The National Security Council on Thursday announced that it is considering the nationwide ban on motorcycles and mining activities in the country.
The Federal Government of Nigeria may ban the use of motorcycles nationwide following increasing security challenges threatening the corporate existence of the country.
The National Security Council on Thursday announced that it is considering the nationwide ban on motorcycles and mining activities in the country.
The meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari, at the State House in Abuja, said although the council was mindful of the pains the ban would cause, it was part of strategy to curb terrorist activities, checkmate loopholes and cut off their sources of funding.
Addressing state house correspondents after the meeting, the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami stated that investigations were still ongoing especially to establish the correlation between mining and motorcycles which they suspect provide funding for the supply of arms to the terrorists.
Malami said that terrorists had moved from the conventional ways of funding their activities to mining and ransom taking.
He accepted that the economic consequences of the proposed resolutions, particularly the motorcycle ban would be enormous but noted that it had become imperative in order to guarantee the nation’s security.
He said "Terrorist groups, in particular in Nigeria, are increasingly interested in controlling areas of production of gold. The opportunistic nature of these activities ties strongly to the fact that gold is often the favoured mineral of the terrorist groups as many of these groups use this to secure a source of funding for future operations."