Plateau killings: FG planning to incarcerate me — Jang

A former governor of Plateau State, Jonah Jang, has said attempts to link him to criminal activities, especially the recent killings in his senatorial zone, were deliberate plan by the Federal Government to get him out of the way, so he would not participate in any of the 2019 electoral processes.


But reacting to Jang’s allegation, the Federal Government said it was not aware of the plan to incarcerate him.

“I am not aware,” Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, told Vanguard, yesterday.

However, Jang, who represents Plateau North senatorial district, lamented that the sacrifices Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, made to nurture democracy for 16 years were being eroded by All Progressives Congress, APC, which sought to intimidate opposition party and turn the country into one party state.

The former governor raised the alarm while speaking with journalists in Jos, yesterday, decrying the renewed spate of killings not only in the state but also in many parts of the country and tasked security agencies to stand up and live up to expectation.

He said:  “Doesn’t that sound funny that Jonah Jang, a Berom man from Plateau State, is organising herdsmen to kill Beroms or which killings are they talking about?

“But I just want to say that it is a pity that politics is turning to what it is. I believe that everything is being done to find a reason to incarcerate me so that I will not participate in the ongoing politics.”

‘’I am the senator representing Plateau North, I may be re-contesting the Senate, I may be contesting a higher position, that decision is in the making and the PDP is working very hard to win the election on the Plateau and I am a key figure here on the Plateau.

“There seems to be a very deliberate plan to get me out of the way so that I don’t participate in any of the electoral processes. If this is the way our politics is going to be, then I am sorry to say that the democracy that we worked hard for will be be destroyed.

‘’PDP nurtured democracy for 16 years, that is why democracy is stabilizing but now, the APC as a party, has come and wants to destroy democracy by trying to make sure that there is no opposition, they want Nigeria to become a one party state.

“The security agencies should do their work, year in year out.  When I took over power in Plateau State in 2007, this crisis was on, for eight years, I was struggling with the security to get this crisis resolved.

“Now, it has gone into a wider dimension. We were talking about Plateau, now we are talking about Taraba, Benue, Zamfara, it is going even down to the southern part of the country.

‘’The security must stand up and live up to expectation because if the security is saying that the matter has gone beyond them, let the President ask the United Nations to come in if Nigeria’s security agencies cannot handle it.”