The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Ezenwo Nyesom Wike, said President Bola Tinubu has given approval for emergency procurement of digital tracking tools to help halt kidnappers in their tracks.
Wike at a media interface on Monday in Abuja said while he would not go into details, the informants recently arrested by security agencies in the territory are cooperating and offering actionable intelligence.
He said, “So many facilities were not provided. Vehicles for the security agencies are not there. You cannot believe it that equipment to track criminals are not there. When anything happens, they go back to the Office of the National Security Adviser or to the Force Headquarters. That is not the way it is supposed to be.
“When I was the Governor of Rivers state, the DSS told me they wanted a particular equipment. We were the only state that had it then. In fact, sometimes the headquarters asked for its use. That is a special equipment they needed and that equipment, we know how expensive it is but we had it and that was able to help us reduce the level of crime. It was able to track the specific phones not one that would say for example the criminals are around the city here. With that equipment, it was specific. It can track a particular phone to the exact spot or room. So, what we have done with the approval of Mr President, giving us approval for emergency procurement, we have been able to identify what each of the agencies need and we will be able now to provide them.
“Again before we came on board, the police had said that they had requested procurement of certain number of motorcycles where vehicles cannot get to- the remote and mountainous areas. Unfortunately, they were not provided but we are going to do that now.
“Security is not just these equipment. You also have to motivate the personnel. I don’t want to talk about the strategies because we are talking security now.
He said; “So many facilities were not provided. Vehicles for the security agencies are not there. You cannot believe it that equipment to track criminals are not there. When anything happens, they go back to the Office of the National Security Adviser or to the Force Headquarters. That is not the way it is supposed to be.
“When I was the Governor of Rivers state, the DSS told me they wanted a particular equipment. We were the only state that had it then. In fact, sometimes the headquarters asked for its use. That is a special equipment they needed and that equipment, we know how expensive it is but we had it and that was able to help us reduce the level of crime. It was able to track the specific phones not one that would say for example the criminals are around the city here. With that equipment, it was specific. It can track a particular phone to the exact spot or room. So, what we have done with the approval of Mr President, giving us approval for emergency procurement, we have been able to identify what each of the agencies need and we will be able now to provide them.
“Again before we came on board, the police had said that they had requested procurement of certain number of motorcycles where vehicles cannot get to- the remote and mountainous areas. Unfortunately, they were not provided but we are going to do that now.
“Security is not just these equipment. You also have to motivate the personnel. I don’t want to talk about the strategies because we are talking security now.
“Assuming Mr President did not approve this emergency procurement, we had been to the Bureau for Public Procurement since December to allow is to procure under emergency. If you don’t and you have to go the whole hog of the processes, it can take you two months and that is not what you tell members of the public, that procurement process is a problem.”
