Abdullahi Ganduje, governor of Kano state, says there should be a law banning the movement of cattle from the north to the south.
Speaking with journalists after he and All Progressives Congress (APC) governors met with President Muhammadu Buhari in Daura, Katsina state, Ganduje said if the movement of cattle is not stopped, there will be no end to farmer-herder conflicts.
The governor said his administration is already constructing a settlement for herders in a forest near Kano’s border with Katsina.
He said the settlement will have houses, a dam, an artificial insemination centre, and a veterinary clinic.
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“We are building a Ruga settlement in Samsosua forest, our border with Katsina and we have succeeded in curtailing the effect of banditry in that area,” Ganduje said.
“So, we are building many houses, we are constructing a dam; we are establishing a cattle artificial insemination centre, we are establishing a veterinary clinic and already we have started building houses for herdsmen.
“My advocacy is that we should abolish the transportation or trekking of herdsmen from the northern part of Nigeria to the middle belt and to the southern part of Nigeria.
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“There should be a law that will ban, otherwise we cannot control the conflicts between herdsmen and farmers and cannot control the cattle rustling which is affecting us greatly.”
Shehu Sani, former senator representing Kaduna central, had also called for the setting up of grazing reserves in the north to end farmer-herder crisis.
5 comments
VERY PATRIOTIC, VERY MATURE ADVICE MUCH UNLIKE THE DANGEROUSLY GREEDY ATTITUDE OF SOME ELDERLY POLITICIANS
This is a welcome development and I also suggest that there should be age control among herdsmen the use teenage boys should be stopped so that this children can also have at least primary and secondary education. If government can integrate them in place instead of moving round the country and end up causing problem, then peace won’t be far away and conflicts would definitely disappear.
It is a big surprise that northern governors like Ganduje are only just discovering the wisdom of preventing cows from moving from the north to the south. If there is no hidden agenda of land grabbing and ethnoreligious cleansing and expansionism, all herdsmen and their cows should remain in the north where there is VAST grasslands suitable for animal husbandry. They should leave the southern minimal and marginal lands alone. But who is fooling who. The desire is to occupy displace and plunder.
Happy to note that there is in the North such a truthful and objective Nigerian. More of Gandujes to Nigerian problems, whether North or South, especially among the Fulanis.
Honestly this is welcome development and school is integral part for this development so many schools has to be built in that ruga settlement so that their children can be enrolled all the time and as such they cannot be terrorist as we are seeing them now.