One time winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Professor Wole Soyinka, has hit out at President Muhammadu Buhari over his perceived inability to handle the situation with the rampaging Fulani Herdsmen.
He said this at the National conference on culture and tourism where he stated that he hadn’t seen any signs of the government coming up with a solution to battle the Herdmen and stop the violence.
The Fulani herdsmen have seemingly taken the place of Boko Haram in the fear and apprehension they have incited in the nation. A couple of days ago there were the deadly attacks in Enugu which followed the much-publicized one in Agatu.
Professor Soyinka is unconvinced of any efforts being made by the government to combat this new enemy.
“I have yet to hear this government articulate a firm policy of non-tolerance for the serial massacres that have become the nation’s identification stamp,” Professor Soyinka stated.
“I have not heard an order given that any cattle herders caught with sophisticated firearms be instantly disarmed, arrested, placed on trial, and his cattle confiscated. The nation is treated to an eighteen-month optimistic plan which, to make matters worse, smacks of abject appeasement and encouragement of violence on innocents.
“When I read a short while ago, the Presidential assurance to this nation that the current homicidal escalation between the cattle prowlers and farming communities would soon be over, I felt mortified,” Mr. Soyinka said.
“He had the solution, he said. Cattle ranches were being set up, and in another 18 months, rustlings, destruction of livelihood and killings from herdsmen would be ‘a thing of the past’. 18 months, he assured the nation. I believe his Minister of Agriculture echoed that later, but with a less dispiriting time schema.
“Neither, however, could be considered a message of solace and reassurance for the ordinary Nigerian farmer and the lengthening cast of victims, much less to an intending tourist to the Forest Retreat of Tinana in the Rivers, the Ikogosi Springs or the moslem architectural heritage of the ancient city of Kano. In any case, the external tourists have less hazardous options.”