The Middle Belt Forum (MBF) yesterday urged President Bola Tinubu to come out with workable solutions to the bloodletting in Benue State.
It also advised Tinubu to overhaul the security architecture to address insecurity, questioning the appointment of three Fulani to key defence institutions.
Tinubu is scheduled to visit Benue today to assess the security situation in the state following the recent murder of over 200 citizens by gangsters in Yelwata. The MBF National President, Bitrus Pogu, said: “There are some things I will suggest to the President.
“Our NSA (National Security Adviser) is a Fulani, our Minister of Defence is a Fulani and our Minister of State Defence is also a Fulani. “He should look into it. It doesn’t matter, we can say it doesn’t matter where somebody comes from as long as he performs, but there has to be something done about this.
“I am saying it today people are not talking about it, but it’s a reality staring in his face.” Pogu told our correspondent on telephone that the President should ensure the return of calm in Benue. He said by postponing his planned visit to Kaduna State to visit the state, Tinubu had given a clear indication that he was deeply concerned about the violence in Benue State.
Pogu said: “Tinubu should give the people clear assurances that he is going to tackle insecurity in the state and ensure that Benue has peace and nothing short of that is acceptable. “The good thing is, unlike (exPresident)Muhammadu Buhari, at least Tinubu is going to Benue physically to see things for himself.
“Buhari never cared. He told former Governor, Samuel Ortom, to learn to live in peace with these people (herdsmen). “For the President to visit Benue shows that he cares, and we are confident he will make strong points and follow it up with action to ensure that Benue has peace; not only Benue but the whole of the Middle Belt and Nigeria at large.”
The MBF leader, who condemned the Yelwata killings, said: “One thing Nigerians should learn from these killings is that the terrorists are learning newer and applying new techniques and refusing to waste their bullets. “They are using their guns to threaten, hack the people after threatening them, using fuel to burn them alive.”
Pogu advised Governor Hyacinth Alia to revive the anti-open grazing law aimed at regulating the activities of herdsmen. According to him, the law greatly helped Ortom stabilise Benue to a great extent.
Meanwhile, Governor Hyacinth Alia, has said bandits and terrorists wreaking havoc in the state have adopted guerrilla-style tactics that make them increasingly difficult to track and apprehend.
Alia spoke on Focus Nigeria, a programme on African Independent Television (AIT), yesterday, while addressing the recurring violence and killings in parts of the state.
He said the security challenge has become more complex, as attackers now hit and retreat without a trace. “We’re talking about the bandits and the terrorists who have come to a very mystifying frame of guerrilla warfare.
They come, hit, and go back. So we cannot identify them,” he said. The governor said the support of the federal government, particularly in intelligence gathering, is helping the state make progress in tracking down the perpetrators.
“With the Federal Government’s continued support now through intelligence finding and searching, I think, we are going to do even more,” he said. Alia also linked the worsening insecurity to the internal crisis within the state chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC), saying the party has not been working in unity.
