Follow Us on Google
From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
The Southern and Middle Belt Leaders’ Forum (SMBLF) has declared that insecurity across the nation was getting worse under the watch of President Muhamadu Buhari’s administration.
Leader of SMBLF/PANDEF, Edwin Clark, Leader of Afenifere, Ayo Adebanjo, President-General, Middle Belt Forum, Dru Bitrus, and President-General, Ohaneze Ndigbo, George Obiozor, in a communique issued at the end of its extraordinary meeting, said insecurity was not only worsening but having devastating impacts on the welfare and livelihood of ordinary Nigerians and called on the Federal Government to take urgent steps to stem the tide and assuage the suffering of Nigerians.
The Forum also denounced the spate of targeted terrorist attacks on churches and abduction of church leaders.
It condemned in strongest terms, the daring attack on St. Francis’ Catholic Church, Owo, Ondo State on June 5 by gunmen, killing no fewer than 40 people and injuring many other worshippers; describing as worrisome the hasty and doubtful conclusion by the Federal Government that the dastardly act was carried out by the Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP).
The Forum also condemned the incessant killings of indigenous peoples and decimation of communities in the Middle Belt region, in particular, the current escalated war on Southern Kaduna, targeting communities and Churches in Kajuru Local Government Area with reports of helicopters dropping weapons and supplies to terrorists in their locations.
SMBLF equally decried the continued confinement of victims of the Kaduna train attack in the terrorists’ labyrinth after 89 days as well as several other Nigerians who have been held by terrorists and criminals for months; calling on the Federal Government and security agencies to secure the safe release of all victims.
It warned that the ambiguity of the Federal Government and the failure of the security agencies to decisively deal with these situations, buttress concerns that officials of the Federal Government and security agents are complicit in the security anomalies in the country.
He warned that the continuous abdication of the Government’s primary and abiding constitutional responsibility of safeguarding the lives and properties of its citizens, is an irresistible signal to Nigerians to exercise their inalienable rights of self-defence, by all means, in deviance of extant laws, which have not deterred terrorists the use of weapons even superior to those of the security agencies.
