30 January 2013, Sweetcrude, Yenagoa – Bayelsa State Governor, Hon. Seriake Dickson, has prescribed death penalty for kidnappers in the state.
Making this known during the swearing-in ceremony of the chairman and members of the Judicial Commission of Inquiry on the Agbere communal crisis in Yenagoa, the governor said he would not hesitate to sign the death warrant of kidnappers or those attempting to commit the crime as government would no longer condone acts of lawlessness.
“We have made it very clear that wherever there is any breach of the peace and breakdown of law and order, this government will use all its resources and authority to ensure that the right thing is done and people are brought to book,” he warned.
He threatened that any traditional ruler caught aiding and abetting kidnapping and other related vices would be dealt with in accordance with the law.
A bill to this effect would soon be forwarded to the state House of Assembly for passage into law, which according to the governor, became imperative in order to forestall disruption of government’s developmental projects.
He urged youths to take advantage of government’s policies and programmes geared towards building their capacity.
“Let me also use this occasion to sound a clear note of warning in this state, we thought we were through with kidnappings in this state, but just one incident of kidnapping is bad enough for us.
“We have a situation where we have an ambitious programme of infrastructural turn around of the state because there is work going on in every community of the state and it will be so for quite sometime, therefore we do not want to tolerate even one case of kidnapping of anybody.”
However, he commended law- abiding youths of the state, noting that reports reaching government indicated that there have been no cases of disruption of ongoing projects across the state.
