Over 800,000 Displaced in Nigerian State as Catholic Charity Decries Silence on Crisis

“With the Boko Haram insurgency in the North claiming global headlines, the rapidly deteriorating situation in the South has gone largely unnoticed,” the DHPI Director said, and added, “Over the past months, land invasions by ‘Fulani Cattle Herders’ have increased in the South. Ogun State, Cross River, Benue, Ebonyi, Imo and Anambra are particularly severely affected.”

In the June 30 report, Mr. Viljoen says the fact that hundreds of thousands of people have already been affected by the crisis in just one Nigerian State points to the dire situation in the entire Southern region of the country that is also suffering at the hands of Boko Haram.

The DHPI official makes reference to a report by the President of the Benue Alliance for Truth and Justice (BATJ), Peter Shande, who noted that communities across the State had been destroyed by armed Fulani herdsmen and the people evicted from their ancestral homes.

The BATJ official has condemned local authorities for allowing Fulani herdsmen to be carrying AK47 assault rifles while herding their cattle.

The official says that the invasion by the Fulani herdsmen in Benue communities is more horrendous than the killings in Zaki Biam, a military operation in which more than two hundred people were killed in various locations in Benue State in October 2001.

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“This is a band of terrorist gang that has held Nigeria to ransom, raping, burning and killing citizens and none has been apprehended and prosecuted. To make matters worse, they are now arm-twisting the federal government to grant them amnesty,” Mr. Shande says in a report quoted by Mr. Viljoen.

The BATJ President asserts that the Fulani menace has dominated the six years that the Benue’s current governor has spent at the helm of the State’s leadership, saying, “It is unfortunate to say that he has buried more citizens killed by the Fulani than all the past administrations put together.”

In his Wednesday, June 30 report, the DHPI Director says that indeed, Fulani herdsmen are walking around with guns, terrorizing residents of River State.

“This is a threat to the residents’ peace and security as the Fulani militia overpower them with sophisticated weaponry, to the extent of attaching guns to the cattle,” Mr. Viljoen says.

He explains, “Vast areas of farmland are now occupied by the armed Fulani militia, recently in Ogoni communities of Seme Luekun, Baa Luekun, Dae, and Kpaa in Khana LGA and Eteo LGA of Rivers State.”

The official of the peace entity of SACBC says that the Fulani militia is armed with weapons far superior to that of the military men who have been trying to work with communities with the aim of restoring peace in South-west Nigeria.

He says that the military needs sophisticated weaponry and modern-day technology to effectively reduce and prevent crimes.

Additionally, the farmers in the Central and Southern regions of Nigeria need to be compensated if the crops or farmland is destroyed by armed Fulani militia or their cattle, the official of the Catholic peace entity says, adding that this will greatly reduce the ongoing clashes.

Agnes Aineah is a Kenyan journalist with a background in digital and newspaper reporting. She holds a Master of Arts in Digital Journalism from the Aga Khan University, Graduate School of Media and Communications and a Bachelor's Degree in Linguistics, Media and Communications from Kenya's Moi University. Agnes currently serves as a journalist for ACI Africa.