THE POSITION OF THE KATARI, AKILBU AND RIJANA COMMUNITIES ON THE PROPOSED RELOCATION OF THEIR COMMUNITIES FROM THE ABUJA – KADUNA HIGHWAY BY GOVERNOR AHMED NASIR EL-RUFAI OF KADUNA STATE
Gentlemen of the Press,
I have the singular honour and privilege of informing you with a deep sense of responsibility that we are here at the prompting of the Katari, Akilbu and Rijana communities to make a public statement in respond to a press release made by His Excellency Governor Ahmed Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State dated 19th May, 2022 while receiving the first quarter security report for the year 2022 at Sir Kashim House Kaduna.
Notably in the said public statement, His Excellency unambiguously accused three communities located on the Abuja – Kaduna highway (Viz: Katari, Akilbu and Rijana) of “alleged connivance with bandits to carry attacks on motorists plying the road”, and that his administration is exploring measures to take on the three settlements, either to relocate them to near Kagarko or clear the entire settlements” subject to deliberations at the state’s security council meeting.
Lamentably, our communities being law abiding and forward looking social entities are eminently miffed and appalled by the aforementioned unsavory pronouncements because they are inherently very damaging, injurious, misleading and volatile.
Resultantly, we deem it very compelling to make the following observations and recommendations in the overriding interest of clarity, probity and mutual understanding by the discerning public and other relevant authorities.
OBSERVATIONS:
To the best of our knowledge, our communities are not aware of the involvement of any of our members either directly or indirectly in any verifiable cases of banditry within and outside our communities. Thus the bogus allegation that we are collaborators of banditry is largely ruse, trivial and unfounded.
Our communities were not given the benefit of doubt or any fair hearing with a view to establishing the veracity or otherwise of the weighty allegations leveled against us prior to His Excellency’s damaging public statement.
CONSPIRACY FACTOR:
There are strong indications that some vested interests are bent on criminalizing our communities using all available possibilities at their disposal as could be seen below:
For instance, in 2019, there was a stage-managed incident in which some security operatives from the Nigerian Air Force faked the bursting of a kidnapping gang purportedly hibernating in the Katari community.
In the said fabricated incident, some of our unsuspecting youths were gathered at the GSS Katari play ground by the Air Force operatives under the pretence of staging a mock simulation exercise.
Curiously, these young innocent boys were made to raise their hands up in the air purporting to be under arrest. They were eventually lifted in two waiting helicopters and brought back after a few minutes flight around the community. For obliging their requests, the Air Force operatives gave all the youths that participated one thousand naira (N1000) each with the promise that they would be considered for recruitment into the Air Force during the upcoming recruitment exercise. To allay their doubt, they gave these youths two contact numbers to use in reaching out to them whenever the need arises (Please see the attached appendix 1).
Surprisingly by the evening time of that same day, the electronic and print media was awash with a News heading credited to Air Commodare Ibikunle Daramola (Director of Public Relations of the Nigerian Air Force) purporting that some notorious bandits were arrested in Katari village a supposed “Identified criminal hotspot” along the Kaduna – Abuja route during a routine simulation exercise.
Touchingly, pictures of these innocent young boys were brazenly displayed as the captured notorious bandits. Accordingly, the Katari Community Development Association through its President – Makeri Danjuma Mohammed circulated a refutal dated 13th February, 2019 (Please see the attached appendix 1).
Another clear manifestation of the conspiracy factor against our communities is the excessively skewed and corrosive media hype against our communities. This involves the deliberate misrepresentation of facts on ground purposefully to criminalize our communities and resultantly elicit or whip up negative public sentiments against our communities.
For instance, the recent terrorist attack on an Abuja – Kaduna bound passenger Train which occurred at a location close to Dutse village near Olam Farms within the precincts of Kaduna Town was deliberately twisted by many media houses both local and foreign to suggest that it occurred between Katari and Rijana villages. Some media houses and online news platforms specifically ascribed it to Katari village. In fact, there are several other instances of media misrepresentation of criminal occurrences on the Abuja – Kaduna highway too numerous to mention here in which our communities were willfully implicated either out of sheer ignorance or pure sinister motives.
Regrettably, the minds of many gullible members of the public have been conditioned to believe that every criminal occurrence on this highway is the handiwork of indigenes of either Katari, Akilbu or Rijana.
OUR PEOPLE ARE ALSO VICTIMS OF BANDITRY:
Contrary to the induced negative narratives from questionable sources and one-sided news vendors, the inhabitants of these communities have severally been on the receiving end of banditry. Records abound to show that many of our people have been kidnapped, raped, maimed or killed by these bandits or terrorists.
