Lagos State Governor Akinwumi Ambode has vowed to rescue the Oniba of Iba, Oba Yushau Goriola Oseni from the hands of his abductors.
The governor in an emergency Security Council meeting on Monday, said efforts were on to make kidnapping a thing of the past in the state and the criminals would be made to face the wrath of the law.
The Lagos State Commissioner of Police Fatai Owoseni, told reporters at the end of the meeting that government and the security agencies were bothered about the rates of crime especially kidnapping, adding that efforts are on to rescue all those kidnapped recently including Oba Oseni.
“What we want to assure the people is that we are putting efforts together to ensure that not just the monarch is rescued but also other victims of kidnapping and we will bring those criminals to justice.”
He said: “All of us are bothered. As the people are bothered, government is bothered and law enforcement institutions are bothered. We are looking at the issue of kidnapping and the only thing we can tell the good people in Lagos is that government is doing everything possible and is deploying all arsenal of the state towards ensuring that we put a stop to all these and at the same time seize this opportunity to tell the fellows engaging in these activities to channel their energy to lawful conduct because there is no excuse to say that because they cannot vandalise the pipelines again, that is why they are resorting to all these soft targets kidnapping.
“They should divert their energy into productive use, he added, “The government has opened up lots of opportunities for people that want to access soft loans for small scale businesses and industries; the Bank of Industry (BoI) for instance is there, they have been putting up adverts, let them have a change of mind, drop their weapons, access these funds that government at the state and federal levels had created and for those of them that have certificates and saying that yes we have stopped bunkering and there is no other thing for us to do, there are platforms that have been created by government for them to be meaningfully employed.”
