The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Fulani herdsmen

  • Benue: Fulani accused Agatu farmers of killing 10,000 cattle

    Benue: Fulani accused Agatu farmers of killing 10,000 cattle

    The Fulani community in Benue State has accused Agatu natives of killing 10,000 cattle belonging to its members.

    Ado Boderi, who spoke on behalf of the Fulani community on Thursday, during a meeting between Agatu community, Fulani community and Police Inspector General Solomon Arase, said criminal elements from both sides escalated the crisis despite the quick intervention of the governor.

    He said that Fulani herdsmen were a peace-loving people, whose main concern was the problem of cattle rustling.

    Akpa Iduh, who spoke on behalf of the Agatu people, decried the continued unprovoked attacks on his people by “Fulani mercenaries”.

    Mr. Iduh, who said that the crisis started over five decades ago, lamented that it had recently turned into a war because of the types of weapons the herdsmen were using against them.

    He alleged that the “Fulani mercenaries” were killing both children and pregnant women on sight, adding that they were powerless after embracing the Benue Amnesty Programme and surrendered illegal arms to government.

    “The herdsmen are bent on turning our land into their grazing area, thereby rendering us homeless and without food.

    “Is it because we are minority and poor that they are using their numerical advantage and wealth against us?

    “We are going to remain in Agatu until the day they have succeeded in killing all of us.”

    The Inspector- General of Police, Solomon Arase, said in Makurdi that the force had deployed enough policemen to end the clashes between Agatu farmers and herdsmen in Benue.

    Mr. Arase, who was on a fact-finding mission to the state, made the assertion at a meeting between Agatu farmers and herdsmen.

    He disclosed that the force had deployed additional four units of police teams to the area to arrest the situation.

    “I am in Benue on the directives of Mr President on a fact- finding mission and to also see if there is a way to resolve the crisis.

    “We have enough security officers to end the ongoing crisis between farmers and herdsmen in Agatu Local Government Area of Benue.

    “We have also deployed additional four units of police teams in the area to arrest the situation.

    “There is no way we can all live together without having disagreements with one another at some point; it is the way we manage the disagreements that matters.

    “Both the farmers and herdsmen must learn to cohabit with one another as a nation for the peace and progress of our people,” he said.

    Reports that out of the 10 council wards in Agatu Local Government Area, only one ward was not affected in the bloody clashes.

     

     

     

     

  • Fulani herdsmen ‘kill’ man in Enugu

    Fulani herdsmen have allegedly killed a man, Chinwuba Ekwueme, in Egede, Udi Local Government Area of Enugu State. The deceased was a member of the Egede neighbourhood watch.

    The murder has heightened tension but community leaders have waded in to forestall a reprisal.

    Chairman of the Egede neighbourhood watch Mr. Donatus Otie said Ekwueme died from gunshot wounds after herdsmen shot at his group. His colleagues fled.

    The ruler of Egede, Igwe Polycarp Oyigbo, lamented the recurrence of such attacks and wondered why the government had not offered measures to stop them.

    Igwe Oyigbo, who said the community leadership had been begging youths not to retaliate, hoped that the police would keep to their promise of prosecuting the culprits.

    “I do not know if it would have been better to allow them take the law into their hands; so government should take appropriate actions to end the menace,” he said.

    President-General of the Egede Town Union Ichie Clement Amuji lamented the pain the herdsmen had inflicted on his people.

    “The attack by these herdsmen is a menace to our people. We have been complaining to the government; we have written letters to Udi council and the DPO of 9th-Mile police station.

    “This has been happening; they have been destroying our crops, raping our women. Three years ago, they killed a man from Umuanum. It is sad because the situation has repeated itself.”

  • Shun negative conducts, Adamu tells herdsmen in Imo

    Shun negative conducts, Adamu tells herdsmen in Imo

    The Special Adviser to Imo Governor on Livestock and Hausa Community Affairs, Mr Hassan Adamu, has advised herdsmen in Imo to shun acts capable of igniting crisis.

