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Tag: Benue state

  • Benue shifts mass burial of 24 victims of herdsmen massacre

    Benue shifts mass burial of 24 victims of herdsmen massacre

    The Benue State Government unexpectedly rescheduled Friday’s planned mass burial for the victims of this week’s herdsmen attack in Okpokwu.

    The 24, including women and children, were killed at Omusu Edimoga. Dozens of others were wounded while some others are missing.

    Governor Samuel Ortom’s Chief Press Secretary, Terver Akase, said the mass burial will now take place on Wednesday.

    He gave no reason for the postponement.

    He merely said :“a church service, followed by burial of the victims, will take place on Thursday, next week at Okpokwu.”

    Governor Ortom however announced that President Muhammadu Buhari will visit the state on Monday.

    It is in continuation of Buhari’s visit to states that recently came under deadly attacks by Fulani herdsmen and militants.

    He has already visited Taraba and Plateau states.

    He is also billed to visit Yobe and Zamfara.

    Benue had in January buried 78 people shot dead by rampaging herdsmen in Guma and Logo local government areas of the state.

     

  • Three herdsmen convicted for violating ranching law –Ortom

    Three herdsmen convicted for violating ranching law –Ortom

    Buhari visit Benue Monday

    Three herdsmen have been convicted in Benue State for violating the Open Grazing Prohibition and Ranches Establishment Law.

    Governor Samuel Ortom disclosed this while addressing party officials and council chairmen during the State Working Committee meeting of the All Progressives Congress, APC.

    He stated that over hundred had been arrested for contravening the law, stressing that assurances had also been given by security agents to help enforce implementation of the ranching law.

    The Governor said Fulani herdsmen who were causing insecurity in the country were enemies of the APC and all Nigerians, even as he called for the arrest and prosecution of leaders of Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore and other Fulani leaders for their inflammatory statements

    Governor Ortom acknowledged the support of the party to his administration especially at its trying moment, assuring that he would not betray the confidence it had reposed in him.

    Read Also: Herdsmen/farmers clashes: Oyo in search of peace

    He tasked the APC on the rule of law, respect for the party’s constitution and the use of dialogue in addressing issues including primaries, saying doing so would reduce acrimony among party members and their supporters.

    The Governor also told the party’s working committee that issues of irregular payment of salaries were being addressed with improved federal allocation to states.

    He officially broke the news of the visit of President Muhammadu Buhari to Benue next Monday to commiserate with people of the state over herdsmen attacks and massacre of Benue people.

    Earlier in a welcome address, State Chairman of APC, Comrade Abba Yaro pledged continued support of the party to the Ortom-led administration, adding that his residence and steadfastness in the wake of herders attacks was commendable.

     

  • Four herdsmen arrested over Okpokwu killings

    Four herdsmen arrested over Okpokwu killings

    Benue state commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni,  said on Wednesday that four persons have been arrested in connection with the killings in Okpokwu Local Government Area; Benue state.

    Suspected Fulani herdsmen had on Monday attacked and killed twenty four (24) persons in Omusu community, Edumoga district in Okpokwu Local Government area.

    Briefing newsmen at the Police headquarters in Makurdi, Owoseni said the four suspects are undergoing thorough investigation and would soon be charged to court.

    Owoseni confirmed that 24 people have been killed while one Fulani herdsman is dead and another missing.

    He said police was alerted to a crisis situation in Okpokwu where youths in the area attacked some herdsmen and their cattle scattered.

    The Police boss said immediately the chairman of the local government converged a peace meeting with the leader of the Fulani the area who his two sons affected was in attendance.

    According to Owoseni, while the peace meeting was going, the attackers swooped on the village and carried out the mayhem.

    Meanwhile normalcy has returned to Omusu community with the deployment of more security men.

    Arrangements are also going on to give those killed mass burial.

    Read  Also: Three herdsmen jailed for open grazing in Benue

  • Five dead in IDP camps – Ortom

    Five dead in IDP camps – Ortom

     

    Benue State Governor Samuel Ortom said five Internally Displaced Persons  (IDPs) including three children taking refuge at designated camps in Benue State have died.

