CDD demands unconditional release of pupils
The Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mohammed Adamu, has assured the nation of the safe return of all abductees in the recent attack on Government Science College (GSC), Kagara in Rafi Council of Niger State and related incidents.
Adamu, in a statement by Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO), Frank Mba, said a joint massive search-and-rescue mission involving the police, the military and other law enforcement agencies is ongoing to ensure that all abducted persons were rescued unhurt and reunited with their families.
“To give impetus to the rescue operation, the IGP has ordered the deployment of additional tactical, intelligence and investigative assets of the Force including four units of Police Mobile Force (PMF) attached to Operation Puff Adder II, one unit of Police Special Forces, personnel of the Counter Terrorism Unit (CTU) and operatives from the Force Intelligence Bureau and the Force Criminal Investigations Department. One Police aerial surveillance helicopter has also been deployed.
“The police component of the operation is being coordinated by the Commissioner of Police, Niger State, who is effectively harnessing all the deployed resources and working in sync with the military and other law enforcement agents in ensuring an intelligence-driven, focused and result-oriented ground and aerial surveillance in the rescue operations and to bring the perpetrators to book,” he said.
BUT the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has called for the unconditional release of the pupils. The centre also urged the Federal Government to declare a state of emergency on the ravaging insecurity across states of the nation.
Director of the organisation, Idayat Hassan, in a statement yesterday, asked the government and all relevant security authorities to do everything within their power to ensure the rescue of all the abductees.
Hassan noted that the continued abduction of school children from places of learning revealed that the Federal Government had failed in its role to protect the people, especially for school children in states across the nation. She lamented that kidnapping school children had become the easiest way for criminals to get money from the government.
The statement read in part: “From Chibok to Dapchi to Kankara and now to Kagara. This callous act of abducting school children has to stop. Our children and their parents cannot continue to live in fear in their pursuit of education and a better life.”
