The Kwara State Government on Sunday evacuated 40 beggars from the streets to combat crime in the state.

Recall that the state government had earlier carried out advocacy against street begging and hawking before it outlawed it.

The state Commissioner for Social Welfare and Development, Dr Mariam Nnafatima, said that those arrested for violating the law would be prosecuted and repatriated after proper profiling.

Mr Nnafatima urged the public to stop patronising beggars and try as much as possible to be their brothers’ keepers.

According to her, as the world is becoming a much more delicate place, we don’t want the beggars to be used as informants to kidnappers and other criminals.

She stated, “As you can see, some of the beggars have arms on them such as knives and sharp objects and a lot of phones and two phones on each beggar.  You see, common beggars will not have more than one phone or will not have a phone at all. So, what this is saying is that we really need to say no to street beginnings. The reason why we will continue the exercise is that we realised that the beggars have changed strategies, because they were not where we normally pick them before. Which means they have informants within the system. That is why we picked Sunday for the exercise, to catch them unawares. So far so good, we have recorded a lot of success in the exercise because the number of beggars we evacuated today is 40 compared to the previous one of 94. So, beggars have reduced in the state. This is the third round of the exercise aimed at sanitising the state capital and improving security situation.’’

The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Ayanwale Peter, advised the beggars to desist from the act or risk being prosecuted

Speaking with the journalists during the exercise, the Special Assistant to the Governor on Drug Abuse Prevention and Control, Mikail Aileru, said that the exercise would continue.

He said, “In as long as the beggars are out for business, we will be out here to evacuate them. The exercise is basically about the security of our state because we have a lot of people out there, some of them are informants while some are drug dealers and we don’t want the beggars to be used. This is about security in this time that country is battling with security challenges, and we want to make sure that our streets are safe. There are reports of people coming from work being attacked or burgling shops after the owners had left. Beggars are always out here at night and Kwara State government frowns at it because we prioritise the safety of our people.’’

The exercise took place at the following locations -Geri Alimi, Tanke Junction, Offa Garage, Tipper Garage and Zango, among others.

(NAN)