    He said the IDPs fled their homes as a result of the sustained fulani killing are in various IDPs camps

    Governor Samuel Ortom made this known on Friday when the National Commission For Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons (NCRMI) visited the state to distribute relief items for displaced people.

    Ortom said that two of the five deceased were crushed by a truck while crossing the busy highway around the location of the Abegana camp, as he expressed worry that they ran away from their homes to secure their lives but found death in the camp.

    Earlier, the Federal Commissioner of NCRMI, Sadiya Umar Farouq, said during the visit to two of the IDPs camps situated in Guma Local Government Area, near Makurdi out of a total of nine camps in the state that the intervention was meant to ameliorate the sufferings of some Persons Of Concerns (POCs) to the commission.

    “Let me state that the items provided for our POCs does not reflect the totality of our interventions, rather a demonstration of our continued support to the Benue State Government in its efforts to provide succour and other necessary social services for our POCs and communities in the State,” she said.

    Read Also: Ortom: I’ll keep crying until we get justice

    Represented by Mr Charles Anaelo, the commissioner noted that the NCFRMI was aware of the influx of over 10, 000 Cameroonian migrants presently in Kwande Local Government Area of the Benue state, adding that the commission in collaboration with the United Nation High Commission for the Refugees (UNHCR) is currently conducting data  registration of all the victims for further necessary action.

    She therefore reiterated the commission’s commitment to continue to work very hard to ensure that the lives of the IDPs are improved, rehabilitated and fully restored while stressing that in this phase of intervention, the commission had distributed food, care and empowerment items to POCs in the state

  • Benue: Military operation will favour herders over farmers – group

    Benue: Military operation will favour herders over farmers – group

    A Tiv sociocultural group, Mzough U Tiv, has alleged that the military exercise in Benue State is a ploy to provide cover for herdsmen to take over Benue land.

    The operation tagged Ayem Akpatuma was flagged off in Guma Local Government Area on Thursday.

    According to Mzough U Tiv, the military’s  ‘real’ intention can be found in a pamphlet which it circulated on Tuesday.

    The pamphlet, which was issued by the Department of Civil Military Affairs, Army Headquarters, features a picture of a farmer and a herder conversing in Tiv on how to avoid conflict in practicing their professions.

    Mzough U Tiv’s President-General, Engr. Edward Ujege, who spoke to journalists yesterday, claimed that the pamphlet admitted that the herdsmen were responsible for the spate of killings in the state.

    Ujege said: “We wish to express our profound displeasure at the emerging trends of the military operation tagged Ayem a kpatema.

    “The general public may recall our initial apprehension about the real mission of troops deployed to Benue State. True to our predictions, the flag-off of the exercise on Tuesday confirmed our fears.

    “A pamphlet circulated by the Nigerian Army has defined the real intention of the military in Benue State. The pamphlet confirmed that the military had come to provide cover for armed Fulani herdsmen to take over our land.”

    Ujege stated that the message in the flyer, “underscores basic assumptions and erroneous impressions that the military has acknowledged that the Fulani herdsmen are responsible for the large scale massacre and massive destruction in our land.

    “Yet, without addressing issues of justice, reparation and compensation, they are compelling Benue people to accommodate the perpetrators of the heinous atrocities.

    “Moreover, there is no reference to the Open Grazing Prohibition and Establishment of Ranches law 2017, which addresses the fundamental issues of making both the farmers and the herders to coexist in peace.

    “The military is not only silent on the law, but has encouraged open grazing with all its concomitant consequences. This silence on the law points to the fact that they are not in its support and are not ready to ensure its enforcement.”

    According to the group, “the military has also assumed very wrongly that Benue people are responsible for cattle rustling which is not the case as rustling can only be undertaken by professionals in cattle rearing.

    “The publication of the pamphlet in the Tiv language gives the impression that the Tiv are the target of the exercise, whereas the herdsmen attacks cut across the entire Benue State which is multi-ethnic.”

    Ujege said, “This profiling” of the Tiv people was also unacceptable.

    “If the military are to be relevant in the state, they must assist in chasing away the invaders and restoring peace which can only be possible through the enforcement of the anti-open grazing law.”

