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From Godwin Tsa Abuja
A group under the auspices of Tiv Professionals (TPG) has called on the Federal Government to avail compensation to the victims of Fulani killings in Benue state and to stop the ongoing land grabbing by killer herdsmen in the state.
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Meanwhile, the group has advocated for an “All Nationalities Submit” to address the rising insecurity in the country as well as the noticeable structural imbalance.
In addition, the group has demanded the return of the over one millions displaced persons currently squatting at the various Internally Displaced Persons(IDP) camps to their ancestral lands.
It lamented that property, food and farms worth billions of naira has been destroyed following the attacks.
At a press conference in Abuja, Chairman of the TPG, Prof. Zackharys Gundu lamented that the people had been abandoned by the Federal government despite the huge losses suffered directly and indirectly by the victims.
While calling for the prosecution of violent armed Fulani groups in the country, TPG equally stated that the strategy to violently subsidize open grazing by blood and ancestral lands in the state by marudding killer herdsmen must stop.
Prof. Gundu who chronicled the various unprovoked attacks on Benue communities by herdsmen lamented that such attacks and killings takes place on daily basis without the intervention of security agencies.
“Inspite the daily killings President Muhammadu Buhari is clearly antagonistic and continue to turn the other way as armed fulani herdsmen continue attacking and displacing the Tiv in Benue, Taraba and Nasarawa states.”
It is also the demand of the group that all the lands violently siezed from the original inhabitants and presently occupied by killer herdsmen should be vacated.
While describing the Fulani as a Trojan horse, TPG accused them of merely riding on the back of the cow to grab land at the expense of indigenous crop farmers for the Fulani of the whole world.
Gundu noted that the Tiv are predominantly crop farmers in several states of the federation and are worried that Fulani herdsmen are attacking Benue, Taraba and Nasarawa incessantly and grabbing ancestral lands.
According to him, “most of the Fulani attacking Benue come through Nasarawa using the state as a corridor of terror.
Speaking on the possible way out of the problem, Gundu maintained that “ranching will enable all Nigerians participate in the livestock value chain and break the Fulani monopoly of the cattle industry which they have badly mismanaged.
TPG said the Tiv people are prepared to take their destiny into their hands should other ethnic groups prefers to be enslaved before the country can survive.
Other members of the TPG at the event were Dr. Yakubu Tor- Agbinde, Ade Linus, Dr. Sabastine Agbinda, Prof. Magdalyne Dura, John Shihi, Prof. James Ugo, Dr. Qrisstuberg Amua, Samuel Nyagba, Prof. Cephas Turshima, Prof. Idyorough Fulafia, Prof. Alloy Ihuah, Comodre Christopher Goda (retd) and Chris Agaba.
