Skirmishes between largely indigenous farmers and so-called settler pastoralists in Southern Kaduna, since 2015, has assumed an alarming dimension with killings being reported on a daily basis.
For instance, in December 2016, the Catholic diocese of Kafanchan disclosed that within a space of one year pastoralists killed a total of 808 people in 53 villages and burnt 1,422 houses across the local government areas (LGAs) of Kaura, Sanga, Jama’a and Kauru. Farm produce estimated at N5.5 billion were destroyed too. Even the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El Rufai, confirmed the invaders were Fulani herdsmen; the state government had to pacify and pay them to stop the killings.
They so-called herdsmen over the last four years have literarily gone amok, killing and destroying communities as revenge for their rustled cows, as reprisals for the killing of any of their member or to ensure access to grass for their cows. It’s the same story in Benue Plateau, Taraba, Enugu, Delta, and Ekiti. Fulani gunmen loot and burn communities either in the thick of the night or in the mornings when the men have gone to farms, killing defenceless and innocent women, children, the old and infirm..
Shockingly, government’s initial reaction to these killings has followed one trend: deafening silence. Followed by a half-hearted response that has failed to stop the killings and a refusal or inability to apprehend the killers and bring them to justice. At one occasion, the President’s spokesman, Femi Adesina, curtly berated those expecting the president to speak on the issue because the president believes in true federalism and the state government was handling the issue.
On the eve of the just concluded presidential election El Rufai, announced that about 66 Fulanis at Maro in Kajuru local government had been killed. Some human rights groups and humanitarian agencies including the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and the Red Cross providing relief and engaged in peace building efforts in Kajuru hotly disputed the veracity of this information. The Kaduna state governor revised the figure of those killed to 130 and not 66 as reported earlier.
After that ill-informed announcement by the governor, the Adara community in Kajuru LGA has been besieged by armed Fulani herdsmen. Hundreds of men and especially women and children have been killed in cold blood and neither the state nor federal government has responded.
In 2015, Nigerians had hoped that, given his military background, the election of President Buhari would end the deteriorating security situation of the country. Sadly, the security situation is hardly better. Even more worrisome is the lack of any clear strategy from the president, other than the usual platitudes, for ending the killings.
Despite the deteriorating security across the country, the President has kept the heads of his security agencies. Unless the president knows something that we don’t about his security chiefs, there is no better measure of their performance than their ability to protect Nigerians. What is the purpose of a government if it cannot protect its own people?
The killings have continued because there have been no consequences. Those who should arrest them have not done so because no one is holding them to account. Mr President, ultimately, is responsible. Meanwhile the perpetrators are emboldened.
“How can a responsible government allow [its] people to be killed in this way” asked President Buhari back in 2013 when he criticised former President Goodluck Jonathan over Boko Haram. He even suggested that Jonathan resign for a more competent leader to handle the security situation. Six years after, perhaps it is time President Buhari heed his own advice.
