Police continue recovery of illegal firearms

Rivers Commissioner of Police, Zaki Ahmed, is appealing to citizens in the state to submit any weapon in their possession to the command.

Ahmed said an 8-man task force set up by the command has recovered some AK47 rifles, and double barrel guns.

He said the move is a directive from the Police Boss, Ibrahim Idris, to mop up illegally acquired arms in the country.

The Force Headquarters’ Joint Task Team, led by the Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) Joshak Habilla recovered 2,753 illegal firearms from 13 states.

Following what was described as an impressive turnout of the exercise, Inspector General (IG) Ibrahim Idris has extended the ultimatum for recover of illegal arms to April 30.

The IG initially gave a 21-day ultimatum, which began on February 22 and will elapse on March 14, for members of the public to surrender illegal firearms in their possession.

Force spokesman ACP Jimoh Moshood, while parading the firearms at the Force Headquarters in Abuja, said the Joint Task Team was still collating the firearms from the states.

He said 425 illegal firearms arms were recovered by the team in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) during raids, stop and search operations carried out by the team’s personnel.

Items recovered, according to him, are: two General Purpose Machine Guns (GPMG), 114 AK47 rifles, eight SMG rifles and 301 other assorted guns.