Rose Ejembi, Makurdi

A former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Founder of Women Youths Children and Crime Organisation, WYCCO, a Non Governmental Organisation, Dr. (Mrs.) Farida Waziri, has charged the various layers of Nigeria’s security apparatuses to invest in and deploy technology to complement human efforts being deployed to tackle the numerous security challenges facing the country at the moment.

Waziri spoke, in Makurdi, the Benue State capital, where she led other officials of WYCCO to donate relief materials to the Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs camps in the state.
While commiserating with the state governor, Dr. Samuel Ortom, and victims of the recent killings in parts of the state, the former police chief said “What we are here doing today is to identify with the people of Benue, especially families of the victims and the displaced by bringing succor through essential relief materials to the various IDPs camps in the state as a complement to what governments at different levels and other concerned persons and groups have been doing.”

While noting that the NGO is committed to rendering humanitarian services to victims of violence and advocacy against violent attacks especially against the vulnerable in the society, she said “For us at WYCCO, we take inspiration from the statement of a former British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill who once said “you make a living by what you get, but you make a life by what you give.”

She noted that bringing relief materials to support and assist the victims of violent attacks can only be a temporary measure adding that a long lasting solution is for the various security agencies to rise to the challenge of their constitutional responsibility of securing lives and property of citizens; farmers and herdsmen alike, wherever they find themselves in any part of the country, through preventive measures.

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“Prevention, they say, is better than cure. A life lost can never be regained, no matter what we do thereafter. That this is happening too early in a year of political campaigns should get us thinking and looking beyond surface evaluation.

“As such, I will seize this opportunity to challenge our security agencies to look in the direction of employing scientific and technological means of intelligence gathering rather than relying wholly on human intelligence. In this age and time, technology will reveal large movement of people towards any particular direction, provide clues to their motives and give a headway on how to nip any crime in the bud.

“This way, atrocities like the recent killings not only in Benue but in other parts of the country can be prevented. In essence, we should invest in technology and use same to fight crime.
“From experience, I know this is achievable because as Chairman of EFCC, I had to, at a point, seek help to develop a software we call ‘Eagle Claw’ to track scam letters going out from and coming into Nigeria. Through this, several scammers were nabbed in the act and hundreds of potential victims were saved and millions of dollars stopped from going into the hands of criminal gangs.”

She urged the victims, their friends and relations to take solace in God and shelve any thought of reprisal. “Let me also appeal to our people to embrace all peace initiatives and shun any idea of reprisal because reprisal begets reprisal. It is a vicious circle that blows no one any good”, she stressed.

She expressed appreciation to the Oba of Lagos and former Inspector General of Police, Musiliu Smith, who is the patron of WYCCO for their support towards the initiative.