The Senator representing Southern Kaduna senatorial zone, Danjuma
La’ah, has emphasized that Southern Kaduna does not welcome any Cattle
Colony in whatever guise.
A press statement he personally issued on the proposed cattle
colonies in the country, Senator La’ah observed that, “Kaduna South
Senatorial Zone, and by extension, the entire Southern Kaduna, rejects
any attempt to seize more of its lands for the exclusive settlement of
herdsmen and their cattle using state power.
“Already, there is an existing Cattle Grazing Reserve in Laduga from
lands taking away from indigenes of Zangon Kataf and Kachia Local
Government Areas dating back decades ago.
“That massive land officially gazetted at 32,000 hectare, (32,000
football fields), but which the present Kaduna State government has
expanded to 74,000 hectares was taken from my constituents without
compensation till date, as records have it.
“It therefore, means that Southern Kaduna has already given much,
much more over the needed 5000 hectares by 15 times or at least 6 times
the needed space for a Grazing Colony – should the size of Laduga
Grazing Reserve be put at 72,000 or at 32,000 hectares.
“The population of Southern Kaduna is fast increasing with equal
demands new farmlands, animal rearing and other land uses for now and in
the future.
“Ask us for lands to site Universities, government institutions etc.
We are willing to give out our lands in partnership with industrialists,
mechanised farming, estate developments and all positive social and
economic endeavours that are of mutual benefits to everyone.
“We have co-habited for very long with Fulani herdsmen without the
kind of strange and evil relation that their presence has suddenly
turned into in many communities of Southern Kaduna. Herdsmen, their
cattle and our people have fared even better in the past when we
peacefully lived together in affected communities.
“It is still possible to normalise that relationships if government
is sincere and serious about it, because we believe that majority of our
local herdsmen are law abiding and crave for peace and development.
“I am sure that had our parents not been living in peace and with the
Fulani in their time, a lot of resistance would have been put against
the Laduga Grazing Reserve becoming a reality even at that time that
they had no political power, were not so literate and exposed to
forecast the doom that their future generations would later encounter by
the creation of that Grazing Reserve.
“It would now look as if the terror unleashed on Southern Kaduna and
the Middle Belt is to cower them into submitting their prime lands for
new colonies of herdsmen.
“No land in Southern Kaduna is free again for the exclusive economic
benefit of a group of people who have paid us for humanely accommodating
them with mass murder and destruction in scores of our settlements
since 2011.
“Herdsmen are rich and can afford to negotiate and buy lands from
willing farmers to ranch their animals as is the practice in modern
times, since pastoralism is regarded as backward and prone to conflicts.
“While, I still very much would encourage cohabiting in a peaceful
and free atmosphere with every ethnic group residing in Southern Kaduna,
I wish to advise both Kaduna State and the Federal Government not sow
permanent seeds of problems that will far outlived their temporary stay
in office – such as creating a new permanent abode for herders under the
tense and suspicious condition that farmers have for herdsmen today.
“The solution to the strange violence developed by armed herdsmen
against farming communities is not confiscation of farmers’ lands and
settling those who are marauding them.
“The solution is to bring to justice those carrying out these heinous
crimes and provide security to the defenceless – after all some of them
have been identified and paid by Kaduna State government. When this is
done, sincere dialogue to ending the terror may start between all
stakeholders in the crisis.”