The Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN), has backed Anambra State Governor, Chief Willie Obiano for tagging herdsmen with AK 47 as criminals
Obiano on Tuesday, at the Prof Dora Akunyili Women’s development Center in Awka, said such persons would not be allowed into Anambra State again
The Governor reacted after the traditional rulers had complained to the Inspector General of Police, Abubakar Adamu about how herdsmen had taken over their farmlands carrying AK 47, while the women were being raped at random.
Obiano immediately ordered that itinerant herdsmen who carry AK 47 guns should be treated as criminals in Anambra State after the head count his administration was planning on them
However, reacting Thursday, the Chairman of Miyetti Allah in the Southeast, Alhaji Gidado Sidikki, first, debunked the claim that the group had hands in the food blockade to southern Nigeria from the North
While speaking with reporters in Awka, Sidikki said Obiano’s action was in line with the already established agreement between the South East governors and MACBAN that any herder found in possession of gun should be treated as criminal.
He said that the leadership of Miyetti Allah in the South East zone under his watch always screen any Cattle herder that came into the region before he was allowed to graze.
According to him, “My members have been having a good relationship with their host communities, despite some isolated cases of misunderstanding, which he said, was normal in every human existence
“Our interest in the zone was purely economic; no herder is interested in contesting the ownership of land with members of their host communities”
He therefore, appealed to the host communities not to use the order as an opportunity to kill and destroy properties of law abiding Fulani herdsmen living in the region.
Speaking further on the ban on foods items from the North to South, Sidikki said, it was the work of Amalgamated Union of Food and Cattle Dealers of Nigeria, not Miyetti Allah
He said the union had earlier wrote a letter informing Miyetti Allah that it would embark on a protest to demonstrate the incessant killings and destruction of its member’s properties in various part of the country.
“So, the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association, as a body, has no hand in the blockade of food stuff from North to Southern Nigeria,” he stated.
Meanwhile, MACBAN commended state governments in the Southeast for securing the area against banditry.
The group said more still needed to be done to ensure that law-abiding citizens, including herders were free to carry out their businesses without any hindrance of any type in order to make life better for every Nigerian