  • Don’t use BSU to fight Ortom – Council Chairman

    Don’t use BSU to fight Ortom – Council Chairman

    The Pro- chancellor and council chairman of the Benue State University BSU, Professor Zack Gundu has appealed to the people of Benue State to drag the institute into politics.

    Speaking at the meeting between Management, parents and students held at the Auditorium of College of Health, Professor Gundu expressed regret that students unrest led to the cancellation of semester examination and advised parents to monitor their children.

    He said it was unfortunate that about 50 percent of the students failed to register their courses, a development he said it’s strange in a university system.

    The Council chairman warned that the university management will no longer accept a situation where students disrupts examination and blocked the main entrance.

    According to the council chairman there about 20,000 certificates pending collection from students who have graduated more than 10 years and said students must first register for their course before sitting for any examination.

    Vice chancellor Professor Msugh Kembe said all students must pay and registered for their courses in within two weeks before they will regarded as students.

    Professor Kembe said the university is for moulding character and appealed to students with financial challenges to go through proper authority than embarking on demonstration.

    He said management has made available scholarship for indigent’s students and urged them to take advantage and further their education

    Management of Benue State University Makurdi closed the university last week and ordered all students to vacate following protest over payment of school fees.

  • Policeman slaughtered by Fulani herdsmen in Benue

    Policeman slaughtered by Fulani herdsmen in Benue

    Suspected Fulani herdsmen have slaughtered a policeman, plucked his two eyes as well as remove his nose in Azege, Tombo ward Logo local Government area of Benue State on Monday.

    According to a statement released by the Police Public Relation Officer (PPRO) Moses Yamu, a DSP said the body of the Non Commission Officer (NCO) was found today by a team of policemen and deposited in the mortuary.

    He said despite the setback, the police is undaunted, in its effort to tackle security challenges in the state.

    Read Also: Police arraign 3 for alleged car theft

    The statement from the police, regarding the death of the policeman reads

    “The Command regret to announce the death of one of its NCO, who was one of the two remaining missing Policemen in the attack of 9/2/2018.

    He was found brutally slaughtered, with both eyes and ears as well as nose removed.

    We pray that God Almighty grants him eternal rest.

    However, the Police remain committed to its statutory and daunting obligation of ensuring security as well as protection of life and property of all, please.

    The Nigeria Police Force
    Benue State Police Command”

     

  • Wike playing politics with Benue Killings – APC

    Wike playing politics with Benue Killings – APC

    The Rivers State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has accused Governor Nyesom Wike of merely playing politics with his Wednesday’s N200 million donation to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Benue State, while Rivers people are wallowing in abject suffering.

    It expressed shock that whereas victims of killings and criminalities in various parts of Rivers state were licking their wounds and wondering where help would come from, but their governor was busy donating money in another state, creating the impression that all was well in Rivers state.

    Rivers APC, through its Publicity Secretary, Chris Finebone, yesterday in Port Harcourt, stated that lofty as Wike’s gesture seemed, what he only succeeded in doing was classical and wanton display of primitive hypocrisy of the worst type.

    The main opposition APC in Rivers said: “Beyond the highly politicised, self-serving and half-hearted visits to Omoku (in Rivers State, where 23 innocent worshippers were massacred on New Year’s Day), Wike has completely ignored the killings in various parts of Rivers State, especially in the local government area of his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Chairman – Andoni (Prince Uche Secondus).

    “The Rivers governor has neither mentioned nor visited Ajakajak and other Andoni villages, where many persons have been gruesomely killed. Why has Wike not gone to visit victims of killings in Rivers State and donate to their welfare, but chose to travel to distant Benue State to display crass duplicity? APC demands an answer from the Rivers governor.

    Read Also:  We must solve herdsmen killings, says Wike

    “Quite disappointing to the APC is that some prominent Rivers indigenes (some of whose people are being killed in Rivers State) joined the Rivers governor to Benue State and even prayed at the graveside of the victims, while their own people are being killed in Rivers State, without any intervention by Wike and his government.

    “We believe that the only purpose for the Rivers governor’s ego trip to Benue State is mainly to score cheap and pedestrian political points that have no value whatsoever to Rivers people. He (Wike) is only working in line with his belief that he is the de facto leader of PDP. Our people consider the current doling out of N200 millions of Rivers money as part of the billions of naira Wike is spending to sustain and exercise control over his political party – the PDP.”

