(Kay Aderibigbe)
Nigeria, of recent mysteriously
became a country that is uniquely in a league of its own. This awareness dawns
on the people whenever they expect an action or authoritative statement from
the commander-in-chief, but oftentimes, all they get to hear is "the
presidency says . .". This made some of us, who do not indulge in
speculations, purposely and reluctantly, to synonymize the term 'presidency'
with the word 'president' in order that we might move on with our lives.
The truth between these terms was
eventually revealed on the 10th of June, 2021, when Arise Television, a media house
based in Lagos, granted an exclusive interview to President Muhamadu Buhari;
where he, Mr. Buhari, spoke in the manner that is typical of those that have
been speaking on his behalf since 2015.
The important question of
Farmers-herders conflict asked Mr. Buhari by one of the presenters was answered
with so much riddle wrapped up in an enigma. Having sarcastically and jokingly
retorted that the interviewer wanted him to contradict his AGF- Attorney
General of the Federation; the President then went into an obviously
inconsequential and unconnected illustration to justify his answer.
A simple breakdown of Mr.
Buhari's reply on how Nigeria government can nip in the bud the menace of the
gun-wielding Fulani herders is that, he tasked the state Governors to conjure
or invent the powers they do not have; whereas, such exercise will simply
exacerbate the current security crisis. What is the fuss about cattle rearing
business and why are the herders always at loggerheads with the farmers? Why
the incessant crisis? What is the mystery behind this national question?.
For the sake of good governance,
students of politics and those whose right to study history has been taken
away, we may need to dissect the issue of Farmers-herders crisis in order that
my readers can understand the problem and infer from my analysis: who has the
right to say what and to what extent, on the perennial problem of
Farmers-herders crisis.
Let's start with the evolution of
the concept of grazing reserves/routes and how it became an issue of concern.
Originally, grazing reserves were areas earmarked for the feeding of cattle by
the Fulanis who conquered and ruled Northern Nigeria. This concept received the
colonial government's attention in 1950, when Mr. Hamisu Kano put forward an
idea which became known as the 'Fulani Amenities Proposal' in 1954.
Ten years later, the federal
government had, in the name of the proposal, gazetted 3.4 million hectares of
forest reserves in Sokoto, kabba, Bauchi, Zaria, Katsina and Ilorin as grazing
reserves (Hector and oladunjoye,1970).
Semiarid zones of the present day Zamfara, and Wase, in plateau state,
were also captured in the forest reservations of the grazing plan.
All efforts to improve the Fulani
man’s welfare through the transformation of the herd business culture informed
Northern Nigeria’s Law no 4 of 1965 which gave birth to the Grazing reserve
Laws of Northern Nigeria (Fatai Rotimi A. Williams, 1969). The totality of the
government's investment in establishing land security for nomadic Fulani
settlement was contained in all the development plans executed by the General
Yakubu Gowon’s administration(1966 -1975).
Despite the magnitude of
government’s commitment towards the sedentarization of the nomadic
pastoralists, the Fulanis couldn’t attain equilibrium in their productivity;
follow the tide of time of modernization and change their mentality; nor ensure
self-sustainability of the facilities contained in the grazing reserves
acquired and developed by the government
which was later handed over to them.
One of the veritable cases was
that of the Wase Grazing Reserve, established in Plateau state, in 1965, which
has 74,000 hectares capacity; all facilities inclusive -school, market,
hospital e.t.c. This vast land was overwhelmed in 1975, due to the failure of
the land tenure scheme (Hurumi in Fulfulde language); despite the joint venture
of the Federal government of Nigeria and U.S.A.I.D. Abandonment of grazing
facilities also happened in Sokoto, Bauchi and other places across the country.
Another problem with the said
gazetted grazing routes is the failure of the government to secure legal title
and fair compensation for the indigenous land owners. I explained this
important problem elsewhere, in 2019,in an article titled "Farmers-herders
crisis: one of the agonizing features of a dysfunctional state", where I
highlighted that . . . "Politicians stole the compensation money meant for
the indigenous land owners,re-appropriated the same grazing reserves to
themselves as farm lands and also declared that pastoralists have routes for
cattle in places where there were and places where there was none."