    Adamu told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Owerri on Saturday that situations where herdsmen rape women, attack and destroy farms in the course of their operation were unacceptable.

    “Before now, there have been some reports of herdsmen using their cattle to destroy crops in farms, rape women and even attack the natives who came to rescue their victims.

    “This kind of misconduct is against the promotion of unity encapsulated in one Nigeria philosophy and must be stopped by those who perpetuate these crimes,’’ he said.

    NAN learnt that there has been an upsurge in the cases of herdsmen raping women and attacking natives in Owerri West and Ngor Okpala Areas of the state.

    Adamu said he had been part of the team that brokered peace in most of the cases, urged them to be law abiding and reciprocate the hospitable gesture of Imo people.

    The aide also warned northern youths against indulging in criminalities, noting that his office had received reports of youths arrested for house breaking and stealing of public property.

    “Recently, a northern youth was electrocuted in Imo because he went to steal a transformer and security men traveling with the state deputy governor arrested some vandalising somebody’s vehicle along Port Harcourt Road.

    “The Commissioner of Police equally informed me sometime that some northern youths were in police custody because of one crime or the other.

    “I feel the youths must refrain from such negative conducts in the interest of peace,’’ he said.

    Adamu, who expressed confident that the involvement of some youths in misconduct would soon been history, said he had met with the leadership of various Hausa quarters on the problem.

    He, however, commended Governor Rochas Okorocha and Imo people for their hospitalities to northerners, and prayed God Almighty to continue to engender peace among Nigerians irrespective of where they live.

  • Falae: My kidnap useful if S’West is rescued from Fulani herdsmen

    Falae: My kidnap useful if S’West is rescued from Fulani herdsmen

    FORMER Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Chief Olu Falae yesterday revisited his recent abduction by gunmen and said his ordeal remains a blessing until the Yoruba are liberated from Fulani herdsmen’s attacks.

    He told a delegation of the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), led by Otunba Gani Adams, at his Akure residence that contrary to claims by the Department of State Services (DSS) that the abductors were mere criminals looking for money, they were determined to kill him.

    “They were not after money alone; they wanted to eliminate me by shooting my car, thinking I was inside the car,” he said.

    He added, “They later walked into my office with their sharp knives and cutlasses and started attacking me before taking me into the bush. We trekked from Akure to Owo, following bush paths and swampy areas on my bare legs till we got to an area close to Ifon in Ose local government.”

  • Fulani herdsmen and food security

    The recurring clashes between Fulani herdsmen and farmers in some parts of Nigeria remain one of the major threats to food security in the country. The recent abduction of former Minister of Finance, Chief Olu Falae, purportedly by Fulani herdsmen with whom he was reported to have been having squabbles over farm issue, has once again brought to the fore, concerns over constant hostility between Fulani herdsmen and farmers across the country. Sadly, this perennial feud could have serious implication for food security n the country. Just recently, an alarm was raised on how the encroachment of farmlands by herds of cattle will, in no small measure, affect the output of crops coming from the north; the region relied mainly upon for the provision of foodstuffs and fruits in the country.

    In Jigawa State alone, more than 70 cases of conflicts have been recorded since the beginning of the 2015 farming season. These cases bordered on encroachment into farms by cattle and farmers misuse of cattle routes. The situation is not different in Nasarawa and Benue states, the food baskets of the nation as Fulani herdsmen persistently engage farmers in feuds that often result in serious causalities on both sides. While farmers accuse the herdsmen of farmland encroachment, the latter blame the farmers and members of their communities for rustling of their cattle.

    In time past, herdsmen and their farmers used to have a reasonably symbiotic relationship. While the cattle served as means of transportation for daily goods as well as manure to fertilize the fields for farmers, the herdsmen in turn obtained grains and other farm products from the farmers. But later, as the expansion of farming activities, which invariably led to a huge demand for farmlands drastically reduced supply of grazing land, flocks of cattle frequently encroach upon already cultivated fields to the chagrin of farmers. This, indeed, is a major source of unending friction between the two. Unfortunately, the friction, if not properly checked could have adverse effects on food security in the country.

