South South: Police record 84 kidnappings, armed robbery and cult cases in April

.As DIG Pedro scores CP Disu, Rivers police Command high

Emmanuel Nlewedum, Port Harcourt

The Police on Monday said it recorded a total number of 84 kidnappings, cultism and armed robbery cases across different states in the South South in April, 2024.
The data which was disclosed by the Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police, in-charge of Information Communication and Technology (ICT), South South Zone, DIG Daniel Sokari Pedro, showed that crime rate in South South States have drastically reduced during the period under review.
According to him, within the period, the police recorded 31 cases of kidnapping, 18 armed robbery and 35 cult related cases.
DIG Pedro disclosed the statistics while fielding questions from Journalists in Port Harcourt on Monday during his working visit to Rivers State, as part of his familiarisation tour of the six state commands under him.
He said he was in the state to encourage the state Commissioner of Police, CP Olatunji Disu and operatives of the Command not to rest on their oars following their numerous successes in combating crime in the state.
DIG Pedro while appraising the performance of the Rivers State Police Command on crime fighting, rated the performance of the command high.
Pedro said, “My main reason for coming to Rivers State Command is because I am on tour of the South South geo-political zone, comprising six State commands. I started from Edo state command, from Edo I went to Delta and from Delta to Bayelsa, from Bayelsa to Cross River, from Cross River to Rivers State and the last leg of the tour would be Akwa Ibom.
“I came here purposely to encourage the commissioner of police who you all know is an excellent police officer. I read somewhere that he was given an award of excellence, that is apart from the fact that he was also given the IG’s award not so long ago.
“I am not such an officer that just sits in my office and just come with fantastic statistics, no, I gather intelligence on my own apart from the SITREPS I gather from various commands. The SITREPS I gathered from this zone gave me the impression that the zone is a very difficult terrain in terms of criminality.
“Despite all these challenges, the CPs are doing well, all I just want to do is to encourage them to do better. The Rivers State CP has been able to harness both management as well as the foot soldiers to achieve what we have here on ground.
“When I was doing my own statistics, I used April as a case study and I three indices of crime, those indices are cultism, armed robbery and kidnapping, we had 31 cases of kidnapping in the month of April, the first three are Edo, Delta and Akwa Ibom, but the least is Rivers State.
“While Cross River had just three, Bayelsa three, Rivers State had only two, let me shock you, in the area of armed robbery, we had 18 cases of armed robbery in the zone, Rivers and Bayelsa had just one each, which makes them the least.
“Cultism, as usual Rivers and Bayelsa came late with just only three cases each, out of 35 cases. So you can see from this small analysis that the CP and his men are doing very very well,” he added.
He added that, “I will keep on encouraging CP Disu. Even without encouragement, He is doing well. Both the officers and the CP are doing well. I gathered information on my own. This zone is a difficult one in terms of terrain and criminality. I will always encourage them to do better. I am afraid when CP Disu leaves here one day, it may be difficult to fill his gap.”
Speaking further, the AIG urged stakeholders to encourage and support the police in crime fighting. He said, “Stakeholders should encourage the Police. What can you do to complement the effort of the Police? We all know that crime is a big venture. Police role is to complement other security forces. If you want to sleep with your two eyes closed, you have a role to play as civilian.”
Earlier, in his address, the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, CP Olatunji Disu, described the visit of the DIG as timely, adding that his words and presence during the meeting with would further boost the morales of the officers and men of the command to put in more effort in the discharge of their duties.
The CP while noting that the command was enjoying a cordial working relationship with the state government, urged the DIG to look into the challenges facing the command which includes shortages of anti-riot equipment, lack of vehicles for mobility and shortage of manpower.
He said, “The visit of the DIG is coming at the right time when his advice is needed to spice up the officers of the command to perform optimally.
“On assumption of duty I went round to appraise the security situation. More disturbing was killing of SP Bako, the DPO of Ahoada Police Division. They were flushed out after my assumption of office.”
Our correspondent reports that Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) zone 16, comprising Rivers and Bayelsa Police commands, Paul Omata and other senior officers were in attendance.