Ex-Senator Gobir Backs Fierce Military Push, Warns Bandits and Sabotaging Informants Won’t Dictate Sokoto’s Future

Former federal lawmaker, Senator Abdullahi Gobir, has declared that armed bandits and terror syndicates will never be allowed to dictate the future of Sokoto State, throwing his full backing behind the ongoing joint military offensives across the state’s vulnerable rural frontiers.

Gobir, who previously represented Sokoto East Senatorial District in the upper chamber of the National Assembly and currently serves on the governing board of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), maintained that relentless raids on rural settlements have pushed agrarian communities to their breaking point, crippling farming, domestic trade, and basic survival.

In a public assessment of the security emergency, the former senator commended the Nigerian Army, Nigeria Police Force, Department of State Services (DSS), Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), and the Sokoto Community Guards Corps for sustaining tactical pressure against criminal strongholds. He noted that the arrival of additional personnel, combat hardware, and specialized equipment demonstrates the government’s resolve to reclaim ungoverned spaces and liberate communities plagued by lawlessness.

Gobir expressed confidence that sustained pressure on multiple axes would dismantle the operational networks of the marauders and restore peace to frontline border communities such as Sabon Birni, Isa, and neighboring settlements.

However, the former lawmaker cautioned that raw military firepower alone would not end the crisis unless accompanied by reliable, community-driven intelligence. Describing actionable intelligence as the eyes of every successful campaign, Gobir urged residents, local hunters, and village vigilantes to serve as the active eyes and ears of security forces by volunteering timely information on strange movements, forest camps, and impending attacks.

Gobir delivered a sharp rebuke to internal saboteurs, warning that individuals who harbor, feed, finance, or provide logistics to armed outlaws are committing dangerous acts of betrayal. He specifically condemned village informants who track troop deployments and leak patrol timings to bandits, warning that such treachery directly endangers the lives of security personnel and leaves entire communities vulnerable to retaliatory slaughter.

Underlining the economic cost of the lingering violence, the former senator emphasized that meaningful development cannot take root in an environment where citizens are forced to abandon fertile farmlands, markets, and ancestral homes out of fear.

Gobir called on traditional institutions, Islamic clerics, youth groups, and community stakeholders to close ranks with law enforcement and cut off the local support networks that sustain criminal gangs. He expressed optimism that through community vigilance, superior intelligence gathering, and sustained troop operations, enduring peace and normal socio-economic activity will be restored across Sokoto State.