Shockingly, many of our farmers cannot access their farms these days while others have to pay levies to bandits before they could access their farms.
Presently, the village Head of Rijana (Mr. Ayuba Dodo Dakolo) and about 24 members of his community are in the hands of bandits. Similarly, twelve (12) members of the Katari Community including women and children are also in the hands of bandits.
In April this year (2022), a former secretary to the defunct Akilbu District Mr. James Abu was gruesomely murdered by bandits on his farm. In the same vein, Martina John was kidnapped from Katari village, gruesomely murdered and her body dumped near Sabon Gayan in Chukun LGA of Kaduna State. Cases of such cold blooded murders of indigenes abound in our respective communities (all perpetrated by bandits).
THE EXISTENCE OF ADJOINING FORESTS AND ROCKY FORTRESSES:
The availability of large expanses of forests and rocky fortresses on the fringes of our communities attracts the attention of bandits and terrorists from far who consider them as temporary hide-outs and escape routes to their permanent bases in Birnin Gwari and faraway Zamfara and Katsina States.
Notably, there is a stretch of government forest reserve from Gidan Busa (near Katari) through Chikwali, Rishi, Akilbu, Mangoro, Sarkin Pawa down to Birnin Gwari and leading to Zamfara and Katsina states. Similarly, there are stretches of forests on the fringes of Eastern and Western Rijana. Pitiably, displaced indigenous settlements East of Rijana like Legede Kwasau, Bakin Garma, Tudun Tama, Gidan Duna, Muruci, Oshuwudu, U/Dadi, etc have been converted by the bandits into their bases from where they launch attacks on the Abuja – Kaduna highway around Rijana general area.
It is also worthy of note to mention here that, the stretch of forest on the Western axis of Rijana leads to Dutse, Gwagwada and Kamuku forest in Birnin Gwari area and by estension to Zamfara and Katsina States.
THE PRESENCE OF A FUNCTIONAL POLICE DIVISION AND OTHER SECURITY OUTFITS IN KATARI VILLAGE:
Another factor that has attracted undue negative media hype against Katari village in particular, is the presence of a Police Division, an IRT Unit, CTU, NSCDC, Air Force and KADVS Units. This makes Katari village a security hub of sorts and understandably always in the news because of routine security updates.
Accordingly, whenever there is any security breach by bandits in the entire stretch of the highway, the first port of call is normally Katari village. In that respect, the persons lodging such reports only know Katari where the report is being filed or ledged because they find it very difficult to identify any other village by name within the Katari general area. Admittedly, the persons filing the complaint would phone their relations telling them that they are at Katari. Thus erroneously implied that the problem occurred at Katari. Social media hawks and other media platforms normally capitalize on these corrosive narratives to further misrepresent the true situation of things.
FALLOUT OF ROUTINE PRESS RELEASES IN KATARI VILLAGE BY POLICE AUTHORITIES:
Since the launching of Operation Puff Adder in Katari on 5/4/2019 by IGP Mohammed Adamu, successive police authorities have routinely organized elaborate press releases in Katari village where bandits arrested or captured from different locations in the entire North-West zone are paraded alongside captured arms before subsequently moved to Abuja for further necessary action. Regrettably, the public often misinterpret these elaborate parades to mean that all the paraded criminals are indigenous to Katari village.
GOVERNMENT SEEMING DOUBLE STANDARDS:
In one breath the Kaduna state Governor openly admits that the bandits ravaging communities in Kaduna state particularly the Abuja highway and Birnin Gwari axis are elements of the dreaded Boko Haram and Ansaru who are trying to establish bases and enclaves in Niger and Kaduna states because they consider Kaduna and Niger state forests very convenient for their operations. Sadly in another breath, the same Governor is ascribing terrorism/banditry to vulnerable peasant farmers and even threatening to either relocate or clear them entirely.
The question is where is the verifiable evidence linking these vulnerable natives to banditry along the Abuja – Kaduna highway? And by the way why are communities like Birnin Gwari, M/Jos with exceptional criminal notoriety not relocated to distant bushes? Why only Adara villages?
THE CONFUSION GENERATED BY THE TWIN MANDATE OF THE RIJANA POLICE DIVISION:
The Police Division in Rijana is mandated to cater for the Rijana community and its environs within Kachia LGA as well as those from Chikun LGA that are within its reach like Kasarami, Quary, S/Sara, Audu Jangwon, etc.
Sadly, when crimes are committed in communities in Chikun LGA are reported at the Rijana Police Division, they are often misinterpreted to imply that they are committed at Rijana which is in Kachia LGA.
