The Nigerian Democracy Watch (NDW) has urged the Plateau State Commissioner of Police, Bartholomew Onyenka, to set as his priority the end of banditry “instead of wasting police resources” on the political disputes in the local government councils in the state.
The NDW, in a statement issued by its national coordinator, Imman Onyi, on Tuesday, June 20, said scores of attacks on the people of Plateau State have led to the death of about 500 persons in the last few weeks.
Noting that the capacity of the police may have been further reduced by the incursion into political engagements, the group urged the police to put its focus on securing lives instead of what it described as the phantom pursuit for political equilibrium.
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It said: “We are concerned that the police has deployed a sizeable proportion of its men to seal the local government secretariats on the plateau at a time these men should be involved in protecting lives and property.
“The seeming haste and efficacy by the police in deploying men to seal local government secretariats should rather have been used to arrest the bandits and marauders who have cut down the lives of nearly 500 people on the Plateau this year.
“While we commend the police on its efforts so far, we believe that the police will do better in redeploying its men from the local government secretariats to vulnerable areas on the plateau as an opening may have inadvertently been given to the bandits by this political deployment.”
It would be recalled that mobile policemen were deployed to all the local government areas in Plateau State following the suspension of the former chairmen by Governor Caleb Mutfwang upon the resolution of the State House of Assembly.
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