By Lewis
Obi
On 2nd October 2015, I offered it as my opinion on this page
that the provocative activities of Fulani herdsmen are likely to lead to war
which “when it begins, will be like all wars – senseless, destructive and
lamentable. No one knows when and where it will begin, but it will begin as a
convulsive reprisal for a massacre by Fulani herdsmen, a phenomenon that has
now assumed all but a common occurrence in Nigeria .’
“The scale and frequency of massacres by Fulani herdsmen without a single prosecution is the clearest evidence of what is known as impunity, and impunity is the reason the coming war is inescapable.”
That was before the herdsmen had kidnapped and murdered the traditional ruler of Ubulu-Ukwu inDelta State .
That was before the herdsmen conducted their full-scale terrorist invasion of
Agatu land in Benue
State practically
paralyzing and occupying eight local governments in the state and killing at
least 500 persons and burning scores of towns and villages. That was before
the Ugwuneshi incident in Enugu
State where a distressed
community being harassed by the herdsmen was gathering to discuss its
predicament. Suddenly Nigerian Army trucks arrived and, as the herdsmen
cheered, the army bundled 76 men into their trucks and on to the Umuahia
Prison. Enugu State Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi then went to Umuahia, trying to
secure the freedom of the humiliated men, and dropped a tear or two. But that
was just the beginning of his anguish. In Ugwuneshi he was dealing with 76 men
unjustly imprisoned. He broke down last week when he had to see recovered dead
bodies of men slaughtered by the same Fulani herdsmen at Ukpabi Nimbo,
Uzo-Uwani.
“The scale and frequency of massacres by Fulani herdsmen without a single prosecution is the clearest evidence of what is known as impunity, and impunity is the reason the coming war is inescapable.”
That was before the herdsmen had kidnapped and murdered the traditional ruler of Ubulu-Ukwu in
The rampaging herdsmen
had attacked and burned seven villages – Nimbo Ngwoko, Ugwuijoro, Ekwuru,
Ebor, Enugu Nimbo, Umuome, and Ugwuachara.
The most frightening
part of the attack on Nimbo was the high level discipline and military
precision of its execution. The Enugu State Government had been informed of
the impending attack and the governor had promptly convened the state’s security
council meeting which included every arm of the security agencies – the Enugu
Garrison Command 82nd Division of the Nigerian Army, the Commissioner of
Police, the Department of |State Security, and Prison officials. Each arm
assured the governor that it would do everything to pre-empt the attack. The
herdsmen apparently operate at a much higher level and, so, the best laid plans
of the governor and the state’s security agencies were thwarted by Fulani
herdsmen. That sense of impotence and helplessness necessitated the governor’s
recourse to and the re-mobilization of the state’s indigenous neighborhood
watch. With the unanimous approval of the traditional rulers and the
association of town unions, Governor Ugwuanyi had to cough out N100 million to
begin the process of activating the vigilante network.
The scariest part of
the Nimbo disaster was the reaction of the 19 governors of Northern
Nigeria who flat out denied the fact known to all that Fulani
herdsmen had conducted the massacre. Indeed, in a show of righteous
indignation, they warned Nigerians to stop ‘insulting’ Fulani herdsmen.