From Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
A group known as Association of Kwande Academia (AKA) has lamented the incessant herdsmen attacks on the Turan axis of Kwande Local Government Area of Benue State, stressing that the attacks have claimed over 2,728 lives between 2014 and 2022.
The group also regretted that more than 200,000 households have been destroyed with property and farmlands worth over N3 trillion destroyed by the invading herdsmen in the Turan axis of Kwande local government area alone. The association, in a statement signed by its President, Prof. Hilakaan Hemba, and made available to newsmen yesterday, further regretted that the invaders have destroyed homes, schools, and places of worship, markets, clinics, hospitals, farmlands and farm produce.
The group added that the destruction of both primary and secondary schools in the area by the attackers has forced over 65,000 school children out of school even as it warned against the repercussions of forcing children out of school.
“The repercussion of forcing children out of school is inimical, deleterious, pernicious, injurious, pugnacious, rancorous, opprobrious, malicious, acrimonious, discourteous and detrimental, including loss of creativity and opportunities, and making them more vulnerable and at risk of violence, such as bullying, rebelliousness, thuggery, arm robbery, prostitution, banditry and juvenile delinquency.”
The group also noted that since the inception of the crises in 2014, the federal government has not taken sufficient steps to halt the killings, deploy serious security units to vulnerable areas, disarm and prosecute perpetrators of violence, and address issues concerning the displaced people.
In order to facilitate their going back to their ancestral homes and continue to live their normal lives.
The group, therefore, demanded, among other things, that the federal government, as a matter of urgency, stop the killings of innocent souls and destruction of property and farmlands, by ensuring that peace is restored in the affected areas, to enable the people return to their ancestral homes.