    However, pastoralists and agriculturalists conflicts are not the only challenges affecting crop outputs and the provision of food security in the country, other factors include environmental degradation in form of soil erosion and overgrazing;  climate change (which has caused shifting weather patterns is increasingly viewed as a current and future cause of hunger and poverty because it leads to increasing drought), flooding, and changing climatic patterns requiring a shift in crops and farming practices that may not be easily accomplished.

    The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that about 805 million people of the 7.3 billion people in the world, representing ratio one in nine, suffered from chronic undernourishment in 2012-2014.  Among all the hungry people, 791 million live in developing countries, representing 13.5 percent, or one in eight, of the population of developing counties.

    Another key issue is the future of industrialization and higher standards of living. The springing up more industries to cater for the growing population of white-collar job seekers affects provision of food for the people. The lands hitherto used for agriculture are being sold to give way for these industries. And often, these lands contain trees- usually felled- needed to boost the oxygenation of the environment as well as produce both food and cash crops.

    Another critical issue is the attitude of young people to agriculture. Commonly tagged dirty and not a money spinning occupation, most young people abhor farming. This is because it does not bring immediate financial returns compare to other jobs such as banking and working in oil servicing firms. There is mass migration of young school leavers from the rural communities to the cities, thereby leaving behind old and tired hands to engage in farming.  Another major obstacle to sustaining food security in the country is the communication gap between the farmers and policy implementers. In most cases, the policy implementers do not really carry the farmers along in the process of policy implementation. This, perhaps, is responsible for the inability of subsidized fertilizers and loans from the government and its agencies to get to the real farmers who are in dire need of it.

    But as daunting as these challenges may appear, the country has options to address them. In the case of farmer-herdsmen violence, the Buhari administration should creatively strategise with stakeholders to find a lasting solution to the problem. One thing that can be done to reduce the tension is for the federal government to establish grazing zones across the country for the Fulani herdsmen. Once this is done, government should ensure that the herdsmen strictly comply with the grazing zone arrangement. This would, no doubt, greatly reduce friction over land resources. Equally, the Federal Government should take steps to dismantle the armed cattle rustling rings reportedly wreaking havoc in the northern part of the country.

    Additionally, governments at all levels should encourage young and unemployed school leavers to embrace farming through the provision of lands, seedlings, mechanized infrastructure and easy access to loan. The Lagos State government is already doing something in this positive direction as it has empowered young rice farmers with inputs ranging from land preparation, seeds and fertilizer provision as well as access to irrigation. Equally, in order to boost productivity, farmers in parts of the country where scarcity of rain is usually experienced should embrace micro- irrigation. This technology enables farmers to enjoy water supply all year round and essentially it efficiently irrigate, grow crops and boost their farming income and outcome.

    It is gratifying to note that grand efforts are already being put in place to boost food security in the country. Recently, the Nigeria Agribusiness Group committed a sum of N360billion to assist small – holder farmers to boost agriculture in 22 states. According to the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Sonny Echono, this investment will create jobs for youths, women, and uplift millions of farmers out of poverty. If loans such as this are judiciously disbursed and used, it will in no small measure ensure food security in Nigeria. It is, however, important that all stakeholders rise up to the occasion by ensuring that more resources are committed into the agriculture sector. If we must boost food security in the country, this is the time to stop paying lip services to the issue of agriculture and walk the talk.

     

    • Bakare is of the Features Unit, Lagos State Ministry of Information & Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja.

     

  • Gunmen kill district head, policeman, 33 others in Niger

    The District Head of Allawa village in Shiroro local government area of Niger State along with his brother, 33 villagers and a police Inspector were killed in a midnight raid by unknown gunmen on Tuesday.

    The gunmen, who were suspected to be Fulani herdsmen, invaded the village with dangerous weapons including sophisticated machine guns and started shooting at the villagers.