Perhaps, that partly explains why the attack on the Abuja – Kaduna bound passenger Train which took place near Dutse in Chikun LGA of Kaduna state was erroneously ascribed to Rijana and Katari communities.
THE AVAILABILITY OF A CATTLE ROUTE NEAR KATARI VILLAGE:
There is a major cattle route that emanates from the core North and traverses or crosses the Abuja – Kaduna highway at a spot near Katari. That very spot is convenient for bandit attacks on innocent commuters because of its undulating nature making distant visibility very difficult for motorists. Before you realize that an attack is going on, a commuter is already in their midst because of poor visibility from a distance. Unfortunately, the gullible public often assume that it is the Natives of the nearest village – Katari that are responsible for the attacks not knowing that they come from as far as Zamfara and Katsina states. People kidnapped at this particular spot are known to have been released at locations embedded in Birnin Gwari and Zamfara forests.
INFORMATION GATHERING BY BANDITS:
The wholesale assumption that bandits get their information only from natives before launching their deadly attacks on the Abuja – Kaduna highway is largely unfounded and trivial. Are the bandits themselves not aware that there is a popular highway linking some states of the N/West to the Federal Capital? Are the bandits not conversant with the flash spots on the highway that are convenient for their operations? Again, bandits can get information from their kidnapped victims which are under duress.
SEEMING GOVERNMENT’S INACTION AND LACKADAISICAL ATTITUDE:
Records at our disposal are overwhelmingly indicative that government is fully aware of the movement of bandits, their bases and some of their financiers.
The question then is why is the Federal government reluctant in authorizing a synchronized military action in the entire North-West to completely root out these terrorists since the passage of the law branding bandits as terrorists? Why chasing shadows instead of dealing with substances. Why is government interested in making vulnerable communities scapegoats while the real criminals re allowed to traverse the length and breadth of this country without let hindrance?RECOMMENDATIONS/PRAYERS
There should be constructive engagement between relevant government agencies and critical stakeholders in the respective communities to foster a workable synergy in the fight against banditry in the area.
All identifiable flash spots where bandits normally take undue advantage of to perpetrate their heinous acts should be placed under strict security control. For instance the route that traverses the highway between Katari and K/Kare should be blocked by locating a strong military presence there. Assuringly, there is enough expanse of land in the government’s forest reserve spanning between Katari, Gidan Busa, Akilbu and Rishi to accommodate any strong security presence or outfit.
Government should discreetly verify and cross check all security reports relating to our communities to ensure that they are not products of mere guess work or figments of some people’s subjective imagination concocted to please some vested interests.
Ensure that security operatives deployed in the area live up to the billing of their critical mandates.
Properly equip and motivate all security operatives deployed in our communities. The investigative arm of the security architecture in the area should be upgraded to meet the challenges of the time.
Recruit more members of our youths into the security forces to reinforce the concept of community policing by gaining the confidence of the communities.
Upgrade the educational status of the communities.
Any member of our communities that is identified as a collaborator of banditry should be dealt with in accordance with the dictates of the law. Meaning nobody should be spared in our communities if found wanting in terms of government’s security drive.
Make provision for another Police Division to accommodate cases from Chikun LGA along the Abuja – Kaduna highway.
Ensure that security operatives deployed in our communities work collaboratively with our stakeholders.
Locate a strong military presence in Rijana community.
It is strongly advisable that no indigenous community on the Abuja – Kaduna highway should be relocated no matter the prompting. Rather, security in these communities should be upgraded to meet global standard in view of the strategic nature of this expressway.
CONCLUSION:
On a final note;
Gentlemen of the Press, we consider it very instructive to state here very strongly that, in functional democratic climes, when situations like this occur, the imperatives of decency and responsive governance dictate that the due process of the law be reasonably pursued through constructive engagement with critical stakeholders.
In other words, diligent investigation and prosecution should be pursued using proper and time tested mechanisms instead of resorting to arbitrary highhandedness based on premeditated conclusions as exemplified by the proposed relocation of our communities from their ancestral roots dating back to antiquity.
Thank you for listening and God bless you all.
CC:
: The Hon. Commissioner for Internal Security and Home Affairs, Kaduna State.
: The Hon. Chairman Kachia LGA
: The Director DSS Kachia
: The District Head Bishini
: The DPO, Katari
: The DPO, Rijana
: The DPO, Kachia
: The Commander, Operation Thunder Strike Katari
: The Ward Commander KADVS, Katari
: All Village Heads Katari.
: All Village Heads Rijana
: All Village Heads Akilbu
Total Media 