“We saw that as a threat to our existence and in June 2016, we reported to the then acting president and to our surprise, these people were not apprehended. When they saw that no one was going to apprehend them, they went further to issue more threats. In October 2016, we reminded the IGP, the DSS and the NSA of the potential violence that we faced in Benue State as a result of the threat from the Miyetti Allah. We, specifically, demanded that the two officers of the Miyetti Allah, the secretary and the president, be arrested. But unfortunately, they were not arrested. I do not know why the Federal Government has abandoned us. If they had acted that time, we would not have gotten to where we are today.” However, worried by the governor’s allegations, the Presidency put up an alibi, saying that he never warned the then Acting President Osinbajo about an impending attack on the state. According to the statement issued by the spokesman to the vice president, Laolu Akande, “Neither Governor Ortom nor the Federal Government was aware of the imminence of the cowardly attack on Logo and Guma on January 1, and, therefore, any suggestion that the vice president or the president ignored the state governor’s warning is both absurdly false and certainly misleading.”
To all intents and purposes, Governor Ortom’s actions portray him as a leader who is concerned about the plight of his people in the hands of the herdsmen. If anything, the gruesome attacks on the state in which 73 innocent citizens were cut down in cold blood confirmed the accuracy of his (Ortom’s) suspicion of an impending terror attack on the state. In our view, the averment that the governor did not specify the local government(s) that could come under attack in his correspondence with Professor Osinbajo is pedestrian and rather meaningless, and so is the statement that the security agencies were placed on high alert to forestall tragedy in the state. How do you justify such postulation in the face of the massive harvest of deaths in the state? It is shocking that in the face of the provocative language used by the leadership of Miyetti Allah to describe a law passed by a statutorily empowered body, the Presidency merely invited it for a chat following Governor Ortom’s letter. It is even more confounding that the same persons continue to insult the sensibilities of Nigerians with hate speech, without even a word of restraint from a government which waxed bold on hate speech and equated it with terrorism only recently.
The foregoing notwithstanding, it is necessary to pose the question whether Governor Ortom indeed acquitted himself creditably well in the admittedly dire circumstances. Our answer is a categorical and resounding NO. Beyond showing concern about the plight of his people and in the face of the Federal Government’s apparent lack of concern, Governor Ortom should have gone ahead to mobilise them to defend their lives against the herdsmen’s terror. This was precisely the point made by Itse Sagay (SAN), a professor of law and chairman of the Presidential Committee on Anti-corruption, on the Benue crisis. Sagay was quoted as saying that “Samuel Ortom is the Chief Security Officer of Benue. Every time the killings happen, he breaks down in tears and puts his hands on his head and keeps blaming the Federal Government. Under criminal law, every Nigerian has a right to self-defence. There is no reason why Ortom shouldn’t have organised the people of Benue State into a state of collective self-defence in which he will totally arm them to face these murderers.”
In this regard, we find the developments in Ekiti State quite instructive. Last week, Governor Ayodele Fayose, apprised of an impending attack by the herdsmen following the state’s anti-grazing law, mobilised local hunters from the 16 local government areas of the state and charged them to secure the state. He also spoke loud and clear on the preparedness of the state to defend itself against any invasion. In our view, this is the kind of attitude demanded by the times. We say categorically that it is better to fight and lose than to keep wailing while waiting for Godot. Even though the level of herdsmen’s attacks in Benue far outweighs those experienced in Ekiti, the no-nonsense attitude of Governor Fayose is a clear indication that the Ekiti people are prepared to defend themselves. Indeed, had Governor Ortom drafted half of his own security details to the affected parts of the state, the story would have been different.
Happily, however, Governor Ortom seems to have found his voice after the tragedy that befell the state. He has, for instance, been categorical on the decision that there would be no cattle colony in Benue. He should keep up the momentum and devise strategies to curb the herdsmen’s menace without delay.
and then