President Muhammadu Buhari has given approval to the return of open grazing practiced during the First Republic where herdsmen used designated grazing routes to move cattle to several parts of the country.
The President made this known in an exclusive interview with Arise TV aired yesterday.
While fielding questions in the 44-minute long interview, the President said he had asked the Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, to begin the process of recovering land from persons who have converted cattle grazing routes for their personal use .
The AGF had kicked against the declaration by 17 Southern Governors to ban open grazing, noting that it is like Northern Governors banning spare parts trading.
Reacting to a question on the decision by the Southern Governors and if he agreed with the AGF’s position, Buhari laughingly responded: “You want me to contradict my Attorney General?
“What I did was ask him to go and dig the gazette of the First Republic when people were obeying laws. There were cattle routes and grazing areas. Cattle routes were for when they (herdsmen) are moving up country, north to south or east to west, they had to go through there.
READ ALSO: Southeast Insecurity; Igbo Elders Council Calls for dialogue
“If you allow your cattle to stray into any farm, you are arrested. The farmer is invited to submit his claims. The Khadi or the judge will say pay this amount and if you can’t the cattle is sold. And if there is any benefit, you are given and people were behaving themselves and in the grazing areas, they built dams, put windmills in some places there were even veterinary departments so that the herders are limited. Their route is known, their grazing area is known. So, I asked for the gazette to make sure that those who encroached on these cattle routes and grazing areas will be dispossessed in law and try to bring some order back into the cattle grazing.”
He flayed Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, for his utterances, implementation of an aggressive anti-open grazing law and for accusing the President of failing to take actions against herdsmen because he is also a member of the Fulani herders.
Buhari said indeed, he is a Fulani man but Ortom was being unfair to him. He said he had told Ortom that the herdsmen perpetrating the attacks are not the Nigerian Fulani.
READ ALSO: AGF Idris Calls For Transparency And Accountability In The Management Of Universities Finances
“The problem is trying to understand the culture of the cattle rearers. There is a cultural difference between the Tiv and the Fulani. So, the governor of Benue said I am not disciplining the cattle rearers because I am one of them.
“I cannot say I am not one of them but he is being very unfair to me and I told him that the Nigerian cattle rearer was not carrying anything more than a stick, sometime with a machete to cut some trees and feed his cattle but those sophisticated ones move with AK 47.
“So, from other areas, people rush to Nigeria. You know Fulani from Mauritania and Central Africa look the same, so they feel they are the Nigerian ones and I assure you that we are trying to resuscitate these cattle routes, grazing areas and make them accountable.”
He also tasked state governors to rise up to the challenges facing their states, recalling how he sent back two southern governors to his state after submitting reports of violence.
“These governors campaigned and won elections, they should be able to sort out issues arising in their localities, not running to the presidency. You know these people more than I do, and you are democratically elected to protect your people. Don’t sit idly expecting me to do everything, take action,” President Buhari said.
©ControlTV2021.
