Madalla Bombing: CP Zakari Biu Suspended Over Escape Of Alleged Mastermind

 

CP Zakari Biu

Police Commissioner Zakari Biu is in trouble over the escape of Kabiru Sokoto, the alleged mastermind in the Christmas Day 2011 bombing of St Theresa’s Catholic Church, Madalla, Niger State. Forty-three people died in the bombing which the Islamist sect, Boko Haram, claimed responsibility. 

Biu was Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Zonal Criminal Investigation Department at Zone 7 Police Command headquarters, Abuja. He was promoted Commissioner of Police (CP) last month.

The CP was said to have sent a team in a Toyota Hilux to conduct a search on Sokoto’s residence in Abaji in the FCT on Sunday. The suspect was handcuffed. Youths in the town spotted him and confronted the police team. Sokoto was freed by the youths. Police’s attempt to re-arrest Sokoto led to a pandemonium, a 28-year old HND student of Federal Polytechnic, Nasarawa, was shot and killed.

Confirming the suspension, Force Police Public Relations Officer (FPPRO), Olusola Amore, a Deputy Commissioner, said the CP and his team of investigators would be prosecuted for Sokoto’s escape, if a criminal case was established against them. 

On getting the information of the escape, the IGP was said to have been shocked. He visited the place Sokoto was detained yesterday morning to get the facts of his escape.

There are claims that the IGP has given an ultimatum that Sokoto, who have been tracked since the bombing, must be brought back at all costs. But our sources revealed that Biu, a prominent member in the Abacha regime once appeared before the Oputa Panel over accusations of torture of detainees.

In an online statement issued yesterday, the police spokesman gave an insight into how the suspect escaped from custody while being driven under police escort to Abaji, a boundary town in the Federal Capital Territory [FCT], close to Lokoja, Kogi State, in furtherance of investigations.

The statement reads: “The Nigeria Police Force wishes to confirm that a suspect was arrested in a successful police operation and was rescued from a team of policemen detailed to carry out further investigation in the matter. 

“The suspect was handed over to a Commissioner of Police for further investigation and he consequently detailed his men to take the suspect to Abaji in furtherance of investigation. 

“In the course of undertaking this important procedure, the policemen on escorts with the suspect were attacked by the suspected sect gang members and in the process the suspect escaped. 

“The Police view this development as a serious negligence on the part of the Commissioner of Police and have since been queried and suspended from duty. 

“If a criminal case is established against him and his team, they will be prosecuted,” it said. 

Sokoto was arrested at Borno State Governor’s Lodge in Abuja last Saturday.

Reacting, the state government described Sokoto’s escape as a fairy tale told to only feeble-minded persons.

This is even as it says the escape confirms the government’s suspicion that there was a grand conspiracy by certain forces to embarrass the governor and the government, with a view to portraying them as sponsors of Boko Haram.

State Commissioner for Information, Inuwa Bwala, who spoke to Daily Sun on phone said, “the intrigues and drama of the reported escape of the alleged Boko Haram suspect arrested at the Borno Governor’s lodge in Abuja from the police, does not only sound fairy tale, it justifies our suspicion to the effect that there may be a grand conspiracy intended to either embarrass the Governor and Government of Borno State, or to eliminate Governor Kashim Shettima.

“Suffice it to raise some posers, the answers to which may give a clue into the seeming mystery: If the man escaped while under escort, how can a man possibly in handcuffs outrun more than a platoon of armed policemen? Could the alleged sympathizers of Boko Haram which Mr President said have infiltrated the security agencies facilitated the escape? Could the arrest and escape stories not be a phantom arrangement after all? From which point did the police radar picked the said suspect in Zuba? Why was the whole drama headed for the Borno Governor’s Lodge in particular?

“Let me state for the avoidance of doubts that nobody or group, no matter their positions, can intimidate Governor Kashim Shettima or rope him or any official of the Borno State Government for that matter into any phantom plot. We are aware that certain people have been plotting to rubbish the development efforts of Governor Kashim Shettima,” Bwala added.