BREAKING NEWS, Column
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| By Maureen Chigbo, Realnews Magazine Online |
AGRICULTURE has contributed much to the economic growth, food security and peace in many African countries. Both crop and livestock farmers are responsible for more than 90 percent of Africa’s agricultural production. In many countries in western, central and east Africa, subsistence farmers and livestock rearers are the backbone of the food production required to feed the larger city populations. The World Bank estimates that agriculture employs 65 percent of Africa’s labour force and accounts for 32 percent of Africa’s total gross domestic product, GDP. It also constitutes 60 percent of the continent’s total export earnings. Recent reforms in agriculture have led to a significant growth in the sector in Africa, especially in Nigeria. However, the World Bank warns that insecurity and insurgency are threatening the sustainability of Africa’s food production. Underlying this threat is the perennial crisis between the herdsmen and farmers in some parts of Africa.
The conflict between the herdsmen and farmers which is increasingly leading to wanton destruction of lives and property should attract the attention of African leaders and decision makers who will gather at the Tana High-Level forum on Security in Africa in Ethiopia from April 16 – 17. The problem ought to be looked at dispassionately by African decision makers, peace and security stakeholders with a view to finding lasting solution to the intractable clashes between herdsmen and farmers in West and Central Africa, which have been on since the 19th and 20th century.
Previously, the herdsmen were mostly seen with machetes, arrows and bow as they move around with their cattle. But that is not so anymore. In this 21st century, the herdsmen carry sophisticated weapons with which they unleash violence on farmers and host communities at the least provocation, especially on allegations of cattle rustlings by some members of the community.
This trend is dangerous and should no longer be ignored by African leaders. If they do, chances are that it will become something worse than Boko Haram ravaging Nigeria and its neigbhouring countries. Consequently, food production will drop as the casualties from such herdsmen/farmers clashes are increasing daily. According to a recent report published by SMB Intelligence, more than 2,000 people have been killed in conflicts between the herdsmen and different host communities in 2015 alone. In comparison, the Boko Haram insurgency that has attracted the attention of the Nigerian government and global community, kills 2,500 people annually, the report states.
Nowhere in Africa is the tale of havoc being wrecked by the herdsmen more glaring than in Nigeria where Boko Haram has also greatly damaged life, property and the economy of states in the North East Nigeria. The violence unleashed by the pastoralists, also known as the Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria, has spread across the 36 states in Nigeria, including the federal capital territory, Abuja. Their nefarious activities attracted a nationwide outcry when the herdsmen abducted Olu Falae, elder statesman and former Presidential candidate, from his farm at Ilado, Akure Ondo state, in September 2015. They released the 77–year old man later after paying an undisclosed amount as ransom.
There have been attacks on relevant authority by the Fulani herdsmen. In a brazen display of total disregard for relevant authority, they reportedly ambushed the Burukutu Divisional Police Officer, DPO, the Area Commander and the Council Caretaker Chairman, who were on assessment tour of the communities. In 2013, the herdsmen audaciously attacked the convoy of Gabriel Suswam, former Benue State Governor, at Tse Aekenyi in Guma Local Government Area of the state, Nigeria. The Governor who led a team of security men comprising the army, police, civil defence, and Department of State Security Service, to take an assessment of the destruction caused in the area by the Fulani herdsmen, was taken by surprise by the rampaging herdsmen who had destroyed over 72 villages and killed 25 residents in Ukpan, near Daudu. Luckily for the governor, the security men with him repelled the attack.
The latest and worse hit by the Fulani herdsmen’s violence is the Agatu community in Benue State, North Central, Nigeria. In just one day, about 500 persons were killed and a whole community set ablaze on March 5, 2016, in Agatu. Ardo Boderi, spokesman of the Fulani community, alleged that more than 10,000 of their cattle were killed by the people of the area while the villagers allege that the herdsmen want to take over their area. The killings in Agatu has been going on for two years. As I write there is still tension in Agatu as more killings are reported with the authorities dithering on how to handle the problem.
The incessant attacks by herdsmen which have sent several persons to their early graves, is increasingly becoming a worrisome phenomenon for government at all levels and Nigerians at large. The herdsmen , who allegedly fled their home towns following activities of Boko Haram sect in some Northern parts of the country, have reportedly diversified into banditry, rape and other nefarious activities in their host communities with security agencies accused of looking the other way.
Another reason the herdsmen move down south and coastal areas in search of greener pastures for their flock is because of desertification occasioned by climate change. Munsuru Arilesere stressed this when he wrote in his article entitled: Security and Development Challenges of Pastoralism in Africa that as grazing regions become hotter and drier, pastoralists are left with no option other than to migrate southward if their cattle would have any chance of survival. He also thinks that urbanisation has opened up more villages and towns, making it easier for pastoralists to penetrate hitherto remote areas. The present security challenges being experienced in parts of the country have prompted pastoralists, like any other Nigerians, to migrate from crisis-prone areas; and cultivated areas and cattle herds have witnessed significant expansion and increase respectively, making resources scarcer and more competitive.
The solution to this lies in governments across Africa emulating what western and eastern countries have done by providing ranches and grazing grounds that should meet the needs of the herdsmen to prevent their cattle from damaging crops planted by farmers and also end the age old era of nomadic cattle rearing.
As Arilesere opines, “We cannot afford to ignore incessant violence related to pastoralism because it poses a threat to national security. The dimension these conflicts are assuming lately suggests deep-rooted issues degenerating into bloody conflicts and targeted killings.”
It is hoped that by the time the 5th Tana Forum wounds up, the African leaders jaw, jaw on issues of security in Africa, will at least weave an implementable strategy to end the perennial problems between herdsmen and farmers to ensure peace, food security and economic progress of the continent.
Maureen Chigbo, Publisher/Editor, Realnews Magazine Online and Regional Fellow of Tana Forum based in Ethiopia, wrote this piece from Lagos, Nigeria. Email: mechigbo@yahoo.com.
— Apr 11, 2016 @ 01:00 GMT
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