Why Buhari Can’t Proscribe Bandits – Lai Mohammed

The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, has said President Muhammadu Buhari cannot proscribe bandits in Nigeria because they are nameless.

Naija News reports that Lai Mohammed made this known in an interview on AIT’s Kaakaki programme on Wednesday.

According to the Minister, proscribing the bandits is not what really matters but how they are treated by the government.

Lai Mohammed said: “You proscribe known groups with names. You can’t just proscribe an unknown group legally.”

“Secondly, it’s not whether they are proscribed or not, it is the way they are treated. Does the government actually treat them with kid gloves? The answer is no.”

The Minister of Information also stated that granting amnesty to bandits, kidnappers or any notorious group is not a new thing in the country.

He stated this while defending critics on Zamfara State Governor, Bello Matawalle, for granting amnesty to bandits terrorising the state.

Mohammed noted that the Federal Government would not restrict governors from addressing the security challenges in ways peculiar to their respective states.

According to him, the governors as chief security officers of their various states were in the best position to address security challenges in the way that best suit them.