Killers, kidnappers, herdsmen and other evil men may have taken over the farms and forests in many parts of Nigeria, especially the North West, middle belt, south-south and south east. This is believed to be cause of consistent price up shoot of food items, especially garri which has gone from N2,500 a year ago to N6,500 per basin in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
In Rivers State, radio stations are awash with calls for rescue from the farms in most parts of the upland areas, especially Etche, Omuma, Emohua, etc. They call in to report they were being attacked or raped in the farms.
Reports from some rural areas in Imo and Abia states cry out over beheaded farmers especially women who went to harvest cassava. This may have caused scarcity of garri in most markets in the towns.
In the north, international agencies have determined that famine is on the increase as a result of exodus from the farms by victims of Boko Haram insurgents. This is as the insurgents take over the forests and turn the farms to their harvest zones. They allegedly also take over herds from herdsmen.
In the middle belt especially Taraba, Benue, Plateau and Kogi, herdsmen make the farm areas no-go areas. Many farmers have lost their lives trying to defend their farm investments. Herdsmen also invade southward to Delta and Enugu states. Other southern states are threatened.
Delta State seems hard-hit by the menace of herdsmen in the farms and even on the roads and homes, allegedly creating ceaseless havoc. For instance, recently, a 50-year-old staff of the Delta State University, Sunday Idama, was murdered in cold blood on his farmland in Ovurie-Abraka Community in Urhrobo Kingdom of the state, by suspected herdsmen after they fed their cattle with the deceased cash crops in his farmland.
Also, recently, there was anxiety in Urhuoka-Abraka, Ethiope following the beheading of a welder and a native of the area, Solomon Ejoor, by alleged herdsmen. Abraka, as one of the food baskets of the state, is a host community to the herdsmen and is now threatened, creating fatherless and motherless children. A farmer said, Samuel Okumagbe, chairman Ogwuezi Quarters: “For us to go to the farm is a problem. We are not allowed to visit our farms because once they meet you, they rape you. We are all afraid and that is why farming in our area has reduced”.
Governor Ifeanyi Okowa believes this is a national challenge that requires national solution, noting that the police was doing a lot in checking criminal activities in the state.
While assuring that his administration would continue to support the police and other security agencies in the state, Okowa reiterated, “For effective check on criminal activities, it is important for the government to have good relationship with the police which we are doing.”
Since the dreaded kidnapper of Aba, Osisikankwo, and his gang deployed to the forests of Obingwa, Abia State, from where they gave Nigeria hell, leading to deployment of an Army Batallion on Aba Road from Port Harcourt, kidnappers and ritual killers have discovered the use of forests in the east as dens.
Farms and farmers are now in perpetual threat from kidnappers, rapists, ritual killers, robbers, and other evil doers. This has pushed people to the cities and locked them out of food supply like prisoners. Most of those who farmed cassava in the rural areas of Etche and Omuma said they cannot access the farms for harvest.
The various state governments have supported the police with patrol vans and vests but these seem grossly inadequate to address the menace of rural terrorists. The King of Opobo, Dandeson Jaja, last month told Governor Nyesom Wike pointedly thus: “There is no local economy in Rivers State right now, His Excellency. Rivers rural economy is dead. Young people now flee. There is no integrated farming to employ them. Cottage industries are all dead. Let this be your new direction and focus, to boost economic activity in the rural areas. Make rate of crime to come down further. You have just handed over eight armoured boats to the Nigerian Navy. Drug abuse is the cause of crime and violence in the region especially in the rural areas. Drugs can be wiped off in the society if the government wants.”
Security is a federal responsibility with governors intervening with supports. Governor Wike has been pumping support in form of patrol vans and others to the Nigerian police but these may help in the cities. The vast rural communities seem empty and open to attacks. Hoodlums seem to roam and reign freely in most of the rural communities; they impose levies on persons, disrupt events, block the roads, and waylay farmers on farm routes.
Governor Wike also gave 10 armoured boats to the Nigerian Navy last month to do battle against pirates, and the amnesty programme had attempted to mop up arms, but more violence seems to greet these measures.
The go-back-farm call by state and Federal Governments seem to meet a rock as hoodlums push back the returnee farmers. Those who secured loans and invested in farms in the east and south-south say they have been threatened by death and loss of their farms to hoodlums.
Top farmers and community leaders have called for government intervention to protect farming in the south-south and east. Martins Elechi, former permanent secretary and top farmer now based in Elele in Rivers State told BDSUNDAY that a special force must be set up to protect the rural farmers. He commended the efforts of the Rivers State governor in massive support to tame insecurity but called for a new attention in the rural areas.
Saying Rivers State is now more secure, Elechi agreed with those calling on the Federal Government to pay attention to the farms.
Collins Nwachukwu, a farmer and community leader in Aboh Mbaise, lamented the frequent attack of rural farmers. He said while herdsmen destroy farms, other animals such as goats destroy plants by eating them up with the owners of the goats looking the other way. “In Mbutu-Nweorie, we have imposed strict penalties to owners of rampaging animals. The owner of plants and owners of animals are all investors. No one should destroy the other”.
He joined in the call for a militia to protect farms and those going to farms. “The way pipeline vandalism was handed over to the National Defence and Security Corps, that is how farms should get a dedicated security volunteer force for protection. Farming is the soul of Nigeria, whatever destroys it has destroyed Nigeria.”
Farmers say hoodlums destroying farms have ruined the resurgence of agriculture and loans meant for farming in the south-east and south-south. They said most of those who took loans to invest in farming are in serious trouble because of the activities of hoodlums, kidnappers, rapists and sundry criminals. Petty thieves also roam about stealing farm produce and causing losses.
Ignatius Chukwu
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