Imo Bilie Initiative Asks Federal Government To Stop Herdsmen Mayhem Now

The Imo Bilie Initiative for social Justice has called on President Muhammadu Buhari and the nation's security agencies to quickly intervene and bring to an end the avoidable killings, raping, kidnapping and destruction of farmlands in the South East by Fulani herdsmen.

The pro democracy civil society group speaking through her National Coordinator, Comrade Aku Obidinma (Abdul) in Owerri decried the impunity at which these herdsmen unleash mayhem on innocent citizens. He frowned at the inability of the federal government and security agencies from quelling this genocide like killings. The National Coordinator lamented that the activities of this miscreants if unchecked is capable of threatening the unity of this country.

According to him, the modus operandi of these ravagers is the same as that of the Boko Haram insurgents and wondered if this is not a disguised extension of the Boko Haram insurgency. He gave an instance with the recent killings in Enugu where the Governor claimed to have notified the security agencies of an Intel about the attack and yet they still couldn't prevent it with over 30 people massacred in cold blood in their communities.

IBIN also rejected the response of the Minister for Information Alhaji Lai Mohammed that government is doing something secretly about it and asked the government to instead do such openly since these atrocities are committed in the open by the marauding herdsmen.

He warned that if the vulnerable people are left continuously unprotected, they may resort to self help which may escalate the crisis. Finally the group called on the South East Governor's forum and all the elected federal lawmakers to quickly engage the federal government and the security agencies to put an end to this violence.

The group also stated their stand against the controversial grazing route bill before the national assembly, arguing that animal rearing should remain a private venture of the owner and should not be made a national affair. They warned that mapping out a grazing route will amount to forcefully taking away people's farmlands which is unacceptabl and therefore called on all South East lawmakers at the National Assembly to oppose the bill.