Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State on Thursday said that the people of the state would take their decision on sophisticated weapons procurement if the federal government failed in the next one month to respond to its already written application to the appropriate quarters.
Ortom said his administration had for the past three months applied for a licence to legally procure AK47, AK49 and other sophisticated weapons for the Benue State Volunteers Guards to enable them to tackle murderous terrorists.
The governor made this known in his address during the passing-out of the second batch of the Benue State Community Volunteer Guard (BSCVGs) at the IBB square in Makurdi.
“I have on behalf of the Benue State government applied to the responsible federal government agency for approval to procure automatic weapons, particularly AK47 assault rifles to further strengthen your logistic support base and your defence capability.
“I am still awaiting approval from the federal government to deal accordingly. I am still waiting for the federal government’s reply after three months but if the federal government does not reply in the next one month, I will revert to my people and will do whatever they tell me,” he said.
Ortom, however, stressed the need for the 1,100 newly inaugurated volunteer guards who are an addition to the first batch of 500 personnel birthed on August 4 to work closely with conventional security agencies in the state to curtail insecurity.
“We will have 10,000 personnel before the end of my tenure,” he added.
The governor emphasised that the formation of the guards would help unprotected rural farmers, travellers and residents live a deserving life of protection.
“Towards this end, the Benue State government has already procured some essential equipment as permitted by the law and handed them over to the police for use by the BSCVGs for effective crime fighting. Motor vehicles and motorcycles have been made available to you,” he said.
The NSA remained silent on the matter when contacted to comment on the dateline given by Ortom.
More so, when newsmen contacted presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, he referred them to the National Security Adviser (NSA), Major General Babagana Monguno (rtd).
When contacted the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) did not respond.
Several calls to the mobile phone of the Head of Strategic Communications, Zakari Usman, were also not answered.
He was yet to respond to text messages sent to him via WhatsApp as at when filing this report.
