Mace snatching: How thugs overpowered us – NASS security opens up

Security operatives at the National Assembly, Thursday, said they could not overpower the hoodlums who carted away the Senate mace because they lacked the requisite training and facilities, TOPNAIJA.NG can confirm.

Speaking with a high ranking officer in the office of NASS sergeant-At-Arms, who did not want his name in print, he said, “our major challenge is that our staff need training, continuous training. It could be organised by outside experts or among ourselves on how to handle the situation in the chambers”.

But when grilled on why the suspended Senator, Ovie Omo-Agege was even allowed into the Senate chamber, he said, “Actually, he was not supposed to have been allowed. But the way we work here, sometimes, we are being demoralised. Maybe, our staff were thinking that if they had stopped him, some of his colleagues would have intervened.

“When the hoodlums were intercepted, the suspended senator said, ‘They are with me’. You know when your master said, they are with me, it becomes a normal thing since he has identified them”.

He continued, “But when one of us ran out from the chambers to inform us that something was happening, we thought that it was an issue between a visitor and our security personnel.

“But unfortunately, as we tried to prevent them, they overpowered us”.

Speaking on why the hoodlums passed through the villa gate successfully, he said it was largely because they had no communication gadgets with which to raise alarms and disseminate urgent information.

“What happened was because we don’t have communication gadgets to pass information during such an urgent situation. Even, one of us used his car to block them”, he added.

The highly placed security officer, however, denied the knowledge of whether or not presidency had a hand in the political brigandage and desecration of the hallowed chambers.

“As for whether or not the presidency was involved, we don’t know. That is their politics”, he said.