By Kayode Tani-Olu
The governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Fayose, recently deployed a militia of local hunters to hunt down “Fulani” herdsmen in reaction to a recent incident in Ikole Ekiti, where some local people were killed as a result of clashes between “Fulani” herders and the local agrarian community. I have been trying to follow the arguments of those supporting the governor’s reaction to this unfortunate – but avoidable – incident.
CAVEAT EMPTOR
Please allow me to shed a bit of light on this subject which is currently generating so much debate within the Nigerian community. I wish to begin by saying, without equivocation, that I write this piece as a Nigerian patriot and as a former Nigerian career diplomat. Least of all, I write as a human being.
THE FACTS ABOUT HERDSMEN
The so-called cattle-herders are the Bororo or the Wodaabe. They are ethnically related to the Fulani – although some of the Fulani people will not agree they are Fulani. They are made up of many clans which are spread all over West Africa. Their relationship to the Fulani is similar to what the Itsekiri have with Yoruba. Their culture is so similar. Some others describe the Fulani, Fula or Peul as the town or “settler Fulan”i and the Wodaabe as the “cattle Fulani”. My personal opinion is that both cultures and languages are mutually intelligible, hence the similarity. In this write up, I would like to refer to them as the Wodaabe. The Wodaabe have never been educated, they have never owned land, and they don’t even have an ancestral home. For those of us that do, not having an ancestral home is incomprehensible – I can understand that. The Wodaabe often migrate north and south, east and west, and have done so for centuries within a very large area, criss-crossing the borders of more than 15 countries in the search for pasture (they move anywhere from Chad in the east, to Mauritania in the west, depending on the movement of the dry season).
CONFLICT
In every country where they exist, their itinerant lifestyle has often put them in conflict with agrarian communities. In the last few decades, they have been victims of cattle rustlers and of recent Boko Haram. They probably carry AK47s to protect themselves. I personally know of instances when even local communities have stolen or killed their cattle and they have reported to the police, and the police had done nothing.
Their cattle are their lives and they will kill defending their livestock. It is a wrong assumption to think that these cattle herders are working for “big men”, like some people have been saying. I can understand why some people think this way – how can such “uneducated” people have so much wealth in cattle and livestock? However, we own homes, cars, books, electronics, investments, etc. Those cattle are simply what the Wodaabe own.
A Wodaabe will never hold or care for another man’s cattle. It’s anathema to their culture- they simply don’t do it. Their itinerant lifestyle has also not allowed them to mix with other tribes in marriage – in fact they never intermarry with other groups – hence resulting in much inbreeding, and the side effects of this. I believe every Wodaabe in this world is related, hence in the event of a vendetta against a local community, it is easy for them to rely on reinforcement, support and logistics of other Wodaabe. Whenever you see them with a large herd (sometimes in thousands) of cattle, it’s usually because a whole clan – grandfather, husbands, cousins, brothers, etc – are herding together. The strange thing is each animal knows his master’s voice – just the way Jesus Christ described his sheep – that they know HIS voice. For the Wodaabe, while many have embraced Islam, most are still for the most part predominantly “animists”.
THE RANCHING QUESTION
Some have said, since they have no homeland, why don’t we ranch them in Sambisa Forest? The problem with that is that Sambisa Forest spans more than five states in Nigeria. We all know every inch of terra firma in Nigeria is owned by at least one tribe or ethnic group, so to give away any part of Sambisa Forest will be giving away land that belongs to another ethnic group to the Wodaabe. However, the British colonial administration provided for the Wodaabe (especially in the Northern Region which now comprises at least 24 states) in the various colonial constitutions, including the one Nigeria inherited at independence. In those constitutions, “grazing areas” were provided for them in many locations.
Those areas have since vanished – since various states governments, over the years, have “stolen” or appropriated the land meant for them. Even when the government in the spirit of the various colonial institutions that we inherited, recently tried to revisit the issue of the grazing areas in order to address the problem, most Nigerians from the southern states said it was a ploy to establish the Fulani hegemony over locations outside the northern states of Nigeria. Hence, the Wodaabe had no other choice than to look for pasture wherever they can find it – bringing them into endless clashes with just about every agrarian community they come in contact with.
