After a thorough investigation of the persistent attacks in Southern region of Kaduna State, the Governor, Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State has linked the crisis within the region on banditry and fueled by religious differences and lawmakers utterances.
El-Rufai said that Kaduna and other northern states were currently battling with banditry and other similar insecurity and that what had made his state different was the religious connotation that was being added by parties affected.
Southern Kaduna has been in the news lately after scores of persons were killed in the area, despite efforts by the Federal Government.
The governor, who made the claim yesterday during an interview with newsmen, stressed that aside from religious connotation, ethnic differences were already included and has aided its escalation.
“I think the issue is not just in Kaduna State. We have security challenges all across the Northeast and Northwest,” the former FCT Minister explained.
“But I think what makes Kaduna’s case situation unique and headline-grabbing is because of the injection of religious and ethnic connotations to the attacks and the clashes between the various ethnic groups.”
According to him, since Kaduna has a long history of ethno-religious intolerance, he added, every criminal situation in the Northwest is given ethnic and religious connotation.
“That complicates things more difficult to resolve because religion, ethnicity, and political are identity issues. They are very emotive and people tend to lose their calm and their heads in situations like this. That’s what complicates the issues.”
On some federal lawmakers from the southern part of the state raising the alarm of planned attacks in Kaduna after the Eid celebration, El-Rufai described their utterances as lack of leadership qualities.
He claimed that they (lawmakers) have a habit of not presenting the facts and always in a hurry to go the press instead of sending intelligence reports to security agencies.
“I think they should provide this kind of useful intelligence to security agencies,” El-Rufai said, noting that it will help the law-enforcers nip such plans in the bud.
