The Zamfara State Police Command, under the leadership of CP Ahmed Muhammad Bello, has declared a 60-day window to end the insecurity caused by insurgency, banditry, and criminality, vowing to restore peace and stability to the state.

This was disclosed during an exclusive interview between the new Commissioner of Police, CP Ahmed Bello, and *The Sun* correspondent at the Police Headquarters in Gusau, the state capital.

The new CP outlined his mission and vision, expressing a readiness to partner with sister security agencies, critical stakeholders, and members of the public to combat insecurity in the state.

In his words, CP Bello said, “We all know the existence of violent crime and criminality in the state and how it has paralysed both political, economic and spiritual activities. Security becomes the paramount focus in this environment because, without security, movement to places of interest will be obstructed. Zamfara is a 90% grievance society as it is now.

“We are aware of the fact that in a couple of months there is going to be a rainy season; the majority of these farmers will soon commence farming activities and members of the criminal network take advantage of the terrain to unleash havoc on the generality of the citizenry. As at last week we have studied the terrain, currently we are reinvigorating our security architecture with the view to redeploy personnel and ensure maximum compliance is in place.”

He continued: “The vision and the mission is to secure public safety and security while at the same time ensure adherence to compliance, taking the issue of gender inclusivity into consideration and ensuring the art of policing with human face as overall objective. Whatever we do here, we all are Public Servants and we must have to be accountable, carrying the public along in all we do and serving with integrity.

“The issue of community engagement becomes imperative for building trust by working together with the members of the public. If you are doing the right thing and the public is not aware of what you are doing, you will end up creating chances where you may be negatively misinterpreted, thwarting your efforts, but carrying them along with you changes the narratives, creating opportunity for cohesion and mutual understanding.”

The CP further emphasised the importance of collaboration: “Another important thing is carrying along all critical stakeholders from the community of operations beginning from the planning stage, implementation and information sharing. It is important to note that information mismanagement is one of the greatest problems we are facing in this state; everyone should not be giving out information. It is better to remain silent over unverified matters than saying things that will mislead the populace.

“We prioritise active policing based on intelligence gathering; information must be sanctified and the identity of the source must be adequately protected. Information must be handled on the basis of professionalism and once it is processed into an intelligence, must be timely disseminated to appropriate areas for what we call proactive policing. We prefer proactive measures to policing so we will never give chances to disruption which will lead to total failure.”

He added that: “Another important thing to note is that the defence and security officers in the state must work together, synergising and partnering together in the best interest of the state. We are legally positioned to bear our firearms openly unlike the insurgents; only at ungoverned spaces would they move freely with their weapons. We assure the members of the public that we will make all sieged spaces governable by being able to carry the war to the criminals’ hideout.

“Once again, what made criminality succeed in the state is what we described as broken window tools, meaning that, there are things that security operatives would have done but they are not doing it. Failure to consider it and take proactive measures to it gives the criminals chances to afflict the people."

CP Ahmed Bello assured the public that the command would “mend fences, windows, doors and walls that broke down,” thereby giving criminals no opportunity to attack the people within the next 60 days.

He also reaffirmed that the command will prioritise policing with a human face, enhance policies of maximum compliance and gender inclusivity, and engage with communities and critical stakeholders for maximum efficiency.

CP Ahmed Muhammad Bello has recorded remarkable achievements during his service as a police officer in Akwa Ibom, Borno, and other states within the federation; there is little doubt that he will invest his wealth of experience in bringing an end to insecurity in Zamfara State.

(The Sun)

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