BD INVESTIGATIVE SERIES: Killings continue in Benue despite operation ‘Cat Race’

Over a month after the Nigerian army began exercise ‘Ayem Akpatuma’ or ‘cat race’ to arrest the rising cases of herdsmen killings in Benue state and to allow the over 175, 070 internally displaced persons (IDPs) currently taking refuge in ramshackle camps across the state to return to their homes, the army has been unable to stop the killings in the state and the militias responsible for the killings have only grown bolder, extending their areas of attacks from the towns bordering Nasarawa state to hinterland communities in the state.
On March 6, the Fulani militia invaded Omusu in Edumoga local government area of the state and killed 26 residents in cold blood. On Thursday, 22 March, the herdsmen also attacked Umenger community in Guma local government, killing two and injuring many other farmers who had gone to their farms to get food. Just two days ago, the state commissioner of police, Fatai Owoseni confirmed that over five people were killed in various parts of the state over the weekend. He confirmed two people were killed in Agatu, another two in Tse-Semaka and another person along Lower Benue in Makurdi.
“With the magnitude of the crisis we have at hand and, given the on-going killings despite Exercise Ayem A’ Kpatuma, we appeal to President Muhammadu Buhari and the federal government to convert the exercise to a full military operation to chase out the killer herdsmen from our communities,” the governor, Samuel Ortom pleaded during one of his frequent visits to the IDP camps in the state.
“There is no doubt that the level of killings and destruction of property in Benue by herdsmen is comparable to what is happening in the Northeast and, with the rains fast approaching, the humanitarian crisis may get out of hand because many of the IDPs sleep outside, and we all know what that means if the rains set in.”
On a visit to some of the IDPs in the state in February by the BusinessDay correspondent, it was found that although the state government and some well-spirited individuals and groups have been able to ensure that the IDPs have food to eat, the general living conditions at the camps have been pathetic, with frequent outbreak of diseases.
Some of the camps were even relocated due to flood and there are fears the camps could become humanitarian disasters when the rains start in earnest.
Even at that the state government has reached a breaking point and the governor is seeking for federal assistance. Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue state, met privately with President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday, March 27, to seek security help for the resettlement of the displaced 175,000 Benue farmers.
Governor Ortom who briefed State House Correspondents after meeting with President Buhari, said he was at the Presidential Villa to seek help on the plight of farmers whose homes and means of livelihood have been destroyed by the conflict.
“I am here to intimate him of the plight of over 175,000 IDPs that we have in eight camps. They have expressed their desire to go back home”
The crux of the crisis
Although the federal government, the police and security agencies always try to portray the killings as communal clashes, the reality point to a more systematic attempt at dispossessing local communities of their lands forcefully for pastoralism.
True, Benue state being predominantly an agrarian state with virtually all the population, inclusive civil servants, teachers and others, into farming, it was difficult for herders to move freely without encroaching on farmlands.
Clashes therefore, with pastoralists, who move their cattle around in search of pasture along the Benue value, which is ever green, are inevitable.
Fr Solomon Mfa, Parish priest of St Augustine Catholic Church, Demekpe, and one of the founding fathers of a pressure group: Movement Against Fulani Occupation (MAFO) told BusinessDay that what used to be a conflict between farmers and herdsmen over grazing however soon turned to a quest for occupation of some part of Benue land.
Mfa said he discovered while working as a catholic priest in Guma local government, that starting from 2013, the conflict started taking a different dimension; from just mere clashes between farmers and pastoralists for grazing land to one that is targeted at annihilation and occupation.
He said from around that time, the Fulanis started arming themselves – usually with weapons like AK 47. From then, they will deliberately direct their herds into farmers’ lands, eat up their crops and kill and sack the community when they complain.
Surprisingly, they will prevent the displaced communities from returning to their homes and will permanently settle in the communities. He said, the Fulani’s stopped the traditional dialogues and settlements that had always taken place between dissatisfied farmers and herdsmen and are now determined to permanently settle on the Benue valley that is ever green and provides pasture for their herds all year round. This, he said, was accentuated by the coming of Buhari to power. “They became more brazen and acted more like an occupation force than herdsmen in search of pasture for their herds,” he charged.
“The way they went about things was the complete opposite of the Fulani’s we used to know. In years past, we have Fulani’s that come to graze. They came with their wives; they came with their children and they came with sticks. This was in the time when our forests had wild animals. We saw them with no AK 47s. But those ones who come around these days that there are no wild animals, no forests, do not come with their wives, children and sticks. They come alone with AK 47. What is the threat they face that they go about with AK 47? With their superior weapons, they took people’s houses and farmlands and refused to allow those people come back to their lands.”