    Several villagers were seriously wounded while trying to escape the invaders, while 25 houses were razed by the invaders.

    The attack which lasted two hours left the villagers helpless as no security agency came to their aid.

    The motive for the attack remains unknown as there have not been any friction between members of Allawa village and Fulani herdsmen in the locality.

    Confirming the incident, the state’s Police Public Relations Officer, ASP Bala Elikana, who expressed shock at the death of innocent people, said the command has not been able to get the exact number of victims of the attack.

     

     

  • Our Girls; Remember  Fulani Herdsmen-Farmers War; Assets; Info Ministries/Media  save lives

    Our Girls are still missing since April 15, 2014. President Buhari has promised to focus on their safe return and to relocate the Forward Command HQ of the Boko Haram War to Maiduguri, the embattled state capital and long sought prize of the insurgents which has again come under murderous attack along with Fika, Gamboru and Ngala since the President assumed office. Maiduguri must not fall.

    Let us congratulate the majority of the seriously over-estimated 160+ Nigerians, most likely nearer 120m, on surviving the ‘Political War of 2015’. There were deaths, murders, casualties and a massive nationwide trauma from the massive non-democratic assault on the democratic wishes of the citizens.  Add to that a huge war budget nationwide which has been a major contributor to the crippling of the finances of the country, including the fall of the naira, and we see the true cost of this ‘Political War of 2015’.

    We must congratulate President Buhari for being tenacious enough and politically savvy enough to cooperate with strange bedfellows to achieve the APC, a ‘fruit salad’ of good and evil to defeat the pot of stew, amalgamated evil, that PDP turned out to be with too few good pieces. In a fruit salad, the pieces still remain individual and separate and identifiable. The person we have put in charge, President Buhari, can use his opportunity and powers of investigation to choose between the sweet and sour pieces to present to the people the next group of leaders. He and the VP have set a good example by declaring their assets, hopefully publicly. Of course they can and will insist on obedience to the law and make ‘Assets Declaration’ accompany ‘Acceptance of Appointment Forms’ for Ministers and all advisers and appointees. The difficulty would be to get governors to follow suit with themselves and their commissioners and advisers. It is not a moral difficulty but a corruption perpetuation difficulty.

    However President Buhari must try to make Assets Declaration the first step to all such government appointments. Whether he can get assent from a current NASSty NASS remains to be seen. The NASS track record, for party members of all parties, in financial transparency is legend and abysmal. It is in serious doubt if the membership of NASS and even the state assemblies are willing to clean up their act or allow themselves to be cleaned up. Indeed the President referred to difficulty with getting the states and LGAs to cooperate. Only time will tell. The President was particularly silent on the second Nigerian War –The Fulani herdsmen- Farmers across 10 states War’ which claims between 30 and 100 citizens a day and over 5,000 to date. He will be expected to tell us his plan for the end of this war in the near future.

    While we give President Buhari the next few days to tell us his plans and reminds him that there are 1460-5= 1455 days  left, let us take a break from politics and remember to implement policies at home and at work that will save ourselves to enjoy the fruits of our 2015 democratic struggles.

    I have recently advised several groups on how to stay healthy and attended the funerals of too many acquaintances and friends. No one will live forever and no one knows the day of death, but there are a few things we can all pay attention to in order to even the odds. There are lessons to be learned from the maybe N1.5-2tillion naira political campaign even as we remove the posters and burn the newspaper adverts. If we paid as much attention to our health as we do to politics and gossip we will be a healthier happier people.  If we funded health posters and health adverts as much as we fund political posters and political messages we would all be healthier or and happier. If our 200 radio and TV stations carried as many life-saving and health information messages as political messages we would all be healthier and happier. If the ministries of information at federal and state and LGA level did their real job of informing the public every day about the 200 life-saving messages instead of what politicians’ daily antics we would all be healthier and happier. Nigeria’s media must educate. It must take responsibility for the medical and social ignorance of the citizens as it has 24/7 access to citizens who are often ignorant of life-saving skills and messages. This is the task before all government and private media organisations and executives – to educate the citizenry during the next 1455 days on staying alive before 2019 round of democracy and election education. There is more to media responsibility for citizens’ education than Ebola and Elections. There is life itself and people need life skill education daily as new ignorant citizens hear and see radio and TV for the first time every day.

