The Kogi State Government has confirmed the killing of a notorious bandit leader, Kachala Ibrahim Batijo, fingered in a recent attack on a school in Iluke Bunu, Kabba/Bunu Local Government Area.
State Commissioner for Information and Communications, Kingsley Fanwo, made the disclosure on Tuesday during an appearance on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily, stating that Batijo was among several bandits killed in a coordinated operation by Nigerian security forces.
The slain leader was linked to the attack on the school in Iluke Bunu, which resulted in the deaths of three people, including a vice principal and a six-year-old child.
According to the commissioner, Batijo had been coordinating plans to abduct students from multiple schools across Kogi State.
Fanwo described the operation that led to the bandit leader’s death as a significant breakthrough in ongoing efforts to tackle insecurity in the state.
He said: “It’s a process that took a very long time. Initially, we got intelligence that he wanted to attack our schools in Kogi State. And while we were working on getting him, we shut down our schools for more than three weeks.
“It was painful, but they were unable to take our children away from the schools. And then we also learned that they were targeting the writing of the West African Secondary School Certificate Examination at a particular school, GSS Iluke, so that they would be able to kidnap all of those students. He was the one coordinating all of those strategies to be able to take those children away.
“But Kogi State has invested heavily in high-tech intelligence gathering equipment. We were able to monitor all of his activities. We moved our students from that remote place where the school is.
“The school is about three kilometres away from Iluke. They call the place Alara. So, we moved it to the heart of Iluke town, and we were monitoring how Batijo was coordinating his people with the support of the military, the DSS, the police, and all of our local security architecture.”
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Speaking on the recent attack, the commissioner said: “On June 10th, Batijo struck. He went to Iluke with this very large number of people. About 40 motorcycles were used to carry about 100 terrorists to that place.
“They attacked a few places, including attempting to take away the students from the school, and it was foiled. They could not take a single student away from the school. Our local security architecture provided the first line of defense, and they were supported by the military to be able to foil that attack, including the police, the DSS, and all of the security forces in Kogi State.
“We were able to neutralize Batijo and a good number of terrorists who carried out that operation. It was quite successful.
“As I speak, more than 15 to 20 bodies have been found of the terrorists, and even yesterday, while security forces went to where he was secretly buried to exhume his body for further examination, more terrorists were neutralized.”
He added that security agencies were confident that Batijo had been killed but said further verification was underway.
“We are very confident that he’s the one, but we will still subject that to science to confirm. And that is the reason we have taken the decision. We didn’t just stop at saying we’ve neutralized him. We knew that he was secretly buried by the other gang members that survived the bombardment from the Kogi security forces.
“But we decided that his body should be exhumed and further autopsy and investigation should be carried out on the body to fully establish it,” he said.
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