Delta women barricade road, protest against killer herdsmen

Govt defends hosting of NCI meeting

Thousands of women from Ossissa, Ndokwa East local council of Delta State yesterday barricaded the Ughelli-Asaba expressway to protest against the activities of Fulani herdsmen.

Commuters were stranded for several hours following the traffic gridlock on the road, which started as early as 5:30a.m.

The protesters said they would no longer tolerate the serial brutal attacks on their people and raping of women on farmlands by herdsmen, who also destroyed their crops.

One of the protesters, Mrs. Grace Oliseyeun lamented that the community has been living in fear for the last three days as a result of the attacks by herdsmen.

According to her: “The herdsmen have invaded our community and are constantly harassing the women and youths. We cannot go to our farms for fear of being attacked. They are very hostile and our lives are in danger.”

The President of Ossissa youths, Mr. Chris Ebisue corroborated Oliseyun. He said herdsmen had unleashed terror on their community, which led to the death of a young man on his way to the farm recently.

He said: “They have been attacking our people and denying them access to their farms. They threaten our women who have now abandoned their farms for fear of being raped. They came to our town some days ago, threatening our people and injured two men.

“We have petitioned the state government and those in charge of conflict resolution convened a meeting between us and the herdsmen on April 20 where a 10-day ultimatum was given to them to vacate our community. Instead of complying with this directive, they went back to re-enforce and since then it has been hell here.”

He urged the state government to take a drastic action against the killer herdsmen.

Meanwhile, the Commissioner for Information, Mr. Patrick Ukah, has explained the decision of the state government to host the 46th meeting of the National Council on Information (NCI) scheduled for October 26 to 29, 2016.

The commissioner told journalists yesterday in Asaba, that the event holds much potential for the state government and information officers who are expected to explore the meeting to update their knowledge.