Chinelo Obogo
Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF) have rejected the National Livestock Transformation Plan and the Water Bill proposed by the Federal government, saying it is another form of the suspended RUGA settlement programme and are capable of escalating herdsmen and farmers clash.
The organisation made the statement after its meeting in Abuja, saying that it is worried that rather than confront the problems confronting the country, the Federal government has busied itself with policies that are ‘divisive and smacks of domination and conquest of sections of a country by another section.’
The leaders in a statement signed by Yinka Odumakin (South West) Prof Chigozie Ogbu (South East), Senator Bassey Henshaaw (South-South) and Dr. Isuwa Dogo (Middle Belt), also said they rejected the programme because they cannot support the conversion of the collective resources of Nigerians for use by herdsmen, many of whom are non-Nigerians.
“We reject the National Livestock Transformation Plan aka RUGA, because it converts the collective resources of Nigerians for use by herdsmen, majority of whom are non-Nigerians while doing their private business that has nothing to do with the rest of us. It is akin to the government making budgetary allocations to Coca Cola to produce drinks to sell to Nigerians.
“Apart from the plan not making any economic sense for the country, there are other fundamental problems it raises. “There is the issue of citizenship which was exposed by Bauchi governor, Bala Mohammed, who said that Fulani from all over Africa are going to benefit from the scheme. Mohammed said the Fulani man is a global or African person who moves from The Gambia to Senegal and his nationality is Fulani. He said Nigeria cannot close its borders to the Fulani.
“Why are we then closing our borders with the Benin Republic when there are many people of Yoruba origin there? What is the contribution of those Fulani imports to the development of Nigeria to come and live on our resources while our citizens are the poorest on earth? Why is it difficult to apply common sense in our inter-ethnic relations in Nigeria?
“Another conquest agenda in sync with NLTP is the vexatious Executive Bill titled “A Bill for an Act to Establish a Regulatory Framework for the Water Resources Sector in Nigeria, Provide for the Equitable and Sustainable Redevelopment, Management, Use and Conservation of Nigeria’s Surface Water and Groundwater Resources and for Related Matter.” This bill seeks to abrogate all existing laws and institutions governing the management and control of water resources nationwide and replace them with new ones in a manner that gives the president, through the Minister of Water Resources, the power to control the nation’s rivers (especially those that pass through more than one state), lakes and underground water.
“The Waterways Bill is another land-grabbing move like RUGA by ethnic supremacists who are working against the unity of the country. Major rivers in Nigeria can be made available, by Federal law if the bill is passed, to Fulani pastoralists and there is nothing the indigenous people within such vicinities can do about it. The police and the security agencies will be handy to enforce it and it will be another White farmer versus the African landowners scenario in southern Africa during the apartheid season,” the statement read.