YNaija Editorial: These Middle Belt crises need to end

Since 1999, Nigeria has been dealing with a number of internal security challenges, starting from the ethnic clashes in the South-West stoked chiefly by ethnic militant organizations such as the Oodua Peoples’ Congress (OPC) to the Niger-Delta militancy and presently, an Islamist insurgency in the North-East waged by Boko Haram.

However, another internal security challenge has been increasing – clashes in the Middle Belt, which have been recurring in ever-increasing frequency predominantly in Plateau, Benue, Nassarawa, Taraba and the southern part of Kaduna State.

These clashes are not entirely new – they predate even the formation of Nigeria to as far back as 200 years to the expansionist wars of the Sokoto Caliphate and the Fulani Jihads. Most times, they are abbreviated into herdsmen-farmer clashes or a continuation of the wars of centuries past to subdue minority ethnic groups and religious faiths. But in reality, these crises are caused by a mix of ethnic, religious, political and economic tensions.

For example, the increase in frequency of these clashes is a result of climate change which have forced herdsmen further southwards into the Middle Belt with its abundance of lush vegetation and water and bringing with it the inevitability of clashes with the predominantly farming populations in the areas. This is further aggravated by organized criminal groups specializing in cattle rustling and reprisals by victims of these crimes against innocent people.

The number of people that have been killed in the past five years in these crises goes into the thousands (accurate numbers are hard to come by as data keeping in Nigeria is a challenge) going by the tens that die with each attack. Not only that, the region affected can be described as the food basket of Nigeria, producing most of the tuber crops, vegetables and fruits in the country, not to mention grains like rice and maize.

However, the biggest cause of these crises is that governments over the years have refused to solve the root causes of these crises and bring perpetrators of past crises to justice. In a 2013 report on inter-communal violence in Plateau and Kaduna States, the international non-profit organization, Human Rights Watch (HRW) blamed the lack of justice in past crises for the recurrence of the killings.

When perpetrators of crimes as heinous as murder and ethnic cleansings are not brought to justice, the wounds are still left open and people are forced to take the law into their own hands in the name of defending themselves and it continues the seemingly never-ending cycle of violence.

It is about time that we put these killings to an end for good.

Our governments at all levels need to start by putting in place adequate security to safeguard lives and properties and prevent further attacks. There is need for security forces to investigate the source of arms that seem to have saturated the region and making the attacks on hapless citizens so easy. A strong message needs to be sent to those involved in these attacks that they are not above the law, else future culprits will not be deterred.

Additionally, there is need for the reports of past panels of inquiry into such crises to be implemented. These panels have previously been used just to create a perception of a solution to a problem being sought; however, in reality, they just create motion without movement as the reports are hardly ever made public not to talk of being implemented.

For example, the HRW report gave a lot of recommendations for each stakeholder in the region, from the federal government to state governments to security agencies. However, none of these recommendations seems to have been implemented.

Also, a permanent solution to the problem of encroachment on farmlands by herdsmen needs to be found involving the government, herdsmen and farming communities. There needs to be creation of grazing reserves and clearly demarcated cattle routes that will not cause trespassing and destruction of farmlands.

Nigeria cannot bear to continue having this crises going on within its borders.

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