The Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Abubakar Mohammed, told senators yesterday that he was prepared to place a ransom on the head of the fleeing chairman of the Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina, if that could help to apprehend.
But the senators, who massed on the platform of the Senate Committee on Police Affairs, bluntly told him get the man since it remained their irreducible demand. They mandated him also to engage the INTERPOL to help track him down wherever he may be hiding abroad.
The IGP who told the senators that he is handicapped by the delay in the signing of the 2013 budget to be able to place a handsome reward for whoever apprehends Maina, assured that the force would deploy every available means to arrest him.
Giving a timeline of the hunt for Maina, in compliance with Senate’s directive contained in a warrant of arrest, the IGP told the senators that he withdrew the police from Maina immediately the Senate issued the warrant of arrest and since that time, the man absconded and has not been seen.
He, however, explained that they are yet to scan the immigration to determine which country Maina ran to, because all the processes must be procedural. That, notwithstanding, he said that the police would soon declare him wanted through the involvement of the International Police Organisation (INTERPOL).
According to him, the police team trailing Maina had extended its dragnet to Biu, Borno state, the home town of the subject, on January 31, 2013.
“At about the same day, the team arrived at the family house of Alhaji Maina in the heart of the town. Two elderly persons in the compound informed the team that subject had not visited them for long. Further inquiry revealed that subject has a home in Kaduna and the Team immediately proceeded to Kaduna on February 2, 2013 in search of him, but with no success,” he said.