Hon. Denen Igbana is the Senior Special Assistant to Governor Samuel Ortom on Security. He speaks exclusively to Time Nigeria shortly after the Joint Benue/Taraba Security Council meeting held at the Benue Peoples House recently.
Sir, there are growing concerns that the people of Benue South have not submitted a single pistol since the Amnesty Programme began, what is your take on this?
Well on the issue of Zone C, the governor has pleaded that all those with illegal arms should submit them and get rehabilitated by government. As for Benue South that you mentioned, there is no big deal. The governor is not specific on a particular zone that will return arms. He called on the teeming youths of Benue in possession of prohibited fire arms to return them to government and embrace amnesty. So, he is not specific on a zone but I do know that the responses so far are coming from Zones A and B so for Zone C, what we know is that whether you store arms or not, once the amnesty expires and it is discovered that you have fire arms and you refuse to return it, the law will take its cause, so nobody is going to search anybody for arms, it is a voluntary return of arms so the issue of this zone has not submitted arms does not arise, the law will take its cause at the expiration of the amnesty.
Sir, recently, a retired Commissioner of Police, Alhaji Abubakar Tsav, condemned the amnesty programme, alleging that it was a ploy by the governor to provide a soft landing to some of the youths he used to prosecute his elections in April. How would you react to this?
That allegation is baseless. Abubakar Tsav is known for such activities, first, it was the former governor of the state and now Senator of the Federal Republic, Dr George Akume, and you will recall that he did all he could to rubbish the regime of Akume throughout the eight years that he held sway as the governor of this state. During the Suswam era, well I can’t tell you what went on between the two of them but frankly, much was not heard of him for reasons only himself can explain. For Governor Ortom, Abubakar Tsav started insulting and saying all kinds of rubbish which calls to question the objectivity of his criticism of this administration. Ghana (the militant leader) and his group embraced amnesty after concerted efforts by all concerned beginning with the governor. So, what Abubakar Tsav is alluding to is completely baseless, we all know him and his utterances on every human being. It is not new and this government will never be distracted by such unwarranted and baseless allegations. As an elder statesman that Abubakar Tsav is, one would expect him to be playing an advisory role to people in government instead of trying hard at all times to pull them down. He should be seen trying to proffer solutions to nagging issues, issues that will tend to bring about development to the state; issues that will avail job opportunities for our people as someone who served the country at a very high level. That is the role his contemporaries are playing in their respective communities and is expected of him to follow suit instead of heaping abuses on his younger ones in government all the time. The governor is very sincere about this amnesty and by the grace of God the desired results would be achieved at the end of the day.
Sir, shortly after the submission of 84 weapons by Ghana and his group, a police station was allegedly attacked in Ugba, Logo Local Government Area, where arms were said to have been carted away. What does this portend for the programme?
Yeah, I am quite aware that a police station was ransacked in Ubga but for other details, I may not be very competent to speak about that because, that is the work of the Police Commissioner and it is left for him to investigate and unravel the situation. I am quite sure that the police are investigating the matter and as soon as possible we will be briefed on what actually took place there.
These arms so collected, will they be handed over to the police or what are they going to do with them?
Well, I am not competent to speak on that as well. It is the duty of the governor and the State Security Council to decide what to do with the arms at the end of the amnesty period. So, I am not in a good position to speak about what will happen to the arms.
Your advice to Benue youths on the issue of thuggery and other social vices
My advice to the youths of Benue state is that they should embrace the amnesty programme. No nation, no state nor community progresses where there is proliferation of arms, where there is anarchy, where youths carry arms to go and kill indiscriminately. No community, no local government progresses in the midst of these. We can only have development in the state if our teeming youths embrace this amnesty programme by turning in their arms so that the government will give them back up, so that they can have permanent trade and earn their living instead of going about with arms intimidating, maiming and killing people. I will advise all youths of Benue to return their arms so that we can make progress. The governor has promised to create an enabling environment for Medium and Small Scale Enterprises to thrive and I would want these youths to rather key into this agenda and get government encouragement so that they can engage themselves in more meaningful ventures and live better lives.
