‘Even Senators Agreed Security Has Improved In FCT’ — Wike Says After Meeting With Lawmakers

The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has reiterated that there is marked improvement in the security situation of the FCT.

Wike said this while addressing journalists in Abuja on Wednesday, shortly after a closed-door meeting on security with the Senate at the National Assembly.

The minister had hunoured the lawmakers’ invitation to brief them on the security situation in the federal capital.

Wike said there has been a reduction in crime and criminalities in the FCT, noting that two of the most wanted kidnappers in the FCT were recently arrested.

While noting that it was impossible to put a total stop to crime and criminalities in any society, Wike assured that the FCT Administration, working with the security agencies, will continue to do its best to secure lives and property in the nation’s capital.

His words: “Even the Senators agreed that security has quite improved in the FCT. There is no part of this world where criminality has been eradicated completely.

“What we are trying to say is being able to limit or reduce the level of insecurity. But if anybody tells you that as a society is concerned, you will not have one form of criminality, that is not correct and we must have to tell ourselves the truth”.

Wike also disclosed that the kidnapping incidents in the FCT were sometimes stage-managed by unscrupulous elements in the society while assuring that the security agencies will continue to ensure that kidnapped victims were released.

According to the Minister, “The kidnappings you hear, sometimes, are stage-managed by people. There are some internal arrangements. Take for example, you have a housekeeper in the house, you have a driver who will plot to kidnap the child of their master. In that case, what do you want us to do? All we can do is to see how the person that has been kidnapped is released. But to stop it will be difficult because it’s an in-house arrangement, where a driver that is involved in bringing a child from school will mastermind the kidnapping”.

Speaking further, the Minister said, “I’m not saying that we don’t have kidnapping. Mind you, two most notorious kidnappers, we have gotten them and that’s why you see that the level of kidnapping has reduced.

“We are not saying that we have gotten where we want to be, but we are doing a lot and people must acknowledge that what used to be is not what we are seeing now and we will continue to do our best by providing the best for our people, but we cannot give you the assurance that there will be no form of criminality. Nobody can say that”.

In recent times, the FCT witnessed a significant rise in cases of kidnapping and attacks prompting the creation of a Special Intervention Squad to combat the situation.

At the height of the attacks, the senator representing the FCT, Ireti Kingibe had vowed to summon Wike and heads of security agencies over the spike in crimes in the nation’s capital.

“He should be able to tell us, the committee, and specifically me, that this is the plan for protecting the people of the FCT. Between him, the police commissioner, and the head of the DSS, they must have a plan,” Kingibe had said.