The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has called on security forces to adopt more effective strategies to end banditry and terrorism ravaging communities.
In a statement on Saturday in Kaduna, the forum condemned Thursday’s abduction of 287 school children and their teachers in LEA Primary School and Government Secondary, Kuriga, Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna state.
The statement signed by Prof. Tukur Muhammad-Baba, spokesperson of the forum, called for the immediate and unconditional release of the abducted children to their parents unharmed.
The forum also called for a regional multi-pronged strategy against terrorists operating in all contagious states.
“In these regards, the security forces should never dither or stay on the course of plain ineptitude and ineffectiveness that characterise the current strategy to contain and stamp out terrorism throughout the country,” Muhammad-Baba said.
The forum demanded the immediate deployment of new measures, including the much-discussed Special Schools Scecurity Scheme, the Schools Vigilante Force, and Anti-Kidnapping Squads across the terror-proned states.
It urged the federal government to “go beyond perfunctory directives to the security forces to rescue the abducted students.
“The federal government must go beyond bland and sterile directives to insist on results within specific time frames;
“ACF believes that the time has long passed when this terrorism is fully eradicated nationwide,” the statement said.
The forum said it is gravely saddened and exasperated at the news of the mass abduction of the school children by bandits.
“As ACF had observed in July, 2023, when students of the Federal University Gusau were abducted (and sadly still in captivity), these disturbing incidents point to the very parlous state of security in the country, and specifically that around school children, a defensively vulnerable population.
“ACF unequivocally decries and condemns the incidents in strong terms and hereby calls for the immediate and unconditional return of the abducted students and pupils, unharmed, to their parents/guardians…”
By John Shiklam in Kaduna
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