“Majority of those involved in this banditry are Fulani, whether it is palatable or not, but that is the truth. I’m not saying 100 percent of them are Fulani, but the majority of them are. These are people who live in the forests where their main occupation is rearing of cattle.
They are the same people like me, who speak the same language like me, who profess the same religious beliefs like me. So, what we have here on ground with these bandits, they are not aliens; they are people who we know.”
Gov Aminu Masari, 6th September; 2021 on Channels Television
It is absolutely normal for any rational voter to disagree with one or two, perhaps even more positions on certain issues by a candidate they are going to vote for. Except of course where one takes any candidate as god and themself as incapable of their own opinion on issues.
Arising from a presidential interactive session organized by Arewa Joint Committee held at Arewa house in Kaduna, news portals were running headlines like “Why I was very angry with Gov Ortom – Atiku Abubakar”. The PDP Presidential candidate would then be quoted as basing such anger on his belief that Governor Ortom had profiled Fulani people as bandits!
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There’s an avalanche of literature out there, replete with Governor Ortom’s out cry on the tragic subject of armed herdsmen freely sacking communities across the country. Almost always, it carries with it, his efforts at making the distinction between the good Fulani amongst whom he too has the best of friends and helpers one could ever hope for. Many times he raises his fingers at likely infiltration from neighboring countries.
The latter point being collaborated by President Buhari himself. Indeed, Gov Masari of Katsina State as well as many Nigerian leaders of the Fulani stock, have voiced these same truths.
Curiously, PDP’s Presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar would be quoted as saying he is angry that Governor Ortom profiles the Fulani as bandits. Nothing could be further from the truth.
There is clearly, a want of policy assurances on how to contain the farmer herder clashes that have left large farming communities deserted and new killing fields emerging. This want of policy on the subject is not only visible with the Atiku team. It’s hard to see any of the other 3 major Presidential candidates with a policy document on the subject. It’s too hot for any of them to touch, it seems.
It is conditions like this that speak to the absolute necessity of an Ortom in the Senate! From RUGA to Cattle Colony to a widely reported directive – strange, I might add – by President Buhari to the Attorney General of the Federation to ensure the reestablishment of old grazing routes, Gov Ortom’s unflinching stance has remained a thorn to such land grabbing schemes by an influential oligarchy. Whether or not at a point, he was in same party as the President, the Governor’s voice of reason on the subject has been resolute. In fact, State after State have taken turns to enact anti open grazing laws; region after region, including all of the geo-political zones in the North have come up with communiqué proposing a ban on open grazing and adopting ranching as the way to go. Such are the fruits of the Governor’s staying power and advocacy.
The problem on this subject, for Atiku, is not only that he curiously avoids the more direct and more telling outings by Fulani leaders who admit to their own being the main actors in these acts of banditry and instead picking on Governor Ortom. There’s a much bigger problem.
Apart from the incoherence of policy position on the matter which as per last elections, had him throw up a most shocking proposal that grazing laws in Benue, Taraba, Ekiti etc would be reviewed, he doesn’t seem to have reviewed his own position on this matter. Back then, as the States voiced back their rejection of such an horrendous proposal, another weak and thoughtless one was quickly thrown up to say that he proposes feedlots as the husbandry practice of choice! Feedlot merely being a short term practice of fattening animals (cattle) when it’s 3-6 months to the time they are to be sold or slaughtered for meat. What is the policy on rearing before we get to feedlots? Should States that have opted for ranches and have banned open grazing be supported to achieve both policy objectives or not?
For a leader aspiring to the office of President, Atiku’s condemnation of stuff as recurring as herdsmen attacks on communities, is hard to come by; harder to come by, stories of his visits to IDP camps housing people who have been displaced as a result of such attacks. He needs to show his difference from Buhari on this matters.
As a matter of fact, one with rude awakening no less, in his pursuit of votes, candidate Atiku would be seen condemning a condemnable act, but very fast, in the face of a sectional, ultimately extremists’ inspired grumbling, would quickly ensure there is no longer any evidence anywhere of his ever condemning such an act! It’s stuff beneath a leader who believes in the rightness of his convictions. He must tilt more in resembling the Yaraduas and Shagaris, of which the nation holds fonder memories of.
Atiku’s professed pan Africanism must reflect in his positions on issues; the soundness of such positions and the courage to remain resolute while at it.
Raymond Magen is a Principal Special Assistant to Governor Samuel Ortom on New Media
