Samuel Ortom, governor of Benue
state, has asked Mansur Dan-Ali, minister of defence, to apologise to Nigerians
for demanding the suspension of anti-grazing law.
On June 5, Dan Ali called for the
suspension of the law which is operational in Benue, Taraba and Ekiti states.
Speaking at an event on Tuesday
to showcase the national livestock transformation plan by the office of the
vice-president, Ortom said there should be caution by those in government as
regards the crisis.
The governor said the statement
of Dan Ali has cast the government in bad light.
“Honourable minister (Audu
Ogbeh), just one thing, I’m part of this government and I appreciate what this
government is doing – so since the honourable minister of defence is not a
member of NEC and you are constantly in NEC and you are member of the federal
executive council where other ministers will be there. What you have said is
very important, there should have be a level of caution,” Ortom said.
“In a time like this, we should
be sensitive to what is going on. When the young man was making his remarks, he
was literally shaking and it is coming from the heart and that is how most
Nigerians are. I wonder if the minister has had time to read the newspapers, he
would have felt the feelings of Nigerians for him calling for the suspension of
a legitimate law.
“It is not good enough, it is
casting the government in bad light and the minister of the federal republic
should represent the interest of Nigerians. He should not be the mouthpiece of
Miyetti Allah in a conflict involving Nigerians.
“Especially when it is not your
technical supervision. He should have allowed it to you the honourable minister
of agric who has the responsibility of managing this to say or making such
inflammatory statements because a lot of people read different meanings to it.
Coming from a security council meeting and making such statements.
“Some people took it as the
opinion of the security council. When he clarified it solve some problems – he
needs to apologise to Nigerians.”
Ortom said the anti-grazing law
was put in place out of desperation.
“We did the anti-grazing law out
of desperation to find peace,” he said.
On his part, Audu Ogbeh, minister
of agriculture, said pastoralism “is no longer viable.”
“Matching cattle around is no
longer viable. We have to resolve to ranching and ranching in clusters is
difficult,” the minister said.
“We about dealing with the
problem as they have been presented. We want to assure Nigerians that we want
to bring this crisis to an end. These wanton killings has to come to an end.”
Also speaking, Andrew Kwasari, a
senior technical adviser to Ogbeh, said the federal government had secured 94
ranches in 10 states as part of measures to curb the farmers-herders crisis.
Kwasari said N70 billion would be
needed to fund the grazing reserves in three years which would have 170,000
cows in the pilot phase of the project.
“Total spending over the 10 year
period is slightly in excess of N179 billion. Federal-states funding is meant
for the first three years in the pilot phase, totaling about N70 billion,” he
said.
“Expected milk output to be in
excess of 200 million litres by the second year of the project.”
Click to signup for FREE news updates, latest information and hottest gists everyday
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com