Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
The Benue State Command of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) has arrested eight suspects for offences such as criminal conspiracy, vandalization of government’s critical national assets, theft, criminal breach of trust and cheating persons whose interest, offender is bound to protect.
Parading the suspects at the state Command of the Corps at the weekend, state Commandant of NSCDC, Sule Okeji disclosed that six among the suspects were arrested along Udam-Yagba-Lafia Road near NYSC Farm in Makurdi.
The suspects including Shaibu Sule, Sani Ibrahim, Sagir Abubakar, Alhaji Usman, Danlami Awai and Abdulgafar Tijani were nabbed for illegally removing railway slippers, nuts and bolts.
The Commandant said the suspects were caught red handed with a truck load of the rail line components while they were conveying them to an unknown destination.
Okeji who noted that the arrest was made possible as a result of intensified surveillance on government critical national infrastructure and assets added that during the arrest, the main suspect who hired the truck, the driver as well as one of the loaders escaped.
He said on interrogation, the suspects confessed in their statement that they were hired by the prime suspect (now at large) to only participate in loading the truck with the vandalized rail line slippers, nuts and bolts.
The Commandant, while emphasizing the resolve of the Corps in carrying out her core mandate of protecting critical national assets and infrastructure, averred that vandalization of rail line components amount to economic sabotage even as he warned vandals to steer clear of Benue.
Also paraded were two suspects; Agber Terfa and Agber Sewuese who were caught while trying to sell off another man’s red SAIC MG 350 car with registration number KTU 338 BQ (Lagos) without having the permission to do so.
Speaking with our Correspondent while being paraded, the prime suspect, Terfa confessed to the crime saying he decided to sell his boss’s car which was kept in his custody because he needed money to settle his financial challenges.
“Yes, my boss gave me the car but he didn’t say I should sell it. I decided to sell it because I needed money to settle some bills. I was negotiating to sell it for N1.6 million when I was caught,” Terfa confessed.