Insecurity: Northern elders oppose markets, schools’ closure, others
The Northern Elders Forum (NEF) has kicked against some of the measures taken by some governors in the region to contain banditry.
The measures included closure of markets and schools, imposition of curfew, ban of cattle movement, shutdown of communications networks.
The Nigerian Communications Commission had ordered telecommunication companies to shut down their base stations in Zamfara State following incessant abductions of school children; Kaduna, Katsina and Niger States had suspended weekly markets.
Reacting yesterday, Director, Publicity and Advocacy, NEF, Dr Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, in a statement, said the measures would embolden the bandits to wreak more havocs.
He said the measures represent virtual economic and social lockdowns on people who had been at the mercy of criminals for a long time.
He said unless the measures were accompanied by an aggressive and effective assault on the banditry and kidnapping industry, “they’ll merely add to the misery and hopelessness of our communities”.
“Worse, they could further embolden the bandit and the kidnappers when it becomes clear that governments and security agencies cannot go beyond lockdowns on communities.
“Communities themselves will lose even more faith in the capacity of the Nigerian State to respond to their desperate circumstances. The perception that communities are on their own must never be allowed to take deeper roots, but it’ll, when people see only the bandit and the kidnapper winning.”
He urged the federal government to assist states to relieve communities living under additional pressures.
“State governments imposing additional hardships on communities must know that the measures they’re introducing must produce tangible results within a period that makes them meaningful and tolerable,” he said.
The Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Tanko Muhammad, will today interrogate Chief Judges of six states over issuance of conflicting orders.
The Chief Judges of Rivers, Kebbi, Cross River, Anambra, Jigawa and Imo States had been summoned.
Senior officials of the National Judicial Council yesterday confirmed that the CJN had demanded the records of proceedings in all the suits from which the conflicting ex parte orders arose.
The CJN has also summoned the Chief Judge of Delta State over last Thursday’s order removing the caretaker committee’s chairman of the All Progressive Congress and Gombe State Governor Mai Mala Buni.
He is also believed to be planning a meeting with the leadership of the Nigerian Bar Association later this week.