Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi on Thursday lauded the Federal Government for checking the menace of oil thieves and militants in Ikorodu and Arepo areas of Lagos state.
Adeyemi made the commendation while fielding questions from State House correspondents after a closed door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari in the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
“We have offered some suggestions.
“We are losing huge resources to the activities of the Niger Delta Avengers.
“Coming close to that is the infiltration of the militants in Lagos and Ikorodu where in the last three weeks, 10 landlords were massacred.
“The Federal Government has since sent forces there to wipe them out.
“Normalcy has since returned to Ikorodu and Arepo area.
“If they had successfully spread their activities to the South West, there would have been more destruction.
Lagos is the economic heartbeat of the nation,’’ he said.
“The President listened attentively and he has asked me to pass the information to other traditional rulers in my domain to assist the government.’’
He revealed that during the meeting, he offered useful suggestions on how best to address the activities of the Niger Delta Avengers and the militants.
According to him, the president asked him to also pass such information to other traditional rulers in his domain and beyond, in order to achieve peace and stability across the country.
The Alaafin described the recent meeting of President Buhari with the U.S. Secretary of State, Mr John Kerry as a welcomed development, saying that Nigeria scored diplomatic point as a result of the visit.
“One major diplomatic point the President scored recently was the visit of the U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry.
“America does not usually send top officers for such visits if they have not used certain parameters to gauge the country’s performance,’’ he said. (NAN)