Banditry: Troops comb forests in Northwest

In its bid to flush out bandits and other criminal elements in the Northwest sub-region, troops of Armed Forces of Nigeria have bombarded major forests in the zone in pursuant to the Presidential directives to the Service Chiefs, to up their games in fighting the criminals.

The Coordinator, Defence Media Operations, Maj. Gen. John Enenche, who disclosed this to journalists in Abuja during weekly briefing on the military operations across the country between November 19 and 25, 2020, maintained that the end of bandits is near.

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Though, Enenche did not state the timeline for the defeat of the bandits, he however assured that “it is no longer a hopeless situation”, adding that various operations against the criminals have continued to “progress satisfactorily”.

He explained that the military was optimistic of ending the menace of banditry and insurgency following the stepping up of both kinetic and non-kinetic operations.

“In the aspect of where they got recruitment, it is now blocked. It is a success because it is intelligent-driven and information-driven. So, when I talk about very soon, I mean their end is near but to say a specific time, No!

“What we are doing, with the use of kinetics and the non-kinetics we’ve done, it will not be an endless thing, that there is no end to banditry. There is an end to banditry but the date it will end I don’t know,” Enenche said.

According to him, in Katsina State, the epicenter of the banditry, operatives of Department of State Service, Katsina State Command arrested a couple Usman Shehu and his wife Aisha Abubakar of Rimi Local Government Area of the State.

He noted that the suspects were intercepted at Abukur village conveying large cache of ammunitions to Katsina Metropolis including 14 magazines, 61 rounds of 9.6mm caliber ammunition and 399 rounds of 7.62mm Special ammunition.

He said troops would continue to sustain the onslaught on the bandits till they are completely eliminated, stressing that they no longer have capacity to recruit more members because they now “die in droves”.