate.
He commended him for proactively supporting efforts to curtail insecurity in the zone, while also striving to rehabilitate the arterial Kabba-Isanlu-Egbe-Ilorin road, which is central to the socio-economy and security of the zone.
Salaudeen conveyed the prayers and good wishes of the zone to the All Progressives Congress, President Tinubu and Karimi in the emerging political process.
