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Benue communal crisis: Journalist losses aunt, raise the alarm over threat to life
Benue communal crisis: Journalist losses aunt, raise the alarm over threat to life
By: Michael Mike
Known as the Food Basket of the Nation, Benue is gradually losing that epic crest to be christened the epicentre of crisis.
In virtually all parts of the state hardly a week pass without the record of one damning crisis or the other that have left the state in a shadow of its old self.
If the crisis is not armed herdsmen induced, it is local bandits instigated or communal bloody fight that leaves in its wake sorrows, tears and blood.
It’s been all tales of woes for a people who usually pride themselves as the food power house of the country where several of the grains, citrus, yam, cassava, rice, tomatoes, pepper, ginger, melon and several other are farmed in commercial qualities and hauled to other parts of the country.
Unfortunately the state is fast losing that panache that makes it stand out among the committee of states in the country owing to the ceaseless attacks and killings.
There is no gainsaying that Benue is currently bleeding and not a few families are being set backwards as a result of the crisis.
Many have continued to lose their sources of livelihood, homes, properties and loved ones in the crisis in parts of the state that have defiled all manner of intervenes to have them nipped in the bud.
From Agatu to Apa, Otukpo to Ogbadibo. From Gwer West to Makurdi and Guma, down to Gwer East LGAs; from Ukum all the way to Kwande LGAs it’s been same sad story of crisis.
The implication is that families have been rendered homeless and denied access to their farmlands. Thousands of these families have found solace in Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs, camps where they are surviving on the goodwill of spirited individuals and organisations.
While majority of these displaced persons were victims of armed herdsmen incursions in several Benue communities many others have not known peace because of bloody crisis between neighbouring sister communities that ordinarily should be in peace with each other.
Of special mention is the Mbarvu and Mbasombo communities in Gwer East LGA of the state where all known measures have been taken by the state government to end the bloody conflict over a parcel of land the warring sister communities have resisted all the peace initiatives to end.
The then Governor of the state, Chief Samuel Ortom had also in May 2020 suspended two traditional rulers of both communities, Chief Peter Ikyum of Ishough and Chief Ager Kuhe of Mbasombo, in oder to compel the warring communities to sheath their sword but they remained adamant.
Even the threat by the present administration in June 2023 to take over the disputed land has not been able to convince the hitherto good neighbours to drop their arms and embrace peace.
Bothered by the level of attacks and killings in the crisis, women of both communities had also defied the heavy downpour, trooped out in their thousands and took over the busy Makurdi-Aliade road at Ikpayonge to protest the crisis, the destruction of properties including farmland and farm produce as well as the loss of innocent lives.
The development left road users and commuters stranded for several hours as long queues of cars and trucks coming from the South to the Northern part of the country and those from the Northern part of the country conveying goods and commuters to the South were left stranded.
The angry protesters who sang solidarity songs as they marched for hundreds of meters to register their anger over the needless bloodbath in their communities lamented the incessant killings and razing of houses in the two warring sister communities.
It took the intervention of the Speaker of the Benue State House of Assembly, Mr. Aondona Dajoh and his colleagues who were all drenched in rain water, to calm the angry protesters.
The Woman Leader of Mbakough Kindred, Mrs. Veronica Orbunde who addressed the lawmakers said the peaceful demonstration was to draw government’s attention to the use of militia by the fueding parties, who rape innocent women in their farms and also kidnap and kill some of their husbands for no justifiable reasons.
She said, “we are tired of this crisis and we are pleading with the sister communities to end this senseless killings and destruction of properties in our communities.”
Addressing the huge crowd after inspecting the destruction at the Ikpayongo market in one of the attacks, the Speaker who expressed worry at the development appealed to the warring communities to embrace peace and stop the incessant killings and destruction of properties, assuring that the government would deploy more security personnel to the area to protect the lives and properties of the people.
Among the women who lost loved ones, property and farmland as well as farm produce in the crisis is Victoria Ojeme, a journalist of repute who is currently facing grave danger after losing an aunt in the crisis.
