RIVERS State Governor Nyesom Wike has asked the Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to go after bandits and armed Fulani herdsmen the same way it went after the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) Nnamdi Kanu.
Wike, who spoke when he featured on ARISE TV programme ‘The Morning Show’ on Thursday, said there should be no discrimination in the way the government treated criminal elements.
The governor insisted that the Nigerian government must ensure that bandits, the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, the umbrella body of Fulani herdsmen, and all other criminal elements responsible for insecurity in the country were brought to book.
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He also advised the government to adhere to the rule of law in Kanu’s prosecution so as to allay concerns that the president was against the South-East region.
“Let’s not make a hullabaloo about the prosecution of Nnamdi Kanu. I don’t believe in his principles. I have come out and I have said that you cannot annex my state to be part of your own. But that doesn’t mean that you will not allow the law to take its course.
“The same way that you have arrested Nnamdi Kanu should also be the same way that all others who you have known should be brought to book to face the wrath of the law. You cannot discriminate. You cannot say because Nnamdi Kanu is from a particular area, let us do this. The same principle must be applied to the bandits, Miyetti Allah and others,” Wike said.
The ICIR had reported that Kanu was on Tuesday remanded in the custody of the State Security Service (SSS) following his re-arrest and repatriation from an undisclosed location by Nigerian security agents.
Lawyers and civil rights groups have called on the Nigerian government to give the IPOB leader a fair trial.
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