    So the inadequate amount of airtime allocated to such life skill messages is a scandalous indictment on the media which happily awards itself accolades for branded commercial advertising while to population falls ill and dies from lack of life skills. Life skill messages needing dissemination include taking folic acid throughout reproductive life, checking Blood Pressure, examining your breast and abdomen for masses, knowing your genotype, low sugar-salt-fats-alcohol intake and regular exercise. ‘Life Skill Message Education’ is in and out of school time and worktime.

    ‘If our 200 radio and TV stations carried as many life-saving and health information messages as political messages we would all be healthier and happier. If the ministries of information at federal and state and LGA level did their real job of informing the public every day about the 200 life-saving messages instead of what politicians’ daily antics we would all be healthier and happier’

     

  • Our Girls; Better IDP care; ‘Fulani Herdsmen-Farmers War’- ‘Cow Meat Boycott’ and Mass Transit the answer?

    SIR: Our Girls are still missing since April15, 2014, what a tragedy for the families and our country. We often claim there are no jobs for our professionals and tell them to become entrepreneurs. With high unemployment of professionals will 100 psychologists now be recruited, employed and deployed by government, NEMA, the Red Cross and other agencies. They are needed for the mental and emotional care of those traumatised by the bullets, bombs, bestiality or bereavement of war. Available assistance appears stretched to the limit in caring for Internally Displaced Persons. Yet over N57billion was raised by the Victims Fund and more donated internationally. This is the time for IT-monitored, accountable, open-handed, quick action and red tape-cutting assistance with no corruption or bureaucratic bottlenecks leading to another monumental government failure to help Nigerians. If Nigerians fail to quickly rehabilitate our over two million victims, we do not deserve to be a country. We see no money collections and posters and media urging volunteers and donations towards the relief effort.  Who are the faces of Nigerian women leadership leading the support efforts for victims? This HUMANITARIAN WAR EFFORT is what Governors’ wives and the wife of the new President should be proud to do FROM DAY ONE in the new dispensation in association with the women of Nollywood, women professional bodies, wives of the armed forces, wives of bankers etc. I say ‘wives’ but men also need to support this war effort.

    The destruction in the Middle East should worry all of us. Here, the Boko Haram War will not go away. It keeps rearing its ugly explosive murderous ‘here today-gone tomorrow- back the next day’, guerrilla-style tactics so successfully used in the past by the Boko Haram war machine. The recurrent war events in Maiduguri and the recapture of Borno towns already retaken by Nigeria suggest the need for larger forces. Driving Boko Haram away is not the complete answer. The exits must be sealed and the enemy captured. Therefore we need the establishment of efficient commando counter-terrorism guerrilla-style Nigerian Special Forces units in the bush to encircle and cut off escape routes into the bush, forest and across borders. In the national interest and that of millions displaced and at daily risk of being blown up by an increasing number of forced and volunteer suicide female bombers, misplaced military pride must be replaced by cooperation and pragmatism.

    There is need for better Nigerian/ Nigerien/ Chadian military cooperation. The publicised, un-denied use of mercenaries is not without its huge financial cost. It seems the Nigerian Army has fallen foul of the ‘Consultants Disease’ infecting the federal and state civil service, parastatals like NNPC and even the private sector where at every point ‘Consultants’ are invited to do the ‘dirty’ work like raise taxes from the population, sack staff, conduct forensic audit of accounts and now even fight wars. Often if that cost was properly injected given to the organisation as motivation and material, the same result would have been achieved in the often badly demoralised primary organisation.

