By Olufemi Oni, Ilorin

The President, Ilorin Emirate Descendants Progressive Union (IEDPU), Alhaji AbdulMumini Ayo AbdulMalik, has disclosed that the IEDPU would partner with the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) to rid the capital city of abuse of illicit drugs.

In an interactive session with Journalists on Tuesday in Ilorin, the state capital, AbdulMalik added that the union would also synergize with other security agencies in order to collectively wage war against other various social vices within the metropolis.

He said: “We in the IEDPU are already forming synergy with the NDLEA as well as the Police and the Army to curb drug abuse and other social vices within Ilorin community, because drug abuse in particular is contributing to the insecurity in the state capital.

“We have decentralised the IEDPU where branches can be found in every part of the city and people can make reports whenever they see any anti-social activities within their respective places of abode.”

Speaking further, AbdulMalik, a retired paramilitary officer, said some of the security concerns in Ilorin community can be traced to the illegal activities of some land vendors in the community.

He, however, assured that the union was working tirelessly to mitigate the problem, saying: “We are working on it because we have a standing security committee in the union headed by the retired Lieutenant Colonel Abdulkareem Adisa Muhammad. We felt he would be able to handle it, being a retired security officer. His Deputy is Alhaji Yusuf Abdullahi who is currently the head of Kwara State Community Policing.

“We have been moving around the city to sensitise various community leaders across the Emirate, and we have encouraged each community to have a security committee so that they will be giving us information on security situations in their communities.

“Whenever we get information, we always get across to the Commissioner of Police. I can assure you that both the Commissioner of Police and the Director of DSS are cooperating and collaborating with us and they always act on every information we supply to them.

“We are already sensitising the people on the problem of land selling. Apart from lands that are needed for public use such as governmental development, we have urged our people to stop selling lands. Rather, they should be leasing them out.

“Leasing will reduce the problem of selling a single piece of land to multiple buyers, which often leads to chaos and loss of lives.

“We want to urge our people to stop the illegal act of selling a piece of land to multiple people. But anyone who had already fallen victim should register their grievances to the community heads for resolution rather than causing chaos.”

On the prevalence of moral decadence in Ilorin, the IEDPU Chief said: “We have a role we are playing in that regard. I remember that in the past, the union visited several settlements and communities within Ilorin and met with all the community leaders to discuss the security and conduct of the youths.

“We spoke on how to inculcate good morals in the people, especially the youth. We urged clerics in various communities to promote good values and morals in their sermons”, he said.

AbdulMalik attributed the rising cases of moral decadence in Ilorin to its contact with other cultures, adding that community leaders are making efforts to improve the morality of the people.

“Since our community is now more open to people moving here, definitely we are bound to be influenced by the cultures they are bringing and that is one of the reasons our royal father, the Emir of Ilorin, Alhaji Ibrahim Sulu-Gambari, reintroduced the annual Durbar festival in order to tackle the external cultures that are polluting our own.

“We are glad that these efforts are bringing positive results. Our youths, when they return home during the festive period, no longer stay at junctions to do carnivals where they do all sort of immoral acts such as drinking of alcohol. Rather, they prefer to come and be part of the Durbar festival”, he said.

The President of IEDPU, while speaking on the impact of the Durbar on the Ilorin community, said, “It is part of a cultural revival that was introduced by our father, the Emir of Ilorin. And essentially, it is to curb some of the behaviours amongst the youths who are trying to copy other cultures.

“Some of the greatest achievements of the Durbar are that it brings us home together to socialise because we all come together, irrespective of our political differences. It also has economic impacts as businesses, especially those in the tourism and hospitality industry, make sales during that period. It also serves as an alternative for the youths to participate in rather than organising carnivals that are un-Islamic and against our traditions as a people”, he said.

While discussing the ongoing developmental activities of the State Government, Alhaji AbdulMalik commended the Executive Governor, Mallam Abdulrahman and urged him to forge ahead. He particularly commended the Governor for the all-round developments in the state generally but specifically acknowledged the efforts of His Excellency for trying to accord Ilorin the status befitting a state capital.

On the current goings in the country, he appealed to the people to be patient as the government is fully aware of their desires and is working to address them.

The president also dispelled the rumour that the union is leaning toward a political party, saying that “we as union members do not belong to any political party, and we always relate with the government of the day to get something for the community and not the individual, that is what is happening.

“People make a lot of assertions. I don’t remember any past presidents in recent times that have been given any political appointment. Rather, we only lobby for our people to be in higher positions, which is part of our duty of looking for progress for our community”, he said.

AbdulMalik also commented on the delay in the completion of the construction of a skills acquisition Hub and a Mosque at the Union National Secretariat, which had since set the tongues wagging.

He said, “We are working on the project, but because of this galloping inflation, we have problems with them. We have little means as a union, we rely on the goodwill of the people to support us to get the projects done in good time.

“For the mosque, we are about to do the decking, and we will do that within the next one week or two while the skills acquisition Hub is near 100 percent completion. But what we need now is equipping it with equipment like computer accessories and other things like that and so on”.

AbdulMalik said the union activities are always targeted at promoting education in the community, saying that, “if you look at the pattern of IEDPU, we have been focusing our activities on education, concentrating on how to get our people educated.

“The hub itself was conceived because we discovered now that going to schools alone may not fetch you employment easily, except you have some skills to add to your education, and that is why we have the hub. That is, to train people in skills such as ICT, fashion designing among others. The mosque as well, is not only a place for you to pray, it is a place of learning too”, he said