Mrs Ojeme who has unfortunately become a target for attack by the rampaging militia prosecuting the bloody crisis hails from Mbarvu, one of the communities at the centre of the crisis.
Nararting her ordeal, Ojeme said “I hail from Gwer East LGA of Benue state, Mbarvu community specifically. I am the third daughter of Pa Atule Humbe and my late mother’s name is Mama Bridget Humbe.
“I have been in shock for the past three years and has also stayed away from my community for several years after receiving so many threats from the neighbouring community that has been at loggerheads with my community.
“They have threatened all the youths for coming back home and for those who thought the threat was just a mere threat, never came back alive.
“So many houses have been razed down, the elderly that could not flee were slughtered by the invading community,
“In one of the attacks they killed my Aunt the only surviving woman in my father’s house. Today my life is also in danger. They feel that some of us are crying out about the spate of attacks and killings in the senseless crisis and I have become a target.
“I appeal to the government to take decisive steps to end the crisis as the loss of innocent lives and destruction of properties is already taking its toll on the farming populace who have all deserted their ancestral homes and farmland and have become Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs, in their own state.”
Benue communal crisis: Journalist losses aunt, raise the alarm over threat to life
The Pathfinder Clocks 56
Zulum’s age showcases life in years, not years in life
By Dauda Iliya
What matters in the life of a man is not the number of years in his life but the quality of life in those years. This should even be more applicable to leaders than to the led in all aspects of human affairs.
Every person entrusted with the responsibility of political cum public office should be rich in the capacity to uphold the trust reposed in him by his people, and discharge the concomitant duties and responsibilities to them according to their needs and aspirations.
As he ages on in life, counting the number of years he has lived on Earth, should savour satisfaction from, and build his inner peace with, his accomplishments that purposefully and qualitatively impact the life of the people whose affairs he, by sheer divine providence, has been entrusted with the management of.
How rich is he in the capacity required for the discharge of his political cum public office duties and responsibilities to the people? How much has he accomplished in the discharge of those duties and responsibilities on the scale of the resources made available for the purpose, surmounting all towering challenges, and how has he converted challenges to opportunities, obstacles to stepping stones, in the course of service to the people?
How has he towered above board in the conduct of public service? How much enviable value has he added to the service of the society according to the needs and aspirations of its people? How well has he performed in building and sustaining his personality as a compass in the search for guidance towards purposeful and qualitative public service?
How high and remarkably does he stand out among all other leaders, in person and personae, before and after him in the history of purposeful and prosperous service to the humanity?
All these considerations factor vitally in determining the quality of life in the years he has lived on Earth, not merely the number of years he has lived in life.
It is pertinent to weigh the present Governor of Borno State, Professor Babagana Umara Zulum, on the scale of these vital factors in determining the quality of leadership and public service to his beleaguered Borno State and its peoples, as he attains the age of 56 in life on Earth, Monday, August 25.
As a pacesetter, Zulum is the first Professor to govern the state in its history. To some, this historic educational attainment may not be striking enough to warrant any spectacular recognition that should enviably stand him out of all other personalities that governed the state before him.
However, to others, this educational attainment is remarkably striking, because it serves as the most-desired foundation for him to conceive, craft and efficiently coordinate the deployment of the most-relevant, most-potent and, indeed, cutting age programmes and projects desired for the rescue of an entity out of its epochal humanitarian crisis which, hitherto threatened to crush it out of existence.
Gifted with rare foresight and proactivity, Zulum has governed a Borno ravaged in all sectors by a global-scale terror and its attendant humanitarian crisis over the last fifteen years, steering it out of the global-scale turbulence it has been floundering in, and repositioning it for comprehensive rehabilitation and reconstruction for a prosperity that fast restores its pre-Boko Haram/ISWAP terror glory.
The pathfinding Zulum has purposefully and efficiently deployed his intellectual prowess to craft and drive sustainable reforms for the rapid resuscitation of Borno. The Borno Model of societal recovery he crafted earned him dazzling praises from the United Nations Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres.
