One
of the leaders of a notorious militant group operating in Ikorodu and
Arepo areas of Lagos and Ogun states, Abiodun Amos, said yesterday, that his
group planned to bomb the Third Mainland Bridge in Lagos because the Federal
Government failed to consider its members for amnesty.
The group had planned to bomb the bridge end of last month
before Amos’ arrest by the Inspector-General of Police Special Intelligence
Response Team, led by Abba Kyari, an Assistant Commissioner of Police,
frustrated its efforts.
“We went into bank robberies and kidnapping because we wanted to get government’s attention and all we wanted was for them to grant us amnesty and also offer us pipeline protection contract. We have made several appeals but government is not listening to us.
‘’General” Ossy (leader of the gang) said if we don’t blow up the Third Mainland Bridge, government will not listen to us. We had concluded plans to carry out the attack by November ending. ‘’I am the group’s explosives expert and before I was arrested we were going into the creeks to conclude plans on how to carry out the attack.”
“We went into bank robberies and kidnapping because we wanted to get government’s attention and all we wanted was for them to grant us amnesty and also offer us pipeline protection contract. We have made several appeals but government is not listening to us.
‘’General” Ossy (leader of the gang) said if we don’t blow up the Third Mainland Bridge, government will not listen to us. We had concluded plans to carry out the attack by November ending. ‘’I am the group’s explosives expert and before I was arrested we were going into the creeks to conclude plans on how to carry out the attack.”
The
suspect, also popularly known as Senti, said his group was hitherto involved in
pipeline vandalism, noting that it resorted to kidnapping when it became
difficult for its members to continue with the illegal business due to the
presence of the military and policemen.
The
suspect is a 43-year-old native of Arogbo, in Ese-Odo Local Government
Area of Ondo State. He was arrested by operatives of the Inspector General of
Police Special Intelligence Response Team, IRT, at a river bank in Majidun area
of Ikorodu, Lagos, on Monday.
Two
AK-47 rifles hidden inside a bag were found with the 43-year-old suspect as
Vanguard reliably gathered that additional two cartons of explosives, with the
words Gelatine Dynamite inscribed on them, and detonators, were recovered from
the group’s operational saloon car.
Amos’
arrest, it was gathered, followed intelligence generated by office of the
National Security Adviser to the President, NSA, on November 2, 2016, that the
group had concluded plans to blow up the Third Mainland Bridge.
Vanguard gathered that the information was passed on to the
Inspector-General of Police, Mr Ibrahim Idris, who subsequently directed his
IRT to commence investigation into the matter.
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