Herdsmen Should Vacate Benue, Says Gov Ortom

Tribune / Nigeria: Irked by the constant attacks on farmers in Benue State by herdsmen, the state governor, Chief Samuel Ortom,  has called on the herdsmen to vacate the state immediately, just as he said the people of the state might resort to self defence because they have been pushed to the wall.

Reacting to the attack at the weekend on Agwabi Village, in Binev council ward of Buruku Local Government Area of the state, Ortom, who could not hide his feelings, went wild and stated that the state was under siege, adding that the herdsmen had virtually taken over the land in the state. He submitted that enough was enough for the daily killings of the people of the state.

According to him, “it is a bad situation now, everyday you hear my people are being killed, raped by these mercenaries, they do not have respect for rule of law neither for security personnel.

“These are wicked mercenaries under the guise of herdsmen attacking us and taking over our farmland. I have said it several times that we do not have land for grazing in the state, let them move out of the state.

“There is a limit to which I can appeal to my people to restrain, from reprisal attack, if all of them are killed, then I will be the next target. The problem is that if you push them away from one point, they move to another point and their style is to kill, destroy farmland and take over the land.”

When asked about the herders’ allegation of the youths in the state rustling their cows, the governor debunked the allegation, saying: “it is the criminal elements among them that always go and steal their cows” and queried whether rustling of cows was commensurate with human life.

He further said the herders, most times, hid under rustling of cows to perpetrate evil, “for instance, in my village, they claimed that my people rustled their cows and they went ahead to kill 50 of my people and took over the land, this is genocide.”

The governor also decried the situation where none of the herders or perpetrators of these dastardly acts had ever been arrested or killed by security men, despite their presence in places where they had operated, noting that “in Buruku, there were military men and mobile policemen stationed there.”

Meanwhile, as efforts to rescue the Catholic priest, Reverend Father John Adeyi  from his abductors seem to be hanging in the balance, Governor Ortom has offered to pay N5 million for information on the whereabouts of the priest.

Reverend Father Adeyi, a Vicar General of Otukpo Catholic Diocese, was, about a month ago, abducted on Enugu-Otukpa Road about 2.00pm on April 24, 2016.

According to a statement issued by the Special Adviser on Media and ICT to the governor, Mr Tahav Agerzua, the governor regretted  that one month after the unfortunate incident, security agents were yet to apprehend the culprits and rescue the priest, appealing to members of the public to assist with information about the whereabouts of the priest.

He said any person or group who offered such information would be paid N5 million as reward and expressed worries of the government and people of the state on the incident.

He said security agents have acted on previous information and combed several places without positive results, hence the imperative of making the offer.

Governor Ortom also solicited sustained prayers for the release of the priest adding that with God, nothing is impossible.

He assured the Christian community that the government and entire people of the state were in solidarity with them for the rescue of the priest.

It will be recalled that suspected kidnappers had opened contact with relatives of the priest few hours after he was kidnapped where the sum of N10million was demanded as ransom but was said to have been reduced to N2million after negotiation.

The N2million was said to have been paid four days after the abduction with the promise to release the priest later that Wednesday.

It was however gathered that efforts by relatives to locate him after the payment of ransom was unsuccessful as all the contact lines have since been switched off.