•Not all herdsmen are criminals, says Kebbi gov

From Rose Ejembi, Makurdi and Olanrewaju Lawal, Birnin-Kebbi

Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom has warned those raising false alarms and making inflammatory statements regarding the security situation in Makurdi, the state capital to desist from or face arrest.

Ortom described as unfortunate, the tendency of some persons to exaggerate the situation in the state, thereby causing fear in the minds of the people. He maintained that such alarms could create panic and give hoodlums the opportunity to harass, rob and even kill innocent people.

In a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary, Terver Akase, the governor said the protests  in Makurdi, last week, have been brought under control, just as he urged the Police to apprehend anyone found fomenting trouble.

Ortom assured Benue people of government’s commitment to preventing further invasion and killings by herdsmen in parts of the state, and appealed to residents of Makurdi to go about their normal activities without the fear of molestation and assist security agencies with timely and useful information to enable them perform their duty of safeguarding lives.

In another development, a group known as Movement Against Fulani Occupation (MAFO) has also called on the Federal Government to declare Miyetti Allah a terrorist organisation and ensure the arrest and prosecution of their leaders of Miyetti Allah, whom they said had owned up to the Benue killing.

Speaking at a press conference on Monday, one of the spokespersons of the group, Dr. Sam Abah, who read the position of the MAFO urged the federal government to step up the current security presence inside Benue to include active searches for and flushing out of all Fulani terror gangs that are openly roaming across the state.

The group also enjoined the federal government to set in motion, a machinery for the reconstruction, bill tattoo and compensation of Benue communities that have been ravaged  by over 47 separate attacks from 2011-2018.

Meanwhile, Governor Abubakar Atiku Bagugu of Kebbi State on Tuesday has said Fulani herdsmen need help to change their old lifestyle, old pastoral practices, and education of their children.

  Bagudu noted that herdsmen have recently been labeled as criminals due to killings in Benue, Zamfara and Nasarawa states.

“Not all Fulani herdsmen are criminals; these  killings have nothing to do with religion. It is just about lifestyle that need to change.”

Bagudu stated this during the disbursement of N93,724,821 to communities under the Kebbi State Community and Social Development Project (KB-CSDP).

He continues: “These are people who move around with their animals. The societal pressure and environmental changes have made this pastoral practises difficult. I was in the Senate in 2014 and we set up an Ad hoc committee and the mission was to visit six states; Benue, Plateau, Nasarawa, Kaduna, Katsina Zamfara states, where farmers and Fulani clashes occurred. Part of our findings was that, in all these states, citizens of various groups who are acting like herdsmen, some of these herdsmen, am not saying we don’t have criminals among them,but we have many of them who are just doing their pastoral and the criminal activities are affecting their lives.

  “It is important that we participate in dialogue that would ensure that the pastoral, herdsmen issues come first, not religion issues. It is an economic issue. These people are risking their lives, it is high time their lifestyle change, whether in Kebbi or in Benue states. So,I think it is now apt for all of us to help them.  It is high time we help them so that they can begin to enhance their lives,s end their children to schools and be agents of economic change…”