By Tola Adeniyi
The National Assembly is
about to pass a Bill that is set to kill whatever is left of our so-called
over-centralised federal System. The bill if passed will be the greatest rape
on our democracy and the biggest insult on our collective sensitivity as a
people and as a country.
“The Fulani National
Grazing Reserve” is presently before the National Assembly. The bill has
successfully scaled through second reading in both the Senate and the House of
Representatives. For it to become law it is to pass through the third reading.
The bill seeks to provide
for the establishment of national grazing reserves and stock routes. It is
sponsored by Senator Zainab Kure.
The Bill proposes to
establish a National Grazing Reserve Commission (NGRC) for the country. The
NGRC will be charged with the responsibility of using funds received from the
Federal Government to forcefully acquire farmlands from Nigerians in all the 36
States of the country, develop same at government expense through the provision
of bore holes, water reservoirs, etc; for the exclusive use of nomadic cattle
rearers.
The issue here is very
clear. Fulani herdsmen are cattle farmers. They could as well keep their cattle
in ranches. They could devise whatever means like their counterparts in Argentina , Australia
The owners of these cows
like Generals Obasanjo, Nyako, Abdulsalami Abubakar and our president Buhari
are big time farmers. They are businessmen. It is immoral to ask tax payers to
finance the operations of these businesses. Cattle owners must provide capital
through bank loans or whatever means to create their grazing lands in their
localities. The cows are not owned by the Federal Government.
Just as the Federal
Government is not creating farm lands for cocoa and kolanut farmers in Sokoto
or Katsina, or creating farm lands for Agatu yam farmers in Enugu or Maiduguri,
or creating special areas for fish farming in Zungeru, it cannot for any reason
ever consider creating special lands for herdsmen for grazing. Let the herdsmen
run their business without encroaching on the lands of other people. Let the
cattle owners buy into the Fodder technology and other modern methods of
providing feeds for their animals without roaming the streets and plundering other
people’s farms.
To ever dream of this
perverted bill is to step on the toes of other Nigerians and step on sore foot,
and by so doing create a dangerous precedent.
Nobody should play ethnic
game here. This is not an issue directed against any ethnic nationality in Nigeria Nigeria
The bill must not see the
light of the day. The sponsors want to create serious problem in the polity and
their design must be nipped in the bud.
The Nigeria Bar
Association, the Coalition of Civil Societies, and all those who care about the
continued existence of this troubled country must rise up to strongly oppose
and kill this obnoxious and self serving bill. It beats my imagination that
members of the National Assembly did not see the serious danger posed by this
corrosive Bill.
In a reaction to the
threats posed by this obnoxious Bill, the National Co-ordinator of the Oodua
Peoples Congress (OPC), Otunba Gani Adams, says: “Without any doubt, this is a
very dangerous proposal for Nigeria
•Chief Tola Adeniyi, a former
Managing Director of Daily Times of Nigeria ,
is Executive Chairman, The Knowledge
Plaza
