… Says Akeredolu is on the right course
The Yoruba Council of Elders, YCE, has accused the Federal government of encouraging foreigners to unleash terror on the South-West.
Chief Samuel Agbede, former president, of the body, said this in reaction to FG’s warning to the Ondo state Governor to rescind the order.
His words: “These herders have killed several princes, regents, and lately a first-class traditional ruler in Yorubaland. What do they want Governor Akeredolu to do, to fold his arms and watch all these atrocities happening around him on daily basis?
“If the spokesperson for the Presidency is not sincere about security, those at the receiving end are already fed up with the insecurity in the nation, particularly in Ondo State.
“What has the Presidency got to gain by encouraging criminals to be in the thick forest, killing people? Just last Saturday, a deputy registrar (of Federal University of Technology, Akure) was killed at Iwaraja in Osun State.
“It has been established that most of these criminals are foreigners from Niger, Bourkina Faso, Mali. They encroach on us in our country and unleash terror.
“Why then should the Presidency be encouraging them when it sees all these killings, kidnaps and rapes?
“The Presidency or its spokesperson is in the erroneous belief that security is a tribal issue. Governor Akeredolu is not speaking for himself but for the people of Ondo and by extension people in the six states of the South-West zone.
“Governor Akeredolu has been highly traumatized and embarrassed by the senseless killings, rapes and banditry caused by these herders.
“Now, our people are frightened to go to their farms because these criminals would watch until their maize grows up and then take their cattle there to destroy it. We don’t want to believe that they are encouraging these things to happen so that the South-West will be a consumer nation for agricultural products because it is the North that feels free to bring agricultural products to the South-West.
“We, in YCE, want to tell them that we are solidly behind Governor Akeredolu. It’s not a thing that any government should encourage. If people want to trade, it shouldn’t be in the thick forest of another state killing people.
“Akeredolu is on the right course.”
Meanwhile, the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum, SMBLF, yesterday said the Presidency was elevating herdsmen above law by its order to Governor Akeredolu to vacate his order.
The body in a statement by Yinka Odumakin (South West), Chief Guy Ikoku (South East), Senator Bassey Henshaw (South South) and Dr. Isuwa Dogo (Middle Belt), asked the Federal Government to “withdraw the unjust diktat and allow Ondo to enforce the law.”
The statement reads: “We are supposed to be a Federal Republic and forest reserves in states are fully residual matter to which the Federal Government has no business with. The FG’s statement by Garba Shehu that the Governor of Ondo lacks the powers to decide on its reserves in spite of the Land Use Act that vests land in states in the governors was a complete overreach and clear abuse of the constitution in a bid to elevate Fulani herders above the law.
“It is a continuation of the obsessive attachment to Miyetti Allah, like the President instructing Governor Ortom to go and live peaceably with killers after Miyetti Allah killed 78 citizens of the state in January 2019, to prevent Ondo from holding its rights on its reserves in the face of persistent killings of its people by herders occupying the reserves illegally.
“No decent or responsible governor would allow what the FG wants for Fulani herdsmen. The SMBLF therefore asks the Federal Government to withdraw the unjust diktat and allow Ondo to enforce the law.”