Former Kaduna Central Senator, Shehu Sani has faulted the statement by the Minister of Defence, Bashir Magashi, advising Nigerians to defend themselves against bandits.
Recall that the minister had advised Nigerians to face bandits and not to be cowards, adding that bandits sometimes possessed few rounds of ammunition.
Magashi, while speaking with newsmen on the sidelines of the screening of service chiefs by the House of Representatives on Wednesday, said every Nigerian has a responsibility to ensure that their community is safe.
The minister asked citizens to stay alert at all times and defend themselves, adding that the abducted students and staff of the government school in Kagara would be rescued soon.
He said the service chiefs would swing into action immediately and track down the kidnappers to rescue the children.
But in a tweet via his Twitter page on Thursday, Sani told Magashi to provide Nigerians with enabling tools or allow them to source for the tools in order not to be cowards when bandits attack.
He wrote: “If the Defence Minister is prescribing self defence, his Ministry should provide Nigerians with the ‘enabling tools’ or formally permit them to privately source for it so that there shall be ‘cowards’ no more in this beleaguered and bewildered land.”
Meanwhile, the legislator representing Niger East Senatorial District in the upper chamber of the National Assembly, Senator Sani Musa has submitted that perpetrators of the abduction which took place on Wednesday at Government Science College, Kagara are terrorists, not bandits.
The lawmaker made the submission during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday.
There is no presence of anybody but the bandits. I don’t call them bandits, I call them terrorists,” the lawmaker said.
“It has happened in Chibok, it has happened in Dapchi, it has happened in Kankara, it has happened in Kagara, we cannot guarantee where next, so, necessary steps have to be taken.”