No Going Back On March 2022 Deadline For Military To End Insurgency, Banditry — Lawmaker

The Federal Government has mandated the Nigerian Armed Forces and other security agencies to eradicate insurgency and other acts of criminality bedeviling the country.

This was disclosed at the weekend, by the Chairman, House of Representative Committee on Defence, Babajimi Benson, during an interview with journalists, at the Passing Out Ceremony of the Nigerian Armed Forces Resettlement Centre Trainees Course 2/2021, held at the resettlement centre, Oshodi, Lagos.

To meet this deadline, he disclosed that payment had been made for inventories, both software and hardwares . He also disclosed that the proposed Armed Forces Support Trust Fund would go a long way to providing needed platforms to eradicate insurgency and its likes in Nigeria.

According to him, “there is a March 2022 deadline for Armed Forces to eradicate all these insurgents and the likes. Payments have been made for inventories, both software and hardware, it will take time for them to come into Nigeria.

“The Armed Forces support trust fund was moved by me, it is my bill and we are currently at the 3rd phase which means that we want to consider a report that we wrote, then we will sign up and send it to the Senate for concurrence. “When we resumed, we worked on the PIB, Electoral Act, very soon we will get to that bill”.

He said poverty and climate change, forced herders to move their cattle from the North to the South, describing this as the main cause of insecurity in the country.

To address this, he said,”We, the political leaders, have to fashion out economic development programs that would stop the breeding of people who are indoctrinated to do bad things. The government is trying to uplift 100 million people out of poverty. The plans are ongoing. The Federal government has about 870 projects that are going on at the same time. So in the fullness of time, insecurity will be reduced by economic activities”

He however kicked against amnesty for repentant Boko Haram member “People who have perpetrated crimes, those who I call terrorists should not be given amnesty, the full wrath of the law should be melted out on them,” he said.

“The retirees going into civil society and we have a lot of intelligence that they can give us to assist us in fighting insurgents. We want them to work for us as a source of intelligence and also try to sensitize the community on what the service has been and why the society needs to support us,” he said.

Vanguard