CRIMINAL ELEMENTS
Like in every civil society, town and country, the Wodaabe also have vagrants and criminal elements who commit violent crimes against local communities under the guise of herding their livestock. These vagrants need to be identified and made to face the full wrath of the law. Another point worthy of note is that because of the Woodabe lifestyle, it is very hard to tell who amongst them is Nigerian, and who is not. They have no homeland, they have never had one and international boundaries have no meaning to them; neither do they have ID cards or passports.
I doubt if they have representation in the parliament of any West African country let alone Nigeria. These people are still many centuries behind the rest of us. I have related all these things in the hope that we can begin to properly examine this as a complex problem, and put it in its proper context. I have also tried to put the Wodaabe under the periscope so that as we continue this debate, we can take some of these things into account.
THE FAYOSE SOLUTION
The Federal Government, no doubt, has a complex problem, but Fayose’s solution is certainly not the right one. I know it is easy for some people to go after the low hanging fruit by just concluding that I am pandering to the Wodaabe in this write up. However, I am not Wodaabe.
But the fact is that sometimes we attempt to turn a blind eye to the truth, even when it is staring us in the face; and when you make a different contribution in a debate or hold a different point of view, some of us get so unreasonable. We as Nigerians make a claim for democracy, but we do not want the dialogue and debate (and contrary views) that come with it.
The officials, whom we freely elected to represent and govern us, have decided to start acting like despotic rulers and we see nothing wrong with that. As a matter of fact, we have continued to cheer them on.
In the light of this, has it occurred to those supporting Fayose that we are yet to see the section of the Nigerian law that permits a state governor to arm and maintain a militia, even when the constitution does not allow state police? As a side note, can the flintlock rifles Fayose’s militiamen (local hunters) are armed with compete against the herdsmen’s AK47s? And when the local hunters find themselves overpowered by the superior firepower of the herdsmen, what is he going to do? Is he going to start importing ammunition for the local hunters – especially when he has told them he would give them anything they need? The fact of the matter is, Fayose has raised an armed militia even when he lacks the constitutional power to establish a state police force! The Nigerian constitution only allows for a federal police force and federal law enforcement agencies.
WARNING
Lastly, what do you think the Serbian, Radovan Karadzic, was found guilty of by the International Criminal Court, ICC, regarding the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina? In case you do not remember, he was convicted for arming, enabling and maintaining a Serbian militia (just like Fayose is doing with local hunters), to kill ethnic Bosniaks. Karadzic claimed he was protecting Serbs. Now, Fayose says he is protecting the people of Ekiti by commissioning a local militia to hunt down “errant” herdsmen. He went as far as saying that he could no longer guarantee their safety in Ekiti – he actually said he did not want to see them in his state.
Do you remember the time when former Gov. Fashola of Lagos State “deported” (ok … I found a better word…”repatriated”) some people back to the South East? Remember how people from those areas reacted? How come people are not reacting the same way this time? Therefore, to those encouraging Fayose, I hope they are aware that they are encouraging ethnic violence –even if there are criminal elements within the migrant herdsmen.
I also hope they are prepared to continue their support for him all the way to the ICC when he faces charges of “crimes against humanity”. THE SOLUTION Unfortunately, I am not in a position to recommend a comprehensive solution to this complex problem, which is also on-going in many other West African countries at this time. One person cannot have all the facts – I am not an exception to this rule. Some have talked about ranching. I have lived in the United States for the last 20 years; and not many states in the US can afford or have the capacity to establish and support ranches.
It is usually very capital intensive and the cost of entry (to establish them) is huge. Apart from cost, in Nigeria, we currently lack the capacity in infrastructure, technology, science and support services to do it on a massive scale. Ranching could yet be a long term solution. For an immediate solution, a good place to start will be the identification, re-possession and re-establishment of the previously established grazing areas.
To accomplish this will require collaborative effort on the part of our elected officials at the local, state, and federal levels; our elected officials can, in good time, fashion and execute policies that address the root of the problem, because we need to avoid further bloodshed on all sides – violence begets more violence.
*Tani-Olu lives in Brookeville, Maryland