    Amidst the euphoria of ‘change’ come May 29 and with just 1460 days in control of Nigeria, there are some hard decisions needed. The political battle and war may have been won but there is also real ‘blood and dead bodies’ wars. Boko Haram has local and international, political and religious, poverty and financial, radical and rapist components. But there is another war, a local war which killed three Tiv farmers this last weekend. This ‘our war’ is rooted in Nigerian feudalism and the terrors of an expansionist history, religious and political, territorial and right of way/passage through farms and drive for conquest and humiliation of others. The recent deadly attacks in Taraba, Plateau and Benue resulting in 100 to 400 deaths and involving men in Nigerian army uniform, Fulani herdsmen and perhaps fatal differences between local tribal populations especially farmers. The cost is high and rising with reported tit-for-tat deadly attacks by Fulani herdsmen and farmers in the over 20+ year old Fulani herdsmen-farmers war. It has defied all the conflict resolution attempts of local and international expert mediators to date who must redouble their efforts in the coming months for success.

    Can Buhari stop this ‘The Other War’? Has he got the moral authority? Can the military be applied neutrally? As an interested party, after all he is Fulani, will he be able to be fair to all concerned, as Rotarians will say? Are the causes of this Fulani Herdsmen-Farmers War just difficulties over ‘grazing rights’ or ‘watering holes’ or deep ‘ethnic agendas’ like seizing farmlands and produce without due process or payment for village and farm produce consumed by herdsmen, their families and cattle? There has been historical animosity. Too often the incumbent federal government disarms one side, exposing it to attack or prosecutes one side for possession of weapons for defence as the government does nothing to protect them.  Nigerians must look for other meat that does not cost the lives of its wonderful farming families and gallant soldiers. Why eat meat costing lives or livelihoods of families- Blood Meat. Will a cow Meat Boycott bring sanity through trailer and train transport? Perhaps! In the 21st Century cattle can easily be fed, watered and fattened at source on large northern farms and moved by train or trailer nationwide eliminating the North-South cowherd routes.

     

  • One killed as Fulani herdsmen invade Benue community

    One person has been confirmed dead and 10 others injured at Ikyoawen’s Moon Ward in Kwande Local Government Area of Benue State, when suspected Fulani herdsmen attacked the village.

    An eyewitness told our reporter that the suspected Fulani herdsmen stormed Ikyoawen at 1pm yesterday when most of the villagers had gone to Jato Aka Market.

    Allegedly armed with sophisticated weapons, the invaders set 20 houses ablaze, shot and killed a resident.

    The Kwande Divisional Police Officer (DPO), who declined to speak on the matter, confirmed the attack.

    He said security men had been deployed in the area, adding that normalcy had returned to the village.

  • Army, militiamen clash in Jos

    Nigerian troops battled militiamen in Jos, Plateau State, on Sunday after they destroyed several villages and killed scores of people last week, including six soldiers who had their eyes gorged out and tongues cut off, a military spokesman said.

    The group is not part of the Boko Haram sect, Special Task Force spokesman, Captain Ikedichi Iweha, told Reuters, but he did not give further details on their identity.

    “Tongues were cut off, eyes were gorged out, bodies were decapitated,” Iweha said of the soldiers killed in the April 28 attack that saw several villages on the border of Plateau and Taraba razed to the ground.

    “Yesterday, contact was made with the militia group and a firefight ensued. It is still going on,” he said.

    Iweha said he could not disclose what triggered the initial attack until the operation was completed.

    A resident of the area said the army had killed 20 people in retaliation for the dead soldiers, who he said were murdered Saturday night. Those killed belonged to the Tarok ethnic group, members of which had allegedly engaged in cattle rustling.

    “I saw people killed deliberately by the soldiers. Some ran to the river but could not escape. They were caught by the bullets,” Usman Sabo told Reuters.

    Iweha denied the army had attacked the villagers.

    Clashes pitting the cattle-herding Fulani people against mostly settled farming communities like the Berom in Nigeria’s volatile “Middle Belt” are common.