• Kaduna offers education, healthcare to hoodlums in new peace initiative

Member representing the Agwara/Borgu Federal Constituency of Niger State, Jafaru Mohammed Ali, has escaped being shot by bandits after they opened fire on his convoy while touring his constituency yesterday.

However, six soldiers drafted to provide security for the convoy were killed in the gunfire.  The bandits, numbering over 50, were said to have been armed with sophisticated weapons and laid an ambush for the convoy at the Kuble community along Babanna Road.

The lawmaker and his civilian staff escaped unhurt during the attack. The incident occurred a few meters from the Kainji National Park, where bandits have seized control and occupied for nearly two years now.

The lawmaker and other members of his entourage were later evacuated to Babana town after the military mobilised a reinforcement team.
IN another development, the Kaduna State government has offered bandits access to education, healthcare, and livelihood opportunities instead of cash incentives as part of efforts to end years of killings and kidnappings in the state.

The Commissioner for Information, Ahmed Maiyaki, stated this yesterday during a one-day workshop on “Peace Journalism,” organised by Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Kaduna State Council, in collaboration with Global Peace Foundation Nigeria and the Kaduna State Ministry of Information.

Maiyaki explained that the initiative, known as the Kaduna Peace Model, was designed as a shift from “confrontation to conversation”, aimed at building peace through dialogue and development instead of financial appeasement.

EQUALLY, farmers in Zamfara and Sokoto have appealed to the Federal Government to deploy more security personnel to protect them from bandits’ attacks, which threaten their harvest.