Ace Nigerian Journalist, Babajide Kolade Otitoju, has responded to the latest declaration of bandits as terrorists by the government. Babajide aired his views regarding the development during an interview on TVC News....CONTINUE READING THE FULL ARTICLE>>>
You may recall that a Nigerian court recently declared bandits groups as terrorist organisations. The development came after a series of killings, kidnappings and attacks were carried out by the criminal groups in the Northern part of the country.
Reacting to the development, Babajide Otitoju said, “The issue is not about declaring the bandits as terrorists, the response to the criminal groups is the issue. We are obsessed with declaring bandits as terrorists. I agree that some of their activities are terrorist-like. The groups are too many, and that is a problem. In various parts of the world, they do not have long lists of terrorist groups, the groups are few, and they know them. In other parts of the world, bandits are called bandits, not terrorists.”
Speaking further, Babajide added, “Terrorist groups have an ideology, and they make political moves such as wanting power or a caliphate. Sometimes, their ambitions are religious-like. However, simply going around as a group to kidnap people for money is not defined as terrorism by the dictionary. The dictionary defines what they are doing as banditry. It is fine if we think that calling them terrorists is good. All Babajide Otitoju is concerned about is for us to defeat these criminals.”
