Police detectives are
presently combing South-West states to track other suspects involved in the
April 5 Offa bank robberies and recover firearms hidden by the gang members.
Our correspondent learned that seven gang
leaders were taking police investigators to their hideouts in Kwara, Ondo,
Osun, Oyo and Ekiti states where they were believed to have hidden cache of
firearms.
The police had earlier alleged that the gang
members carted away 21 AK47 rifles during the attack on the Offa Police
Divisional Headquarters where they killed some policemen before they stormed
six banks where they looted millions of naira and killed 33 persons.
A source, who is privy to the investigation,
told our correspondent in Abuja on Monday that Ayoade Akinnibosun, Ibukunle
Ogunleye, Adeola Abraham, Salawudeen Azeez, Niyi Ogundiran, Kunle Ogunleye, 35,
a.k.a Arrow, and Michael Adikwu, a dismissed police corporal, were assisting
the police to recover and mop up arms in different cities and communities in
the South-West.
The source said, “We announced during the press
briefing in Abuja that we had arrested 22 suspects and we paraded 15 while
seven suspects are helping us in the investigation and recovery of arms in the
South-West.
“When we are through with the investigation, we
would present all the suspects to the public. Opadokun and others are alive and
helping us with the investigation. Reports of their death are false information
emanating from the social media.”
The source, however, declined to disclose the
number of firearms that had been recovered but noted that investigation was
still ongoing.
The spokesman for the force, Jimoh Moshood,
could not be reached for comment on the development and he had yet to respond
to calls and a text message sent to his line as of the time of filing this
report.
Meanwhile, a civil society group, Citizen
Communication and Advocacy Centre, says linking the Senate President, Bukola
Saraki, to the robbery suspects could tarnish the image of the National
Assembly and portray the nation in a bad light before the international
community.
The director of the center, Charles Ibiang, at a
press conference on Monday, said, “Are political thugs not a culture for the
present ruling class? Who among them is exempted? Let us use this case to
resolve this issue; citizens must insist on fairness and justice must be seen
to have been done, not vendetta or vengeance.”
He said people must ask questions, like an
update on the retired police officer the robbers accused of supplying them arms
and ammunition.
Also, the Kwara State Governor, Alhaji
Abdulfatah Ahmed, called on the relevant authorities, including the police, not
to play politics with the issue, saying an incident that claimed over 30 lives
should be taken seriously.
Speaking while addressing members of the Kwara
State Artisans Congress, who protested to the Government House in support of
the Senate President, the governor stated,
“I think we should all put our hands in prayers
and urge the police to do a thorough investigation, arrest all the criminals
involved in this dastardly act to ensure that they are brought to book and
justice is done. It is too serious an issue to be used as a political tool.
Ahmed explained that his administration had
empowered residents of the state so they could become good entrepreneurs but
that those who venture into crime should face the consequences.
He said, “You are all aware that we have made
this economic development programme available to different groups in different
forms. For those who have learned skills among the so-called ‘good boys’, we
ensured that they also benefit so that they will be moved out of the streets.
“However, those who have chosen to use the
support we have given them to engage in criminality must be made to face the
wrath of the law.”
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