Beware of the banana skins of the herdsmen

Herdsmen

Sir: “Twenty persons reportedly killed in Enugu State by persons suspected to be Fulani Herds men,” was the news caption recently.When that former governor who swore to an oath to protect the integrity of state – introduced the political form of Sharia to a section of a country known over the years for extolling the principle of multiculturalism and secularism, the president at the time with the power to engage him in a jousts, constitutionally, owing to the secular nature of the Nigerian state looked the other way. The effect of that inaction needs no recounting. With my eyes, I saw a lot and watched pigs eat up the remains of people when crisis erupted after protestations.

People in the Niger Delta live in dangerous times, no thanks to kidnapping which was simulated here, but wouldn’t have been if hordes of men were not armed by politicians, after which sprang the now rested militancy movement which the state could not control. In Nigeria, the state was made for man and not man for state, hence state is under the control of man to be dealt with as deemed fit by man.

Cattle rustling is now a brisk business for many, those irresponsible lots who bring misery to the herdsmen but that regardless is no excuse for herdsmen to trade sticks for guns, tormenting the Nigerian on deathly rampages at every corner and bend of the country.

The inaction of Nigerian leaders overtime has caused the state to be hot under the collar. Irredentism here, militancy there, Boko Haram somewhere and now Fulani herdsmen and yet we ask for investors to come develop polity.

It is time the president began to use the bully pulpit to make them bow to the will of state. Security of lives shouldn’t be negotiated with people who do not value same.
*Simon Abah,
Port Harcourt.