Community Leaders Say Residents Still Traumatized by Massacre in 2016
By Ebere Inyama
Despite opposition from native residents of Nimbo community in Enugu, the state government has decided to set up ranches for cattle rearing in Uzo Uwani local government area (a division similar to a U.S. County).
In a statement signed by the Commissioner for Information, Mr Aka Eze Aka, on Saturday, February 10, 2024, the Enugu state government confirmed that it was planning to establish modern ranches as part of its agro-industrial productivity agenda to turn Enugu state’s dormant assets into productive areas. State officials also argue the move will frustrate kidnappers and other criminals, who masquerade as herders.
The statement by Aka came in response to a protest by widows in Nimbo community who came out en masse to oppose the state government’s plan to establish a cattle ranch at Nimbo, a town close to the border with neighboring Kogi State. A spokeswoman for the widows said they had lost their husbands during the invasion of Nimbo community by approximately 500 armed men in April 2016. The women marched through the streets on Saturday, 10 February, 2024 with pictures of the caskets used during the mass burial of their husbands, chanting, “Nimbo doesn’t want Ruga, Nimbo doesn’t want cattle, Nimbo doesn’t want Ranch.” They described the plan by the state government to establish cattle ranch as “an act of wickedness.”
2016 terror attacks on Nimbo Form Backdrop of 2024 Protests
Nimbo is a border town in Uzo-Uwani area of Enugu State, Nigeria, where seven villages – Ekwuru, Nimbo-Ngwoko, Ugwuijoro, Ebor, Enugu-Nimbo, Umuome and Ugwuachara – were invaded, and scores massacred, by 500 armed herdsmen who spoke the Fulfulde language of the Fulani tribe.
The herdsmen, who reportedly were bent on occupying a portion of the farming community’s land for cattle grazing, allegedly plotted the attack and went on to notify the natives about their invasion on April 23, 2016. The intelligence was promptly reported to security agencies, who did not intervene to defend the villagers. At about 5.15 am several hundred armed men struck the village cluster killing 46 and critically wounding 14. Several young people lost hands and fingers to the invaders who maimed them with machetes. Since 2016 the herding people have occupied large tracts of land in the Nimbo area, a form of land invasion that has displaced hundreds of thousands of farmers in neighboring Benue State. Plateau State in North-central Nigeria has been the focus of waves of organized attacks for several years, the most notable sequence being the 6 day attack on Central Plateau counties widely reported as “Black Christmas” of 2023, TruthNigeria has reported.
As a result of the violence, displaced natives fled to neighboring communities of Nkpologu and Uvuru, (Uvuru-Agada) even as indigenes of those communities also fled to Nsukka in fear of further attacks.
State government woos natives to support the proposed cattle ranching
In his statement, Aka said the government has no plans to cede any part of the state’s lands to herders, adding that the reports of a few individuals purportedly protesting government’s alleged plan to set up Ruga at Nimbo in Uzo Uwani County [Local Governance Area] as the handiwork of political losers aiming to run the administration down for political gains.
Aka explained that state government intends to establish a ranch in Uzo-Uwani LGA, which he says is different from the suspended and rejected RUGA concept of former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration. According to him, the proposed ranch will be established and managed by the state government in line with the strict implementation of Enugu State’s anti-grazing bill, which was signed into law by former Governor, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, on September 15, 2021.
“The intention of government is clear on the matter. Armed bandits and kidnappers in the name of herders have for long taken advantage of our forests and farmland to commit heinous crimes, abduction, rape and killings.
“The government of Enugu State has resolved to put a stop to these and introduce ranching, the most modern way of rearing cattle,” the statement read.
While testifying at the panel of inquiry into the attack on Nimbo community by killer herdsmen, The Traditional Ruler of the community, John Akor demanded that the Federal Government should pay N17 billion to the community as compensation for the invasion of the community and the killing of residents by herdsmen in 2016.
Group tells state government to reverse the proposed cattle ranch
In a statement through a foremost non-political and non-partisan group, Uzo-Uwani Professionals Association (UZPA), signed by its President, Barr. Chinedum Odenyi, and Secretary General, Chief Dan Asogwa respectively, the native residents of Nimbo community condemned the plan by the state government to establish a cattle ranch for Fulani herdsmen.
“Today, eight years later, many are still carrying the physical and psychological trauma of that unprovoked sadistic revelry,” according to the statement. “It is astounding that it is lost on the Mbah administration the tragedy of this proposal in the context of the historical grief: that the innocent victims of a murderous invasion, would have their land, their most prized asset, expropriated by the State Government, to settle the perpetrators of the massacre. Such an irony; such pain,” the statement continued.
“This is nothing short of rubbing salt into injury. Indeed, UZPA finds it a sign of a larger structural disdain for the people of this Local Government that the State Government even contemplated this project and had the sobriety to suggest that the location shall be Nimbo.
The statement went on to say: “The people of Nimbo, and Uzo-Uwani in general have stoutly risen in unison in opposition to the proposal, reading a more sinister objective in the proposed project and calling on the government to stop any further exploration of the subject around the geographic entity of Uzo-Uwani LGA. UZPA, having considered all the reactions on the issue, finds everything wrong with the proposal and calls on the Enugu State Government to immediately halt any further design and attempt to implement the proposed ranch project in any part of Uzo-Uwani Local Government Area. The project is not only insensitive, it is abrasive to the sensibilities of the people of Nimbo Community, and of Uzo-Uwani in general.”
Ebere Inyama is a journalist covering Southeastern Nigeria for TruthNigeria.
