Oloyede said this in an interview with Punch against the backdrop of the recent abduction of 27 pupils and 15 staff members of Government Science College, Kagara, Niger State by gunmen. 

In a bid to secure the release of the victims, influential Islamic cleric, Sheikh Abubakar Gumi, who has been in talks with bandits disclosed in an interview that negotiation was ongoing with the abductors.

In another interview with Punch, Gumi revealed that the negotiation does not involve payment of ransom.

He said the bandits only want the government to release their members in the custody of security agencies in exchange for the schoolchildren.

However, Oloyede has criticised the move by the government, saying government is only encouraging banditry in the country. 

Asked if government should negotiate with bandits and grant them amnesty like the Musa Yar’adua-led government did to Niger-Delta militants, the former Vice-Chancellor of University of Ilorin said civil rights agitation should not be mistaken for criminality.

He said, “Let me tell you, in my understanding, there is a difference between criminality and civil rights agitation. To me, what I believe they were doing with the people of the South-South who felt that they have a right that were being trampled upon-that petrol is coming from them and they were not getting enough- is to create something to remedy whatever infractions the nation might have committed against them; it is sort of reparation. 

But for somebody to stand up, kill people, rape people and then say we can negotiate and give them money not to do those things, to me, it doesn’t make sense; it encourages banditry.”

Meanwhile, Gumi had said that the kidnapped schoolchildren and members of their school staff would regain freedom on Sunday, February 21, 2021.