The Ebonyi State government has reacted to social media reports that a Rural Grazing Area (RUGA) has been created in the state.
Trending reports on social media last week claimed herdsmen were brought into the state with plots of lands allocated to them for settlement.
The report seen by TODAY POLITICS was backed up with images and video clips. It was credited to a journalist residing in the state who reported that herdsmen alongside their family members were transported into Izza Local Government Area with the help of security agencies.
Youths in the area were said to have resisted their visitors from settling in the area despite the presence of security agencies.
“They were later directed to another land still in the same state,” an online new medium which published the report quoted the journalist, Timothy Chinonso, as reporting.
But dismissing the report, the state government said it has not approved the creation of Ruga in any part of the state and narrated what transpired.
It explained that the herdsmen were on their way out of the state after they were asked to relocate from a settlement in the state.
“Contrary to the spiritless fabrication of these political jobbers, what happened on 12/10/2019 was the normal movement of cattle rearers who were on transit from their temporary camp at the Centenary City Abakaliki to a neighbouring state, where they have found more conducive for their Cattle’s livelihood,” a statement by the Commissioner for Information and Social Orientation, Uchenna Orji, partly read.
“These herdsmen once camped in a government reserved area at the Centenary City, Abakaliki but when government started to develop the place for government use as agreed, the herdsmen on their volition decided to look for greener pasture elsewhere in a neighbouring state,” Mr Orji added.
