Katsina State Governor Aminu Masari briefed President Muhammadu Buhari in Abuja on Tuesday on socio-economic and security developments in the state.
Masari, who spoke with House correspondents at the end of the meeting, highlighted the need for northwestern states to renew their efforts by collaborating to address security challenges in the area.
He said, “I think the most important thing for us to be successful in fighting these bandits is that all of us, the states, especially the northwestern states, go to the trouble and work together to make sure we block all the loopholes.”
“But if one state has one policy and another has a different one, certainly (Bandits) will always move from one state to another.
“Fortunately, we are already working closely with neighboring states such as Nasarawa and Niger to bring the problem to a manageable and tolerable level.”
On the recent murder of one of his commissioners, the governor dismissed the media report that he was killed by bandits, saying the incident was purely a murder case.
“The incident we had last week had nothing to do with a bandit attack. It was purely a murder by unknown killers, which the police and other security agencies are working around the clock to unravel.
“My commissioner was killed by an unknown murderer and not a single pin was stolen from his home. You could see that it was a pure crime that must be thoroughly investigated so that we know the root causes and why, “he said.
According to the governor, the state is making progress in the ongoing fight against the activities of bandits and other criminals.
“I think if we talk about banditry, we have certainly seen some improvement; We cannot say that normality has returned, but there is an improvement.
“When we had a comparative analysis before the issuance of the security restraint order, what we saw in three months when we compared, was a drastic drop of more than 100 percent in terms of the rate of kidnappings, murders and their associated crimes. with banditry. .
“So the incident we had last week had nothing to do with banditry,” he said.
(YAYA)