Posted by From Ahamefula Ogbu in Jos on
Governor Joshua Dariye of Plateau State has enlisted private security guards following the withdrawal of police personnel after they were alleged to have joined in a brawl with officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) last week.
Governor Joshua Dariye of Plateau State has enlisted private security guards following the withdrawal of police personnel after they were alleged to have joined in a brawl with officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) last week.
Yesterday at the governor's first public function which was the commissioning of four luxurious buses by the Plateau Riders, police personnel were conspicuously absent while civil defence personnel kept order.
Sources at the Rayfield Government House said since the withdrawal of the police personnel for interrogation, they have not been replaced. "Rather, strange faces have been seen guarding the governor.
The barrel-chested youths follow the governor as if they are ordinary supporters but shove people who try to go too close to the governor aside, which showed that they were there for other jobs than being just supporters.
'Since they withdrew the police security from the Governor, we have been seeing different but new faces and we do not know how they were enlisted. I think they are private security at least you know that the governor cannot expose himself to security problems because the police have taken back their personnel", a source at the government house said.
However, at the commissioning, quite unlike how he use to allow crowd to mill around him, the gate of Terminus park where the event took place was locked to the crowd while only journalists, state executive members and few staff of the state transport corporation were allowed in.
Immediately after commissioning and taking a ride in one of the buses, he was escorted to a waiting vehicle by the mixture of the SSS and the private security who also played the role his police security use to carry out.
He admonished residents of the state to pursue peace at all times while reconciliation should be the watch word in order not to suffer reversal on the gains of peace so far.
He also asked the drivers of the vehicles to observe speed limits especially to conform to the status of the state as law abiding and peaceful place.
Dariye commended the state transport corporation for weathering the storm even when similar ventures in other states died with the scrapping of the Federal Urban Mass Transit scheme.
In his response, General Manager of Plateau Express Services Limited, Chief Aaron Gumir said that they entered into a hire purchase agreement for the vehicles repayable under 18 months so as to launch the third phase of the scheme.
He called for conversion of properties in the name of the company into full blown parastatal arrangement to enable them secure facilities with them for the advancement of the transportation dream of the state.