SECURITY CHALLENGE: VESTED INTERESTS AFTER IGP – YERIMA

Alhaji Yerima Shettima – National President, Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, said that it has come to their notice that certain vested interests in the country were after the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris for selfish reasons.

Alhaji Yerima in a press statement stated that the IGP’s uncompromising war on crime and speedy standardization of the Force operations, was bound to create envy and deliberate misunderstanding by the mischievous interest groups in the country.

Consequently, the Arewa Youths Consultative Forum wishes to make the following observations:

1. We wonder why those trying to set President Buhari against the IGP pretend that there is a difference between Makurdi and Benue. This is how cheap propaganda starts.

2. IGP Idris may not have spent more than 24hrs in Makurdi because of the open hostilities shown to him and President Buhari during the stakeholders meeting by Gov Otom and his co-travellers in the latest anti-IGP campaign. They have conveniently forgotten that he spent more days at the 3 flash points of Goma, Logo and Rijiin, all of which are in the same Benue state.

4. It is also on record that since then, the DIG operations has been stationed in Benue from where he is briefing the IGP. The IGP went the extra-mile to blaze another trail, by stretching his operations to Nasarawa State, which also has IDPs. The IGP visited the Nasarawa and addressed a stakeholders meeting right there, before returning to Abuja to brief the President on the eve of the Armed Forces Remembrance Day.

5. It is not only mischievous but wicked to say the IGP disregarded the President’s directive.

6. For the records, we wish to categorically state that the IGP has blazed a trail in policing Nigeria, in addition to introducing a culture of professionalism in the Force. Therefore, we admonish President Muhammad Buhari to re-consider the possibility of sanctioning his IGP on the basis of systematic propaganda by Gov Ortom and his co-travellers. It is our conviction that President Muhammad Buhari would to well to ignore the politically-motivated rantings of vested interests by refusing to sack a hard working gentleman who is set to break record in policing Nigeria and introducing cutting-edge police operational strategy for our nation. This is candid advice for the President.