The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, has alleged that those behind organised crimes in Nigeria have \u201ccollaborators in institutions of State\u201d.
\nHe spoke at a public lecture organised by the United Action for Change in Lagos yesterday.
\nA copy of the speech delivered by Fashola at the public lecture was obtained by\u00a0newsmen.
\nAmong the organised crimes he listed were kidnapping, banditry, cattle rustling, human trafficking, and migration.
\nIn the speech, Fashola complained that criminal activities were threatening Nigeria\u2019s peace.
\nHe subsequently urged government to invest in security.
\nHe said, \u201cWe must beam a very bright searchlight on organised crime. We must recognise that organised crime is a business that we must put out of business because it thrives at our collective peril.
\n\u201cThe people behind organised crime earn their livelihood from it and also employ people, including the young and able-bodied who play critical roles in the value chain of its operation.
\n\u201cThey have collaborators in critical institutions of State and at sensitive places like our borders, (land, sea and air), as we have recently heard from reports about illicit drugs planted in the luggage of an innocent Nigerian lady who travelled to Saudi Arabia.
\n\u201cSeizures of containers of arms and Tramadol at our ports are not accidental. They are the products of vigilance and dedication by border security personnel against organised crime.
\n\u201cBut the question to ask is how many actually got in undetected.
\n\u201cTherefore, the case for immediate action by budgetary commitment and spending against an illegal business that is investing must be a compelling matter of national consensus.
\n\u201cBecause of the rewards that organised crime offers by way of illicit funds, and its appeal to the young, old, unemployed and vulnerable, we must move financial controls to another level.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, has alleged that those behind organised crimes in Nigeria have \u201ccollaborators in institutions of State\u201d. He spoke at a public lecture organised by the United Action for Change in Lagos yesterday. A copy of the speech delivered by Fashola at the public lecture was obtained by\u00a0newsmen. Among […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":145102,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-226755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=226755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/145102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=226755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=226755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=226755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}