The deployment of the ISR aircraft is expected to enhance intelligence gathering while the combat helicopter would conduct armed reconnaissance and other combat air support operations in close coordination with surface forces deployed to the State.

 Meanwhile, other NAF air assets are available at nearby alternate airfields to hasten the process of restoring normalcy in the State, as might be necessary.

Crisis engulfed Plateau State on the 23rd and 24th of June, 2018 which resulted in the loss of about 200 innocent lives, burning of houses and vehicles, and destruction of properties. The attack was reportedly carried out by suspected armed herdsmen.

Since then , Nigerians have continued to condemn the attack. Speaking on this issue ,
President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki has advised President Muhammadu Buhari to direct his security chiefs to immediately produce quick response measures aimed at tackling the spate of killings in the country.

Saraki, said it is important for Nigerians to start having the assurances that the government is decisively responding to the current threat to lives and properties in parts of the country.

“I am very sad to hear the news of the incident in Plateau State. This is very depressing and giving the impression that the country is not safe. The problem of Boko Haram in the North-east is well known to everybody but this killing by unknown band of assailants in Benue, Taraba, Plateau and Kaduna States is now giving another dimension to the crisis. Coming at the time we are getting ready for elections, we need to respond fast.

“If the plan is to develop some long term measures, we also request that the President should mandate the security chiefs to put forward an immediate short term and quick response measure which will restore confidence in the system and demonstrate to the criminals behind this killings the capacity of government to tackle the issue.

“We have to immediately device a plan through which the criminals behind the killings and their sponsors can be nabbed and made to face the wrath of the law. We have to also develop plans to mop up illegal fire arms in the hands of dangerous elements while also stopping the influx of these arms into the country”, he stated.

Also , the speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Yakubu Dogara, has condemned the killings.

Hon Dogara said it was reprehensible that people who gathered to bury their dead would be gruesomely murdered in that manner.

“Our security agencies must rise up to the task of securing the lives of citizens of this country. The attack reportedly lasted from 1:00 p.m. noon of Friday, and lasted till about 8:00 p.m. on Saturday. Where was the Police and other security agencies that they failed to respond to stop the killings?” he queried.

“This further strengthens my constant call for an overhaul of the entire security apparatus of this country. It just isn’t working,” he stated.

He said that rising level of violence and gruesome killings of innocent and hapless citizens poses serious threat to Nigeria’s democracy and must be stopped.

Senator Ahmed Mohammed Makarfi is pained by the news of breakout of violence and resultant loss of lives and properties in Plateau State. The Senator considers this calamity as unfortunate, unnecessary and condemnable.

Senator Makarfi believes that even though disagreements are normal in any human setting the civilised way of resolving such disagreements is by communicating with one another through constant and continuous constructive engagement. The resort to violence has never been known to have led to the resolution of any dispute.

It is Senator Makarfi’s belief and conviction that since even after real war situations, peace and reconciliation terms are eventually discussed and agreed on a round table, violence shouldn’t be an option in the first place.

The Senator hereby appeals to all Nigerians to eschew violence, retrace their steps and return to the good old days when we all related with one another as the brothers and sisters that we have always been. The artificial divisions that are threatening our fabric are alien to us as a people and it is in our enlightened collective interest to throw away the yolk, embrace one another and deploy that diversity with which God has endowed us for the overall development of all of us, so that we bequeath a legacy of unity in diversity for this and upcoming generatios.

They all conveyed their condolences to all bereaved families, government and people of Plateau State.