Bothered by the rising spate of killings orchestrated by suspected herders, Air Vice Marshall Toni Adokwu (rtd) has charged the Idoma, at whatever position of significance, to fight for the unity and security of the Idoma nation.
Stressing that no one deserves to be killed extra-judicially, AVM Adokwu, who spoke in Otukpo at the weekend, after being inaugurated for another term of two years as the President of Ochetoha K’Idomo, called on Idoma from all walks of life to close ranks and fight to keep their enemies at bay.
The leader of all Socio-Cultural Unions of Idoma nationwide observed that without unity and focus on the common purpose, all efforts to secure the land and attain progress and general well-being of the people may never materialize.
There have been several reports of incidences of mass killings in several parts of Benue state, mid into the current Fourth Republic. The epicenter of the gory incidents had been Agatu and Apa Local Government Areas in the South of Benue State.
After a brief lull, the ugly episodes resumed last April, just immediately after the General elections, when about 51 indigenes were murdered at Umogidi Entekpa, a village in Otukpo Local Government by daredevil terrorists suspected to be Fulani militia.
The killings are however not limited to the Idoma-speaking part of Benue state but spread right across the state.
Unfortunately, the Federal Government under President Muhammadu Buhari is accused of not doing enough to curtail the orgy of herders/farmers’ clashes that have persisted in the lush green grassland of the Middle Belt of Nigeria.
Ochetoha K’Idoma, and other ethnically based Non-Governmental Organisations like Afenifere, for the Yoruba or Ohaneze Nd’Igbo have gained prominence in the past eight years of the Buhari Presidency, following a sudden rise in herders’ violent attacks on indigenous rural, farming communities, nationwide.