Most-spectacular of such reforms are the 25-year Development Plan, Borno State Strategy for Durable Solutions to Internal Displacement, the Borno Model for Peace, Reconciliation and Development, Transitional Justice Framework, under which he has closed all IDP camps that has littered Maiduguri over the last fifteen years, and returning the IDPs to their ancestral lands to rebuild their lives, with the prime purpose of fast-tracking the reconstruction and rapid growth of the state economy.
Faced with the stark reality that there is certainly no shortcut to the desired comprehensive restoration of the state in all sectors from the crisis, and such restoration cannot be achieved with hundreds of thousands of IDPs surviving on handouts from international donors and food palliatives by government, the Professor of Agricultural Engineering carefully coordinated the relocation of the entire IDP population to their ancestral communities to resume their farming, fishing and trading activities that built and sustained an enviable economy for Borno over the ages.
His foresight and vision led him to invest in the health sector, building quality healthcare delivery institutions, most notably the Borno State University Teaching Hospital, Orthopaedic Hospital, Dental and Eye Hospitals, and scholarship for hundreds of the state indigenes to train as medical doctors and other health related personnel.
Zulum’s six years as Borno State Governor are six years of purposeful leadership that reshaped state’s economic, social, and infrastructural landscape from the epicentre of insurgency to a hub for viable economic investments. Consequently, Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC) ranks Borno among the top 10 ranking states in the federation on ease of doing business.
This remark is contained in a presentation on ” Sub national ease of doing business report” by the project manager SABER secretariat Abuja Ms Aimeya Okpebholo.
His humility, generosity, perseverance, simplicity, resilience and, uncommon commitment to justice and fairness in the distribution of development across Borno State and, above all, his impeccable passion for good governance to rescue the state from the sticky humanitarian crisis breathe bubbling life to the years he has lived on Earth.
His exemplary passion for service to humanity has enabled him to write his name in gold in the pages of history with regard to leadership and good governance in Nigeria.
At 56, Governor Babagana Umara Zulum of Borno State proudly exhibits that what should matter in one’s age is the quality of life he has lived on Earth in his given capacity, rather than the mere number of years he has lived.
Happy birthday, Your Excellency
The Pathfinder Clocks 56
Army troops repel ISWAP attack inflict casualties on the terrorists in Borno
By: Zagazola Makama
Nigerian Army troops of Operation HADIN KAI ihave repelled an attack by suspected ISWAP terrorists on Gajigana town in Magumeri Local Government Area.
Sources said the terrorists launched the attack on the town at about 1:30 a.m. on Saturday, targeting a Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) duty post.
“There was a fierce exchange of gunfire between the terrorists and a combined team of the troops who responded promptly to reinforce the defence of the town.
“The attack was successfully repelled, with terrorists suffering unspecified casualties as blood was observed in their withdrawal routes while normalcy has since been restored,” he said.
Sources said one CJTF operative, identified as Mr. Bulama Ngala, aged 45, sustained gunshot injuries from flying bullets during the confrontation.
The sources added that the injured operative was evacuated to General Hospital, Gajigana, where he is receiving medical treatment and responding positively.
Army troops repel ISWAP attack inflict casualties on the terrorists in Borno
One killed, another injured in mob action in Taraba
By: Zagazola Makama
Atleast one persons killed while another injured following a mob attack in Kunini market, Lau Local Government Area of the state.
Sources told Zagazola Makama that the incident occurred on Saturday at about 2:30 p.m.
The sources said that information received from the Officer-in-Charge of Kunini outpost indicated that two persons were attacked by a mob in the market.
“One of the victims was confirmed dead, while the other was rushed to hospital for treatment,” he said.
Security operatives from Lau Division were promptly mobilised to the scene and took charge of the situation.
The sources assured that investigation was ongoing to ascertain the circumstances that led to the mob action and to identify those responsible.
One killed, another injured in mob action in Taraba
The Pathfinder Clocks 5
Army troops repel ISWAP attack inflict casualties on the terrorists in Borno
Two killed as gunmen attack Benue community
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