Chairman of the South-West Governors’ Forum and Ondo State Governor, Mr Rotimi Akeredolu, on Wednesday, tackled the Fulani Socio-Cultural Association under the auspices of Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, over the call by the group asking the Federal Government and National Assembly to stop the implementation of the anti-open grazing law in Southern states.
Akeredolu who blasted the group over the call described the threat by the herdsmen group as unacceptable in a lawful society, saying there is no going back on the anti-open grazing law and would be implemented vigorously in Ondo State.
The governor, in a statement signed by his Senior Special Assistant on Special Duties and Strategy, Dr Doyin Odebowale, said the statement credited to the group through its secretary, Saleh AlHassan in a video is uncouth, uncultured and, evidently, deracinated vagrant.
He urged AlHassan and his group to be contented with the resources within their environment just as he maintained that the south is not ready to cede any part of the ancestral heritage to enjoy “peace and progress” offered by associations of bandits, robbers, kidnappers and rapists.
Akeredolu who said the ban on anti-open grazing will be enforced vigorously said in the statement that: “The Ondo State Government is in possession of a video clip of the press statement issued by a so-called association of cattle breeders, Miyetti Allah Kataul Hore, through its secretary, one Saleh AlHassan.
“This uncouth, uncultured and, evidently, deracinated vagrant, left no one in doubt as regards the level of support certain criminal elements, like he, enjoy, deplorably. This man admits, without qualms, that members of his association have been frustrated to the point of taking to banditry and other forms of criminality to “fight poverty”.
“He makes too much weather of a cultural practice associated with an ethnic group and expects all other ethnic groups to accept such backwardness and adjust, accordingly, or be ready to face the ceaseless onslaught of the denizens of the forests, even those from other countries, who must rape, rob, maim, kill and despoil in response to “climate change”.
The statement read further that “They claim to be above the law of any State in the Federation. They warn of the imminent breach of peace and promotion of pervasive anarchy if they are not allowed to ravage the sweat and toil of the long-suffering farmers who, apparently, don’t count for much in the scheme of things in their estimation.
“They thank the federal government and ask its functionaries and the National Assembly to ensure that they continue to kill, maim, rape and dispossess their victims, whose citizenship is not shrouded in any historical obscurantism and dependence on any nebulous protocol for dubious integration, with the ultimate aim of dispossessing the indigenous owners of the land.
“Any ethnic group, truly indigenous to the geo-political space known as Nigeria, should not be desperate to appropriate other people’s lands to assuage banditry, rape and robbery.
“Modernity imposes certain obligations on any social group which claims a membership of the human race. It is arrogant, and this is being mild, for any assemblage of criminal upstarts, to seek to issue orders to the elected representatives of the people on the best way possible to administer their states.
“It is indulgence taken too far for a group of private businessmen to seek to take over people’s lands because of the mistaken belief of support for banditry.
“There is no ethnic group which does not parade an array of professionals in all walks of life. There is no ethnic stock bereft of sound and principled agents of advancement in a transitional society.
“It is disingenuous and fraudulent for any band of stragglers, certified felons, to paint a highly resourceful people, with the same indolent and retrogressive brush, a befitting epitaph for characters of Saleh Hassan’s felonious hue. No cultural practice permits criminality.
“Banditry, rape and armed robbery should not be attributes of a people. Personal businesses must not become the prime occupation of a government of a geo-political space with multi-ethnic groups.
“Our contemporary history is replete with events of brazen treachery as recompense for the warmth and hospitality extended to the undeserving. Various communities live with painful memories and indelible scars. We refuse to become slaves in our land. We defeated treachery and unbridled arrogance.
“We are not prepared to cede any part of our ancestral heritage to enjoy “peace and progress” offered by associations of bandits, robbers, kidnappers and rapists.
“Saleh and his sponsors should be content with the resources within his local environment if he is indeed indigenous to Nigeria.
“No part of our land will be given to foreigners who cling to a dubious regional protocol as an instrument validating dispossession. Let him practice his cultural practices on his father’s land. His likes will not be permitted to operate with impunity in Ondo State. We will defend our land. Ondo State has a law that prohibits open grazing.
“The Government has a responsibility to implement the law for the benefit of the people of the state and those, who may share in their aspiration for development of their God-given space. The people of Ondo are hospitable. They will, however, be unable to tolerate and condone the invasion of their lands.
“No bandit will operate in Ondo State under any dubious guise”. Akeredolu said.
Alhassan, the National Secretary of the Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, has called on the National Assembly to stop the attempts by some southern state governors to enact anti-open grazing laws targeted at Fulani pastoralists, saying the law would undermine the relative peace and stability currently enjoyed in the local communities.
He said the anti-open grazing laws would destroy livestock production and send into poverty millions of people that depend on the livestock value chain.
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