Since the recent murderous activities of the so-called herdsmen in Agatu, Benue State, and Nimbo, Enugu State, which left a trail of blood and tears, Nigerians have not ceased to question why and when the Fulani herdsmen, who used to drive their cattle with sticks, began to carry AK47s, as well as the sources of these dangerous weapons with which they now unleash mayhem on sleeping communities.
They have therefore called on the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to immediately institute a probe into the sources of these weapons carried by the herdsmen, whose activities have been described as perhaps the most dangerous threat to safety of lives and property in the country and who have been classified by a global report as the world’s fourth most lethal ‘terrorist group’ measured by number of people killed.
Although sources close to BDSUNDAY say these murderers may have got their weapons from returning soldiers who took part in the Arab Spring crisis and that the weapons could be the cache of weapons shipped across the Sahara Desert, either by professional gun-runners or by those individuals who were a fragment of a highly-trained Libyan Armed Forces, many Nigerians insist that only a dispassionate, honest and thorough probe into the matter will uncover the real source of these weapons and the grand plan of the suppliers.
“We are certain that these herdsmen are not the owners of the cattle they rear, and they are too poor to afford these guns which we are told cost as much as N400,000.00 each. There are some big men behind them who are sourcing these weapons for them. Who are these big me? That is what we want the president to unravel and bring them to book,” a prominent legal practitioner in Lagos who does not want his name in print told BDSUNDAY.
“Except, of course, the president, whom we are told is the grand patron of the cattle-herders, has another mission we don’t know about,” he added.
Fide Ozichukwu Chukwu, a former People’s Democratic Party national vice chairman, South-East, told BDSUNDAY in a phone chat that it was important for Nigerians to know where the weapons are coming from and why the security agencies have not arrested the herdsmen carrying them all this while.
“You can agree with me that these herdsmen cannot afford the amount of money with which they can buy AK47. So somebody is funding them and somebody bought these things for them. But the most worrisome is not whether they have it or not, it’s how they get it, who gave it to them, and why is it that all this while the security agencies left them to wander about with it harassing, destroying, maiming and raping innocent citizens? These are very serious issues. For a long time they have been going about like this without any person attacking them. This new experience of carrying AK47 and attacking villagers, raping women and destroying farms is very serious,” he said.
“These are the issues: the source of the guns, the cost of the guns, the poverty of the people who carry the guns, and the source of revenue with which they purchase those guns. Even if they purchase them by themselves, are they allowed by law to carry them? If they are not allowed by law to carry them, why is it that the law enforcement agents all this while have allowed them to wantonly go about destroying people, destroying property, and destroying people’s livelihood? Is there nothing that can be done? Of course, something can be done and has to be done quickly and now,” he said.
Chukwu emphasised that nobody is against people grazing their cattle; rather, everyone is united in saying that cattle-rearing is a business and people who do that business must not use it to destroy other people’s lives and livelihood, adding that it was not a case of the Fulani against the Igbo or the North against the South.
“What we are saying is that the government has no business with the cow-breeders and therefore should not under any circumstance, either by law or by fiat, acquire people’s land and give to other people for their business,” he said.
“I’m sure the president will do something now that he has seen that it is becoming a nationwide problem and crisis and it is not taking this country anywhere. He shouldn’t just start a wildfire which he will not be able to quench. The only thing he should do is to be presidential enough, take responsibility and call this people to order, let them survive and let others also survive. Live and let live, I think that’s what everybody is asking for,” he said.
Ikeogu Oke, an Abuja-based public affairs commentator, in a recent article also called on President Buhari, as head of state and commander-in-chief of Nigeria’s armed forces and the person ultimately responsible for securing the country and the lives and property of its citizens, to use every means available to him to arrest the herdsmen’s murderous march of anarchy, which, he said, is being viewed by some as “a devious manifestation of the 2015 post-election triumphalism of his Fulani people”.
“How many such attacks, and deaths, should it take a sensitive and responsible leader to personally reassure his people that their lives matter to him regardless of their ethnicity, especially one who, before he became president, reportedly interceded with the then Governor Lam Adesina of Oyo State to stop the killing of his Fulani people in his state during an ethnic clash with their hosts? And didn’t another of our leaders, former Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State, boast that the Fulani herdsman can now dismantle and reassemble an AK47? Could his words have anticipated the recent killings by people believed to be Fulani herdsmen?” he asked.
“In sum, these killings are anti-Buhari because they put the president at risk of being judged by history as a leader who promised to make things better but left them worse; and not because he didn’t know what to do or lacked the capacity to do it, as his said intercession with former Governor Lam Adesina suggests. And it is in his interest to stop the killings to avoid such a permanent stain on his reputation, besides justifying those who portray him as a sectional leader ruled by primordial impulses. Also, having designated security as one of his major concerns in his inauguration speech, the rising insecurity reflected in the attacks portrays him as a failing president. And stopping the attacks would nip this negative portrayal in the bud, in his interest,” he added.
Recall that in April 2014, in the peak of an altercation between the Jonathan Presidency and the then Adamawa State governor, Murtala Nyako, the presidency had accused Nyako of sponsoring insurgents and ‘importing’ Fulani fighters into the country.
“We also wish to remind Nigerians that this same Governor Nyako was recently quoted as having boasted openly that now that the Fulani herdsmen can assemble the AK47 gun, the security equilibrium in the country is now balanced. The same man was reported to have imported some Fulanis from outside the country and spent millions of naira in rehabilitating, feeding, housing and catering for their welfare,” Doyin Okupe, then special adviser to the president on public affairs, had said in a statement.
Ikeogu said the country was witnessing a pattern of seemingly well-orchestrated violence whose legacy of death and hate may likely pit the south of the country against the north, with predictable consequences for the nation’s peace, unity and stability should it be allowed to fester any longer.
Indeed, only recently, a new Niger Delta militia group known as Concerned Militant Leaders (CML) reportedly gave the herdsmen a two-week ultimatum to vacate the South-East and the South-South.
“After two weeks starting from today, Tuesday, May 3rd, we are going to search for Fulani herdsmen. Since the Federal Government cannot tell us who they are up till now, we are going to look for them,” the spokesman, General Ben, was quoted as saying in a statement issued in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
“The Fulani herdsmen have indirectly challenged us, asking us what we can do. But, we promise them that we will not allow them to go without taking revenge. It is an insult and we will give them back,” the statement said.
CHUKS OLUIGBO
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