    Rivers APC also called on well-meaning elders and opinion leaders of the state to prevail on Wike to refrain from playing Robinhood with Rivers money, but to use the commonwealth of Rivers people to give the citizens meaningful development and not the superficial projects he had been deceiving the people with.

    Having openly donated money, the main opposition APC equally called on the Federal Government and its security agencies to keep an eye on Rivers governor, in order not to donate “other things” secretly, given that reprisals were already happening in Benue state.

  • Troops arrest two Fulani herdsmen in Benue

    Troops arrest two Fulani herdsmen in Benue

     

    Troops of 707 Special Forces Brigade, Nigerian Army, on  a routine patrol along Gbajimba – Iyiodeh road in Guma LGA of Benue State have  arrested two Fulani militias.

    According to a statement signed by the Assitant Diector Army Public Relations,707 Special Forces Brigade Nigeria Arny makurd,Major Olabisi Ayeni, stated that suspects  were  planning a dangerous mission.

    The troops sighted the militias while on their daily patrol.

    Read Also:  Fulani  herdsmen kill SARS operative in Oyo

    According to Major Ayeni the  militia who were suspected to be converging, possibly for an attack on Governor Ortom’s fish farm and other innocent citizens were about to be approached for questioning when they opened fire on the troops who later engaged them.

    He said violent herdsmen who also fought back was at the same time trying to withdraw.

    The Special Forces Operators intensified their pursuit and succeeded in arresting two of them while others fled in disarray. The herdsmen had since been handed over to the police.

  • Civil society group decries IGP’s handling of Benue killings

    Civil society group decries IGP’s handling of Benue killings

    A civil society organisation, the Sanctity Transparency Peace Initiative (STPI) has called on the Inspector General of Police Mr. Ibrahim Idris to come clean on the alleged complicity of the police and its negligence which has worsened the herdsmen’s killings across the country.

    In a communique issued on Tuesday after its emergency meeting in Abuja, the group bemoaned the deteriorating security situation in the country, particularly in Benue State.

    The communique, signed by its National Coordinator, Sunday Alakho, the group condemned what it called the less than salutary role of the police chief since the killings by suspected herdsmen started on New Year’s day.

    The group said the IGP’s initial description of the mass murder of innocent villagers by herdsmen as a “mere communal clash” is callous and insensitive against people crying out for Justice.

    It further accused the IGP of flouting the directive of President Muhammadu Buhari to relocate to Benue State and also rated the intervention of the police as a monumental failure, as according to the group, the killings have continued unabated.

    The group also expressed concerns over remarks credited to the IGP that the implementation of the Open Grazing Prohibition Law in Benue was responsible for the killings.

    It wondered if the same law was responsible for the herdsmen’s similar killings in Plataeu, Zamfara, Edo, Ogun, Kaduna and Oyo States where such laws do not exist.

    The STPI maintained that the complicity of the police was confirmed by the reference to Benue’s Governor Samuel Ortom as a “drowning man” by Force spokesman, Mr. Jimoh Moshood.

    It demanded for a full public explanation from the police authorities on what it meant by branding an elected governor “a drowning man”.

    The group urged the Nigerian people not to take the characterisation lightly, as it could be interpreted to mean the safety of the Governor is endangered. It demanded a public pronouncement by the police guaranteeing the safety of Governor Ortom.

    The STPI joined other Nigerians in calling for the immediate arrest of leaders of the Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore which it accused of masterminding the killings, following an earlier threat issued by the herdsmen.

    It charged the IGP to impartially execute his presidential mandate by ensuring the safe return of villagers who have been moving to Internally Displaced Peoples (IDP) camps and to ensure the safety of their communities failing which he should resign.

    The STPI warned the police authorities to refrain from dragging the noble force into the murky waters of politics in order to disabuse the minds of citizens who suspect that the role of the police in this crisis is a manifestation of a hidden agenda against particular ethnic groups.

    It also recalled with dismay an earlier statement credited to the Minister of Defence, Gen. Dan Ali, citing the Anti Open Grazing law law passed by the state as being responsible for the killings.