Al-Kadriyars’ abductions must be a turning-point in the war against kidnappers and sundry criminals

A tale of two tragedies is unfolding in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), and we call for redress. One was the kidnap of Mansoor Al-Kadriyar family of a father and six daughters; and the other, the specious attempt to rescue the remaining five sisters through crowdfunding. While crowdfunding for a noble cause is a worthy invention, the use to fester the insatiable appetite of kidnappers may turn a double whammy with unpredictable consequences.

Of course, our hearts are with the kidnapped Al-Kadriyar sisters, and we urge for their immediate rescue.

Thankfully, the Federal Government has railed against the crowdfunding effort as illegitimate and unacceptable. We agree. But we urge security agencies to close in on the kidnappers and rescue the victims.

Speaking after the Federal Executive Council meeting, last week, the Minister of Defence, Abubakar Badaru, said: “We all know there’s an existing law against ransom payment. So, it is very sad for people to go over the internet and radio asking for donations to pay ransom. This will only worsen the situation; it will not help.”

He went further: “If we stop, over time kidnapping will not be profitable and those involved in the crime will stop. It is not easy though, but that is the law.” No doubt, the sound bites of the minister are reasonable. But, while all kidnappings are traumatic, the kidnap of Al-Kadriyar and his daughters is excruciatingly harrowing. The entire family was originally taken into custody by kidnappers within the precincts of the FCT, and that is a metaphor of a nation under capture.

Whimsically malicious, the kidnappers released the father of the girls to go fetch N60 million ransom, and when he was late in coming, they killed Nabeeha, one of the girls, and tossed her body on the streets. The criminals have since raised their demand to a whopping N100 million, soon after the effort by the former Minister of Communications, Isa Pantami, to raise N50 million through crowdfunding. Obviously, the kidnappers have perceived the idea of crowdfunding as a gold mine, hence the increase in the ransom.

The gale of kidnapping is tragically enveloping Abuja and suburbs, and we urge the National Security Adviser, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, to rally the security agencies to quench it. We see as ironical, the effort by the former minister, Pantami, who promised the nation under former President Muhammadu Buhari, that the telephone SIM-card linking with National Identity Numbers (NIN), would make it easy to trace kidnappers. We wonder what happened to the promise, and why the gamut of data collected by various agencies and institutions cannot help our security challenges.

Perhaps, it is time to rejig the nation’s security architecture, and we are happy that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has given his security chiefs a marching order in the wake of the kidnappings and other criminal activities. We also hope the meeting between the FCT minister Nyesom Wike and security heads in Abuja, last week, would pep up efforts to rein in the criminals.

Sadly, sundry criminal activity is festering in the FCT, including what is commonly referred to as ‘one chance’ robbery.

Undoubtedly, residents of Abuja eagerly await the impact of the Special Intervention Squad recently launched by Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Kayode Egbetokun, in Abuja.

We consider it a failure of intelligence that the whereabouts of Al-Kadriyar sisters has eluded the police, the state security services, and several other military and para-military security agencies, which by now should have literally flooded the nation’s capital with their personnel. No doubt, if these agencies are up to their task, they ought to have solved this embarrassing national mystery.

As is obvious, the lack of effective national security infrastructure has been with us for far too long, and even with the scarcity of resources, the Tinubu administration has to find solution to the problem. Sadly, monies budgeted for intelligence infrastructure in major cities like Abuja, were either stolen or mismanaged by successive Peoples Democratic Party-led administrations, while they held sway. Whether in Abuja or Lagos, humongous sums were budgeted and spent for surveillance cameras, regrettably, they have not been of much help. Regrettably too, efforts by the National Assembly and the anti-fraud agencies to recover the monies spent on them have not yielded much.

But the consequence has yielded a nation under siege. Across states, in the north-west, north-east, north-central, south-south and south-east, kidnapping for ransom has become a common phenomenon. Until the advent of the south-west security organ, ‘Amotekun’, kidnapping was a pastime in many of the states. The success of the regional security agency suggests the need to formalise state police. We use the word formalise, because virtually, all states have their own security outfits. The challenge has been their lack of statutory authority to bear arms, to confront the criminals.

The tragedy befalling the Al-Kadriyar sisters should be halted, and may it be a turning point for our nation under siege.

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