Group Tasks Nasarawa Governor On Killings, Inter-tribal Conflict

Nasarawa State Governor Abdullahi Sule has been urged to check the incessant attacks and killings in parts of Keana local government area of the state.

The Alago Ikweyi Ggayi Development Union, which made the call in Lafia, said if the attacks, killings and destruction of properties are brought to an end, they may trigger an inter-tribal war.

Our correspondent reports that conflict between the Alago and Tiv farmers in the Keana local government area of the state over a farmland resulted in the death of four people recently with many sustaining injuries.

President of AIGDU, Mohammed Oshafu, said the disputed land which is in Keana axis of the Benue/Nasarawa border and used for centuries by their ancestors had been encroached by youths from Benue State who always launched unprovoked attacks on them.

“Before the farming season in Keana, the Alago people usually go to clear their farmlands in preparation for the farming season. But this time around, surprisingly, the Tiv farmers emerged from nowhere, stopping and threatening our people and claiming that the Tivs had decided to start farming in the area because it is not part of Nasarawa State.

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“Our people suffered several intimidation and molestation throughout this period from the Tiv people, and at various times, forcefully taken to Daudu in Benue State and illegally locked and tortured in local cells, claiming that the land belongs to Benue and not Nasarawa State.

“The Osana of Keana (Traditional ruler) in his effort to ensure peaceful coexistence between Keana and Benue border communities of the Tivs, met with them severally to sue for peace but despite several efforts by the traditional ruler, the Nasarawa State government, the Keana local government council and the peace-loving Alago people of Keana, the Tiv people continued to provoke and cause problems in the area,” he alleged.

However, responding the President of Tiv Development Association in the state, Simeon Apusu, said his kinsmen are not troublemakers and had never seen violence as a way to settle disputes.

He lamented that the situation had led to the displacement of hundreds of Tiv farmers in Keana town and those of Obosidoma and other nearby Tiv villages in the area.

He urged both the state and the federal government to hasten the ongoing boundary demarcation process between Nasarawa and Benue states to provide a permanent solution to the incessant land disputes between farmers at the border areas of the two states.