True, after the attacks on New Years’ eve that killed 74 people, the National Vice President of Miyetti Allah Cattle Herders Association, Husaini Yusuf Bosso, speaking to the British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC, said the only way the killings would end is for the Benue state government to rescind the anti-open grazing law in the state and provide land for them to keep their cattle.
Hinting at a deeper grievance, the association, in a recent online interview, claimed the Fulani ethnic group were long in Benue before the Tivs arrived and would not allow the Tivs drive them out of the place.
“Before they moved into Benue, we were there, grazing our animals. They were not part of the Cororofa Kingdom. They were the last ethnic group to join us when they came through Obudu. They were only given permission for hunting, which is how the Tiv came. The fact that we don’t domesticate the land doesn’t mean we are not indigenous to the land. We are opportunistic users. We don’t displace people to collect their land. We have never collected land anywhere throughout our history.”
Explaining why they are opposed to the anti-open grazing law in the state, the secretary general said: “Go to section 19 [of the law], the entirety of it, they said a herder can only hire land for ranching for one year and no land owner is allowed to sell land for the purpose of the duration of ranching. And when they seize cattle, within 7 days they will auction them. Laws are created to endanger peace and development, now you design a law to exclude your citizens from participating in the utilisation of the land resources to carry out their rightful economic activities. These people are Benue citizens. Most of them don’t know anywhere except there. You now create a law that either they ranch or the leave; to where? After creating those laws, which farmer would want to give them land?”
“You cannot create a segregatory law and not expect a backlash, because these people have nowhere to go and if there is injustice this people will resist it, and that is what is playing out.”
The Nigerian defence Minister, Mansur Dan-Ali, after a security council meeting on January 25, 2018, briefed the press where he gave the position of the federal government on the conflict between herdsmen and farmers in North central states thus: “Since Independence, we know there used to be a route whereby these cattle rearers use. Cattle rearers are all over the nation; you go to Bayelsa, you see them, you go to Ogun, you see them. If those routes are blocked, what happens? These people are Nigerians; it’s just like you going to block river or shoreline, does that make sense to you? These are the remote causes. But what are the immediate causes? It is the grazing law. These people are Nigerians; we must learn to live together with each other; that is basic. Communities and other people must learn how to accept foreigners within their enclave, finish.”
This position, as many keen watchers of the polity has noted, is indistinguishable from that of Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore – the group being accused of sponsoring the killings in the first place.
Pouring petrol on an already rising flame, the IG of Police also described the killings as mere communal clashes and later, when invited by the Senate, claimed the killings were a direct result of the anti-open grazing law passed in Benue state and that the only way to stop the killings was to suspend the implementation of the law – a position clearly indistinguishable from those of Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore. To make matters worse, the spokesman of the police, Moshood Jimoh, launched a scathing attack on the governor describing him as a drowning governor on live television.
Even before the commencement of the military operation, quite a number of Benue indigenes, including the Tor Tiv, Prof. James Ayatse, openly expressed pessimism over the success the mission of the army and its capacity and or willingness to stop the killings.
Expectedly, even weeks after flagging off Exercise Ayem A’ Kpatuma, or Cat Race, an island community at Mbalagh in Makurdi local government was sacked by the rampaging Fulani herdsmen dispersing its 5, 000 inhabitants into Makurdi town under the watchful eyes of the military. The Fulani invaders reportedly quietly ordered residents of the Island to quietly vacate their homes in order to avoid bloodshed and that they were there not to kill but takeover the land.
When the scared locals left, the well-armed herdsmen razed virtually all the homes in the Island and occupied the territory which is less than five kilometre on water from the Wadata area of Makurdi town.
According to Peter Tachie, one of the displaced inhabitants of the island, “They came in their numbers with their cattle into the island from Guma local government area and other places on foot some weeks ago because the water level of River Benue has dropped significantly so they could easily assess the island on foot. Four days ago they started destroying our houses, farmland and food barns and also taking over the LGEA Primary school in the island and converting same for personal use. As we speak no Tiv person is on that island at the moment, they have taken our farms and also uprooted our cassava from our plantation to feed their cattle which are also grazing freely on our farmland. They have destroyed all that we spent years to acquire, so we have all moved into Makurdi main town with our families to seek government’s attention. You know that we do a lot of dry season farming on the Island and as we speak all that we planted in this dry season have all been destroyed by the herdsmen and their cattle.”

CHRISTOPHER AKOR