Time for sustainable peace in Taraba

Even before the unfortunate and regrettable incident of the cold blooded killing of three policemen along the Ibi-Wukariwho had arrested a suspected kidnapper Hamisu BalaWadume made national news, Taraba had been in the news for all the wrong reasons.

In southern Taraba, the Jukuns and Tivs have been killing each other in great big bleeding batches with whole communities, villages burnt to the ground and thousands of people displaced. All roads leading to and from southern Taraba comprising about five local governments have been deserted by commuters for fear of being kidnappers, and or killed by rampaging militias of the two groups. Things got to a climax when the Federal University located at Wukari following the alleged killing of some Tiv students and staff of the University.

A couple of years back on the Mambilla highlands in the central area of the state, sectarian clashes claimed the lives of scores of people and livestock the graphic pictures of which made gory viewing.

By all accounts and parameters, Taraba state should not be talked about in such terms. It is a state whose diversity in ethnic groups is however positively underscored by the fact that virtually all the groups making up the state are ethnographically linked. The DNA of an average Taraban contains percentages from as many as ten ethnic groups.

Taraba state is also not known as ‘’Nature’s gift to the Nation for nothing’’. It is the only state in the country with three distinct geo-climactic conditions. The Mambilla highland is a temperate climatic zone which temperature seldom goes beyond twenty degrees at the hottest period of the year. The Kurmi area of the state is pretty much akin to what obtains in the southern part of Nigeria. And the rest of the state belongs in the savannah belt.

No state in the country is more naturally irrigated than Taraba. All the sixteen local governments in the state have at least one river coursing through them providing rich farmlands to support any type of agricultural cultivation on any scale.

Yet with all these abundant natural endowments peace seems to have eluded Taraba state. For the past decade Taraba has been engulfed in one sectarian crisis or the other much of which is avoidable.

The state Chief Executive Architect Darius Dickson Ishaku, himself the son of an evangelist who worked with white Christian Missionaries knows first-hand what peace and pacification means to a people. His charge to his compatriots upon assumption of office in 2015 was ‘’Give me peace and I will give you Development’’. But critics say that by that statement, the Governor who as chief security officer of the state should be in the forefront in seeking peace was not showing enough commitment. According to them that statement indicates that the Governor will not commit himself to seeking peace but rather leave it to the communities themselves. Seeking and securing peace for development should be initiated by the governor not the communities.

But by all accounts Governor Darius’ determination to institute peace in Taraba has not been in any doubt. He has stated that on many occasions but the perception has persisted that he has done very little to walk the talk. Governor Darius Ishaku needs to think out of the box and find cutting edge innovative ideas to bring peace to Taraba state. In this endeavour he needs to be pragmatic and avail himself of the tools of modern communication and engagement to construct and sustain peace.Such a tool in a democratic setting will accord the state the opportunity of robust engagement with all stakeholders and experts within and without the state in peace building and conflict resolution taking into account the origin, nature and peculiarities of the various conflicts that have taken place in Taraba. The resolutions reach at such engagements will form the basis for the development of a template for conflict resolution in the state in the short, medium and long term.

This is what has been lacking in Taraba over the years the failure of which has seen the state engulfed in periodic circle of violence which has become seemingly intractable.

But for both its sake and that of the nation Taraba cannot and should not be allowed to continue to wallow in the self- destructing orgy of violence.

President Muhammadu Buhari has thrown a gauntlet to Tarabans with the appointment of Engineer Sale Mamman as Minister of Power in his second term of office. What this means is unmistakeable. Among the overarching tasks and targets of the Minister is the successful delivery of the Mambilla Power project located in Taraba state on which Nigeria dependsto improve its power needs. There is also the Kashimbilla dam project which will be expected to impact positively on Taraba where it is located, Benue and Cross River States. Let us also not forget the Ibi bridge project across the river Benue which is expected to link up and ease transportation of goods and services between the Northeast and North central regions of the country. The successful completion and delivery of these projects will massively impact positively on the development prospects of Taraba state.

This is a gilt edged opportunity for Taraba to move from what some people regard as a backwater state to the centre of Nigeria’s future development. The development which Governor Darius Ishaku has promised Tarabans if they gave him peace has now come to Taraba. The coming of these gigantic ground breaking projects should be seen and received by the Taraba state government as complementing the development projects of Governor Ishaku in the state.

This necessarily calls for synergy and bi-partisanship between these two illustrious sons of Taraba. Although both belong to different political parties, for the ultimate good of the state the Governor as the chief executive of the state and the Minister as the state’s representative at the federal executive council must work hand in hand not just to deliver development to the state but also to bring about an atmosphere of peace for this development to occur.  It will not augur well for the development of Taraba if peace continues to elude the state. The search for sustainable peace must be pursued as a sine qua non for the development of the state.

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