Kaduna State Governor, Senator Uba Sani has described state policing as the only lasting solution to address the menace of insecurity ravaging the North and the country at large.
Sani stated this in an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics.
Bandits recently attacked the Gindin Dutse Makyali village of Kufana district in the Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna State.
The attack left 12 people killed and nine others brutally injured.
Speaking on the menace of insecurity, Sani said, ”In the last six months or thereabout, I have been insisting that we can only address the issue of insecurity if we establish state policing.
”I am happy that some few weeks ago some governors joined me in agitating for state police and it was a lone voice”.
”Some governors have also done a lot in the last few months by establishing or empowering the vigilance services”.
Governor Sani disclosed that normalcy had returned to the affected community and efforts were underway to rescue those abducted by the bandits.
He also noted that the measures employed by his comrades are ”temporary measures” at best.
The governor said, ”This can not and can never address the state of insecurity until we agree to collectively agree to establish state police immediately”.
Asked if he was looking to institute a local police network controlled by traditional rulers to aid in the fight against banditry, the governor was insistent that these forms of security outfits would be best suited to ”intelligence gathering and sharing all aimed at supporting other security agencies”.
”If you have vigilante service or vigilante groups or you have community policing, where is the law that allows them to carry AK-47”, he said.
The governor noted that the law hinders these groups from being well-equipped.
The federal government and the state governments had agreed that a state police force was necessary, marking “a significant shift” in approach, Information Minister Mohammed Idris told reporters after the meeting.
Both governments have also agreed on the need to set up state police to reinforce the more than 300,000-strong national police force in the country.
