VANGUARD
BENIN CITY – THE federal government has been urged not to approve requests in some quarters that the personnel of the Federal Roads Safety Corps (FRSC) should be allowed to carry arms to enhance their performances.
An open letter to the President of the Nigerian Senate, Sen Godswil Akpabio by a governorship aspirant of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Hon (Dr) Joseph Ikpea said Nigeria was already proliferated with arms in the hands of individuals not authorized to bear arms in addition to those legitimately authorized to do so which have led to avoidable deaths and incapacitation across the country and that allowing personnel of the FRSC to carry arms would be another disaster waiting to happen.
In the letter which copy was made available to journalists in Benin City, Ikpea said “There is no contesting the fact that the level of ammunition and weapons in the hands of legal and legitimate security agencies as well as private individuals, let alone the ones in the hands of non-state actors is a soft threat to our national security and it is becoming very worrisome, thus demanding a concerted effort at retrieving same as well as demilitarising our society.
“While, as a people, we look up to government’s actions at mopping up of such ammunition in the possession of non-state actors which has constituted as a threat to our national security, so whatever call from whatever quarter for legitimate proliferation of arms may not be in our National interest.”
