By Ibironke Ariyo

Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola has assured Nigerians that the insecurity bedeviling the country would be over by December.

Aregbesola gave the assurance when he featured on the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum in Abuja.

The minster said that President Muhammadu Buhari had given December deadline for the security forces to restore order and stability in all parts of the country.

Aregbesola quoted Buhari as saying that he would not leave the country without curtailing and effectively addressing the security challenges.

“He gave the deadline of total elimination of such threat to the security of lives and property by December.

“I believe that nobody is resting in all the arms of government with the mandate of maintaining law and order, guaranteeing security and eliminating threats.

“We are at it, and in the first instance, we must ask ourselves, governance is about ensuring security of lives and properties.

“We will eliminate all insecurity issues by December.

“If you look at the state of affairs in Nigeria, I’ll tell you that a whole lot of progress had been made over the years, ” he said.

Aregbesola recalled that before 2015, Nigerians were living with bombs everywhere.

The minister, however, said that the government had completely eliminated the incidence of Improvised Explosive Device and Nigerians no longer have such fears.

“There was a time when the northeastern part of the country was a daily record of one dastardly act or the other and the entire region was under siege of the insurgents.

“To God be the glory, that today it is no longer there and lives had since returned to the region, that people even want to forget that there was a theatre of blood chilling insurgency,” he said.

Argebesola attributed the spread banditry and kidnapping in some sections of the country, partly to the dislodging of the terrorists in the North-East.

“Militancy in the southeastern part of the country, and South-South, cultism, in the South West; but by and large, we have tamed considerably the level, the incidences and the threats to lives and property in Nigeria.

“However, we could do better no doubt, and that is why the President has given us all in the security arm of government the deadline.

“We are all now up on our heels and toes addressing vigorously such threats and I can assure us all that we will get there.

“Nigerians will definitely heave a sigh of relief at the end of the day,” the interior minister said.

(NAN)