By Ayodele Oni
Benue State Youth Forum has described threat by a Fulani socio-cultural group, Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore to drag Governor Samuel Ortom to International Criminal Court of Justice, ICCJ, as a mere distraction.
The Group, during a press conference in Makurdi on Monday, said Miyeti Allah members have been responsible for the spate of killings and abductions in Benue state.
President, Benue Youth Forum,Terrence Kuanum, explained that Miyetti Allah National Secretary, Alhassan Saleh raised lame allegations that Governor Ortom seized 25,000 of their cows and arrested 400 of their members without any cause.
“Granted that Governor Ortom had while unveiling the Benue Community Volunteer Guards, BVCG) in Makurdi, said the government had secured the conviction of over 400 Fulani herders, who had besieged the state and had seized over 25,000 cows, we all know that it was done within the law.
“While we are not worried over the empty and baseless threats to drag the Governor the ICC, we are once again concerned that this group that has claimed responsibility for the massacre of Benue people and sacking of communities and creating a humanitarian crisis is reminding us that cows are more important than human lives.
“Even though the Miyetti Allah leadership further contradicted itself by saying in one breath that their members were not in Benue State, and claiming in another that they were being maltreated in the state.
“It is common knowledge that there is a law prohibiting open grazing in Benue state. When the Open Grazing Prohibition and Ranches Establishment Law of the state was enacted in 2017, the leadership of Miyetti Allah addressed a press conference and threatened to resist the legislation violently.
“The group’s National President, Abdullahi Bodejo and National Secretary, Saleh Alhassan, said they were going to mobilize Fulani herders from across West Africa to invade Benue state and ensure that the law was not enforced.
“They said Benue land belonged to them. The bill, which was assented to by Governor Ortom in May, 2017, came into effect on the 1st of November, the same year.
“Immediately following the enforcement of the law, the herdsmen intensified attacks on Benue communities, killing hundreds of people, and displacing millions who are still in internally displaced persons, IDP camps.
“The height of it was the massacre of 73 people on the 31st of December, 2017 and 1st January, 2018 in Guma and Logo Local Government Areas of the state.
“Barely 48 hours after the mass burial of the 73 victims of the herdsmen attacks in Benue, the National Vice President of Miyetti Allah Cattle Herders Association, Husaini Yusuf Bosso, warned that more blood will be shed in the state if the law prohibiting open grazing introduced by Governor Ortom was not completely scrapped.
“There were also several threats by a group known as Fulani Nationality Movement, (FUNAM) to ensure that there was no peace in Benue unless the law banning open grazing was repealed.
“We are all aware that the same Fulani Nationality Movement claimed responsibility for the attempted assassination of Governor Ortom in March 2021 and several other threats on his life by the group and Miyetti Allah.
“That they have resolved to make Benue a killing field as long as the people do not surrender their land for them to occupy is nothing new, except that little or nothing has been done by the Federal Government to tame them, despite repeated calls by Governor Ortom.
“The Ortom administration has persistently told the herdsmen that they are free to acquire land and establish ranches if they wanted to rear cattle in Benue, but they keep insisting that the land belongs to them and there were cattle routes in Benue hence they must keep grazing openly.
“These killer-herdsmen, who bear sophisticated weapons and carry out nefarious activities, are bent on continually destroying lives and property in our communities and there seems to be little concern from the federal government to call them to order.
“Even as we speak, the group that has been identified as one of the most dangerous terrorist organizations in the world is still unleashing terror on the people and has never stopped even for a moment.
“They are creating a huge humanitarian crisis in the state after killing over 5,000 people, destroying property worth billions of naira and displacing about two million people from their ancestral lands.
“Funnily enough, these same people who have the blood of innocent women, children and the elderly on their hands are the ones crying blue murder now.
“But one thing is certain; whichever way we look at the situation, these characters value the lives of animals more than human life.”
Meanwhile, Governor Ortom has told them he will meet them at the ICCJ.