Each time pastures dried up in
the reserves, herders wander into agricultural farmlands in order to ensure the
survival of their stock. Also,due to overpopulation and land scarcity, there
has definitely been some incursions into the reserves over the years by some
agronomists. Some of which are original\indigenous land owners who were robbed
by the state in the name of the Grazing Reserves, while some of them are new
farmers whose old vocations were rendered unlucrative due to economic
retrogression. Apparently, there will be
confrontation between agronomists and pastoralists in this manner.
Against the above backdrop, the
Land Use Act of 1978, in connection to other land tenure problematic factors
made certain, without ambiguity, in Sec 2(1) (a) and (b) that, "the
management and control of all lands in urban areas is under the sole control of
the Governor of each state". Having clarified earlier that the Grazing
Reserve Law was birthed in the North and was meant for the Northerners, it then
becomes imperative that we expatiate the position of the Land Use Act in
relation to the President’s statement and herdsmen overlordship of lands in
Nigeria, viz-a-viz the Asaba Declaration of May 11, 2021 through which all the
17 Governors of Southern Nigerian unanimously banned open grazing in all the
states of the South.
Mr. Buhari, who resorted to
asking his unintelligent Attorney General of the Federation to dig up old
gazette did not know much about the treachery and frauds with which some of the
acquired grazing reserves were established nor did he understood the details of
the Northern Nigerian Grazing Reserve Law and its limitations. Little wonder he
spewed political venom and created more confusion instead of reasoning along
the line of cultural emancipation of ranching that sought to ameliorate the lot
of the Fulani herdsmen.
Since the ideas of Cow Colony,
RUGA – Rural Grazing Areas, and the National Grazing Reserve (Establishment)
Bill of 2017 were all defeated on the floor of the National Assembly, Mr.
Buhari thought the gazetted lands would host his brainchild, i.e. the idea of
NLTP - National Livestock Transformation Plan, in all the states of the federation.
This is absolutely unrealistic because only the North is subject to the grazing
law which could be exploited for this purpose. Moreover, the Land Use Act in
Sec 28(2)(b) talks about the condition under which the federal government can
acquire land. In addition to this, Sec 51(1)(a) - (h) explains in detail the
meaning of 'to put land to public use' and it does not, via any wording, mean,
to exclusively appropriate land for a particular section of the Nigerian
society and their private businesses.
In fact, if by the virtue of
admonition of peace and national tolerance, some Southern states are willing to
allow the NLTP, there is an illuminator in that regard, i.e. the Land use Act
which already made an irrefragable provision in Sec 6(2) that "no single customary
right of occupancy shall be granted respect of an area of land in excess of 500
hectares if granted for agricultural purposes, or 5,000 hectares if granted for
grazing purposes".
Summarily, the manner in which
the federal government of Mr.Buhari is going about the issue of farmers and
herders leaves so much to be desired. Looking at the enormity of landed
resources and availability of hundreds of thousands of hectares in the North,
why is Mr. Buhari bent on stuffing the already overwhelmed and overpopulated
South with those aggressive and chronic conservative nomads who are known for
violence and land trespassing?
For instance, the Global
Terrorism Index Report (2020), puts it clear that, herdsmen killed about 2,400
people between January and November. Over 300,000 people have been displaced;
while more middle-aged people are injured casualties of these attacks within
that same period. This is rather unacceptable, ungodly and totally unhealthy
for the political and economic well being of any progress seeking society.
This matter is generic; it is
volatile, and it is an important problem that should be handled seriously by
the governors of Southern Nigeria and all lovers of democracy so that tyranny
would not triumph against the wishes of the people.
As long as Mr. president couldn't
proffer a lasting solution to the issue of farmers-herders conflict, but rather
stands as a stumbling block to those who are trying to ensure there is peace
and progress; it means, President Buhari is either a trouble maker, an
irredentist ethnic jingoist, whose action doesn’t make him any better than the
so called secessionist agitators he criticizes today. Or he is either a secret
missionary who doesn't want the herders-farmers conflict to end probably
because he needs the instrument of crisis or societal unrest to propagate a
sort of preconceived negative social re-engineering in order to actualize a
certain hidden personal agenda. '
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