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Robbers rent guns from police — Obasanjo
COSMAS EKPUNOBI, Abuja
PRESIDENT Olusegun Obasanjo said
yesterday that he was aware that some policemen hire out their guns to armed
robbers.
He also said some religious bodies and clerics pray for the
robbers before they go for operation while the bandits make returns to the
former after a successful outing.
The religious institutions, he said, have
so debased themselves that the clerics publicly bless individuals without any
known means of livelihood so far as the individual can cough out fat cash
donations to them.
President Obasanjo, who also came down
hard on the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) and school teachers, accused them,
together with the police and clerics, of aiding and abetting violent crimes in
the society and malfeasance in schools.
The President spoke in Abuja at the
opening of the two-day security summit organised by the House of
Representatives.
He said rising rage of violent crime and
other social vices is a reflection of a deeper rot in the nation’s various
religious institutions, the schools, families, communities and law enforcement
agencies.
President Obasanjo noted that most of the
crime bursting agencies, school teachers and religious institutions had failed
in their duties.
The President, who spoke on the theme of
the summit titled: Juvenile delinquency, crime, community policing: Challenges
and Prospects, said he was aware that some policemen "hire" their guns to people
mainly youths for armed robbery.
"Some of the religious institutions do
pray for the young men before they go for armed robbery and they give returns to
them when they come back," he noted.
According to him, religious institutions
are not helping matters by accepting and blessing persons who have no "visible
livelihood and yet could make a fat donation of about N50,000 to them."
According to him, some school teachers had
continued to aid and abet exam cheats, adding that teachers who abandon their
classes during school hours for other businesses contribute to the juvenile
delinquency and crime in society.
"I heard of a father who had sent his
11-year-old daughter to go and get food for the family; the girl will either go
out to steal or prostitute," he said.
"I am also aware that it is at the remand
homes that most of these youths started learning how to pick pockets and some of
them do leave the home worse than they were when they entered there.
"What do we do where a policeman hires out
his gun for armed robbery and the Customs tamper with confiscated item?"
According to the President, the political
leaders are also fuelling the situation by engaging the youths in thuggery and
violence.
He called on the relevant agencies to rise
up to the challenge, of building a crime-free society, adding that juvenile
delinquency and crime demands wholistic approach for a better society.
The summit is expected to produce a new
security blueprint for the country.
Also speaking, Senate President, Adolphus
Wabara, warned that "leaving private individuals and entities to promote law and
order and to protect lives and property can only lead to chaos."
According to him, "In fact, when there is
a breakdown of law and order, when individuals have to protect themselves and
their possessions and when government has lost the monopoly of force, the state
is said to be unraveling."
Speaker of the House, Alhaji Aminu Masari
in his keynote address, said that government was more concerned with the rising
wave of crime among the youths.
Alhaji Masari said the summit will serve as a resource
base for lawmaking in the House.
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