Terfa Naswem
I am so disappointed in many in Benue State and elsewhere who are not only gullible but strong-willed to swim in ignorance and negligence that the Governor of Benue State, Samuel Ortom is the defender of Benue Valley. They fell for Ortom’s cheap antics used for his political and diabolical schemes.
I am among the group of people who know the politics played by Ortom in some of the Fulani herdsmen killings that took place in Benue State and refused to fall for his duplicity.
President Muhammadu Buhari is the one who made Ortom to be the Governor of Benue State until this moment. When Rt. Hon. Emmanuel Jime initiated legal action against Ortom for coming into All Progressives Congress (APC) through the ‘window’ and obtaining the gubernatorial ticket, Buhari set a reconciliation committee that mediated the crisis and saved Ortom because Jime had incontrovertible evidence to remove Ortom from that office.
One of the agreements that made Jime to withdraw the case was that Ortom will only serve for one term and allow Jime complete the remaining term zoned to Minda in Zone B.
From July 2015 to May 2017 when Ortom was still in good terms with Buhari for coming to his rescue, various deadly Fulani herdsmen attacks occurred that Ortom never accused Buhari of being responsible. He didn’t even call his attention to the attack neither did he want anybody to link Buhari to the attacks or persuade him to do so.
Here are some pertinent questions that need pertinent answers:
1. Where was Ortom when all the initial attacks occurred?
2. Why didn’t he blame Buhari for other attacks only to blame him when the December 31, 2017, and January 2, 2018 attacks occurred?
3. If Ortom were in good terms with Buhari, would he had organized the official mass burial he did for the 73 people killed?
4. Why did Ortom refuse to organize an official mass burial for the over 500 people that were killed in Agatu LGA but organized for the 73 killed in Guma and Logo LGAs?
5. Did Ortom politicised and over dramatized the killings in Guma and Logo including the mass burial for his political and diabolical schemes?
If Ortom were truly the defender of Benue Valley, he would have started that from the day Fulani herdsmen killings started when he became the governor.
He defrauded the minds of free thinkers by poisoning them to fall for his cheap antics that he is the defender of Benue Valley so that he would get cheap sympathy and defect from APC to People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to get cheap votes which many weak-hearted Benue people fell for his trap.
When Sen. George Akume said the killings that took place in Guma and Logo on December 31, 2017, and January 2, 2018 were politicized, many people misunderstood Akume.
Ortom used the killings basically for his political salvation after exploring Buhari’s vulnerability which many people in Benue State fell for.