Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State has vowed to rather die than surrender his ancestral lands to the Fulani extraction.
Mr Ortom made the vow on Tuesday in Makurdi while backtracking from his earlier promise last month to donate lands for ranching to herdsmen whom he has severally accused as arrowheads of insecurity in his domain.
He stated this while receiving the mission team of the Medecins Sans Frontieres also known as Doctors without Borders.
The Benue helmsman who has continued to accused the federal government of complexity in the killings going on in the state said he decided to make a u-turn because violent herdsmen have made millions of citizens in the state homeless.
“Our people are dying, our women, mothers are being raped, our children can’t go to school, they are suffering,” the governor lamented. “These criminals, they display themselves on social media, claiming they are here for an agenda to drive our people away and take over their land and also kill them. And they are here courtesy of Federal Government but for me, if they come, then I’m ready to die than to surrender my land to Fulani men. If God didn’t protect me, then I need no help from anybody.”
“The spate of insecurity has also led to increased internal displacement which is now commonplace in most parts of the nation’s food basket as statistics continue to swell on what seems to be a daily basis with many more communities sacked from their ancestral home by the persistent attacks with no hope in sight for their safe return home,” he added.
