The lawmaker representing Ede-North/Ede-South/Egbedore/Ejigbo Federal Constituency in Osun State at the House of Representatives, Bamidele Salam, has said the federal government must apologise to the families of the abducted Abuja-Kaduna train passengers for not showing enough empathy to them.
The PUNCH had reported that terrorists attacked the Abuja-Kaduna train on March 28, 2022, killing eight while several others were kidnapped.
On Wednesday, Salam walked barefooted from the Unity Fountain in the Maitama area of the Federal Capital Territory to the National Assembly to protest against the passengers abducted during the attack, The PUNCH had also reported.
Meeting with the families on Thursday, Salam said the families had done what was expected of them.
Salam promised to engage with the leadership of the National Assembly so as to facilitate the release of those in captivity.
He said, “I think the first thing is for the leadership of this country to apologise to them. Apologise for the lack of enough empathy because from my interactions with them, they have taken steps and written letters to persons in government including the National Assembly which I will be surprised if that letter got to the office of the speaker because I know he will never ordinarily ignore a letter of this magnitude.
“They have not gotten any response from the security operatives, National Assembly nor have they gotten from all the efforts or contacts they have made since the incident occurred.
“In fact, all the meetings or contacts that have happened since this incident occurred have been at their own instance which I don’t think is very good.
“So I want to apologise on behalf of the leadership and also assure them after listening to this story a positive result would come out.
“I am going to be engaging the leadership of the National Assembly to take this matter in a more proactive manner so that we can bring this to an end as soon as possible.”
He also begged the terrorists to release those held hostage.
Salam said, “To the abductors themselves, if there is a medium through which they can see or listen to this. Please for the sake of almighty God, Allah, let the milk of kindness that the Almighty has put in every human flow in them and please decide on their own to grant freedom to their fellow humans.”
Speaking on behalf of the families, Idayat Yusuf said they have been traumatised since the incident happened, calling on the government to hasten whatever efforts they were making to secure the release of their relatives.
She said, “It has been 65 days of trauma, heartache and unimaginable experience from those in captivity and those at home. And in all our press conferences we’ve been pleading. We have been appealing to Mr President and security agencies ever since this happened yet no result.
They kept assuring us that they will come out. We really plead for urgent negotiation or whatever they are doing as there is no more time.”
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