Governor Abdulaziz Yari of Zamfara State says that 2,385 persons have been killed by armed bandits in the state from 2011 to date.
The governor disclosed this in his address of welcome at the one-day Special Town Hall Meeting on Security on Monday in Gusau that was organised by the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture.
He said that over 6,000 persons were also injured from the activities of the bandits, rustled over 25,000 cows and destroyed over 3,000 hectares of arable land.
He said during the period, over 600 shops and 336 vehicles were also destroyed while thousands of people were displaced from their towns and villages.
Mr Yari added that hundreds of other people were kidnapped by the bandits who charged millions of naira as ransom before they released them.
The governor, however, said that with the formation of a reconciliation committee by the state government, over 3,000 assorted arms were recovered from some of the bandits.
He said that those who refused to repent had continued to lay siege on innocent citizens.
The governor said that more lives had been lost to killings in Zamfara than those lives lost in Plateau, Benue and Taraba States.
He urged the Federal Government to come up with more positive actions that would stop the killings.
According to the governor, this is a pure case of criminality we are facing here.
He commended the efforts of the security agencies, especially, the army, the police, the DSS and the Civil Defence deployed in the state to fight the menace.
In his speech, the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, commended the efforts of the state government noting that the security situation in the state had improved significantly.
Lai, however, blamed the media houses saying that they were not giving good coverage to government efforts.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that a video containing the situation of the crisis was shown to the guests while a copy of the clip was handed to the Minister of Information and Culture.
NAN also reports that the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan-Ali; the Minister of Environment, Usman Jibrin and the Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu; attended the meeting.
Others in attendance were the Minister of state for Budget, Zainab Ahmed and Minister of state for Industry, Aisha Abubakar.
NAN
