• As groups warn FG over herdsmen, grazing reservesAbimbola Akosile in Lagos and George Okoh in MakurdiThe Representative ofthe United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to Nigeria and EconomicCommunity of West African States (ECOWAS), Mrs. Angele Dikongue Atangana has stated that the level of killings and destruction perpetrated in Agatu local government by herdsmen is the worst in history.Also, the Federal Government has beenenjoined to handle the matter of grazing by Fulani herdsmen objectively, in order toavoid a crisis in the country.Atangana, who was led on the tour of the area by the Deputy Chairman House of Representative Committee on Internally Displaced Persons, Refugees and North East Development Initiative, Ezekiel Adaji, also described the damage as unimaginable.The UN Representative, who said the plight of Agatu people deserved both national and international attention, stressed that it would be difficult for the affected people to rebuild their communities with external help.“In my 20 years of working as a humanitarian, I have never seen such a level of destruction. If steps are not taken, the crises can affect the country as a whole,” she said.She noted that the damage caused by the herders was similar to what was happening in the North-east, and assured listeners thather commission would aid in the rehabilitation of the displaced persons.Addressing the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) at the Ugbokpo camp, Mrs. Atangana disclosed that the commission had donated non-fooditems worth over N20 million to the IDPs, stating that the items were already with the State Emergency Management Agency,SEMA in Makurdi.Meanwhile, some prominent groups have condemned the inaction of the federalgovernment to the recent killings by Fulani herdsmen in the state.[image]The groups, including Mdzough u Tiv (MUT), the Idoma National Forum and the Omi Igede condemned what it termed as “The Barbaric Killing and Wanton Destruction of Property of Benue Indigenes by Fulani Herdsmen”.Also, another group called Think Tank for The Body of Christ (Edo & Delta States) recently released a position paper titled ‘The Politics and Economics of GrazingReserve’, where the federal government was urged to avoid favouritism in the issue of grazing reserve in the country. The leadership of the Benue groups observed with dismaythe inability of both the Federal and State Governments to prevent the escalationof the occupation of their lands since it started manifesting several years ago. They also blamed the escalating crises on the delay in the take-off of the Presidential Investigation Panel promised by President Muhammadu Buhari.“The proposed Town Hall Meeting by the Federal Government is not only diversionary, but a deliberate ploy to downplay the degree of attention and seriousness that should be accorded the invasion of our land. We wonder why the same Governmentthat promised to set up an investigation committee is now resorting to a mere ruse called ‘Town HallMeeting’.“We observed that theTown Hall meeting held on the 24th day of March, 2016 in Abuja by 1 Idoma Initiative with the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) during which some major decisions were taken as detailed in a communiqué did not have the mandate of major stakeholders in the crisis.“The Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps are poorly managed, and the IDPs are living in very deplorable conditions, with inadequate security arrangement and acute shortage of relief materials.”In their demands, the groups called on the federal and state government to set up a Judicial Commission of Enquiry to unravel theroot causes of the gruesome massacre of Benue people.“While we appreciate the efforts of various concerned groups at resolving the Fulani crises, the invasion ofour land by people under the cover of Fulani Herdsmen should be classified as an act of insurgency and the perpetrators labeled as terrorists to be routed out by the military. The perpetrators and sponsors of such heinous crimes against humanity must be brought to justice”, they said.
They also demanded that all herdsmen in Benue State should relocate immediately to allow farmers go totheir farms without fear of being attackedas the farming season approaches inorder to avoid severe famine next year; and added that a Victims Support Fund should be established for rebuilding destroyed communities with adequate compensations to families of victims.In the position paper by Think Tank for the Body of Christ, the group noted that due to population growth of both humans and cattle, creating grazing reserve is not a sustainable project.“Rural and urban sprawl, commercial ranching, river basin projects, wildlife reservation, and the construction of roads,railways, schools, airports, research stations, state, and local government headquarters have all made provision of grazing reserve an impracticable project.“If Nigeria is a countryof laws; if the Nigeriangovernment does not want to be an accomplice in the pogrom of inestimable proportion that will certainly result from its irrational knee-jerk approach to solving the Fulani aggression and assault on innocent Nigerians, then, the resolution toprovide grazing reserve across the country should be quietly withdrawn”, it added.
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