Plateau Civil Society Organisations Forum (CSOs), has called on traditional, religious and stakeholders to resort to constituting community police to protect themselves against any form of attack to help repeal a repeat of the ugly Christmas Eve attacks in Bokkos, Barkin-Ladi and Mangu LGAs communities.
President of the Forum, Rev Chris Damcher, Plateau CSOs Forum, made the call Friday, while addressing journalists at the International Press Conference, held at the State Secretariat of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) in Jos, the Plateau State capital.
The president said, “The killings in Plateau started on 7 September 2001. It has grown into a massacre and a barbaric act of violence, cowardly engineered which counters every known attitude of a normal human being who believes in the sanctity of human life.
“As it is common with most of the attacks meted on communities, there are most often early warning security alerts circulated on the social media. We are fully convinced that such information usually gets to the security agencies and relevant authorities, but we are so worried and saddened that each time such planned attacks by the same so-called Fulani militia are circulated, their plans are usually executed to a high percentage, unabated.
“What is really disturbing at this juncture is that: There is hardly or never a proactive measure(s) by the security operatives to counter the early warnings circulated nor intercept the attackers in the act. It is no longer news that the attackers are not only after the lives of the community dwellers but truly their ancestral and God given lands to occupy”, he asserted.
According to Damcher, “From our observation, what is glaringly taking place on the Plateau is the sprouting of strange new Fulani settlements and herders at the footage of the hills all around the Northern and parts of the Central Zones of Plateau State.
“The original owners of the lands have been displaced to the Internally Displaced Person Camps (IDPs) and other host communities where they are out of touch with economic realities. The lands are being taken over and there is no government and traditional institutions fighting or promoting the returning of the IDPs to their ancestral land. while the grabbers are moving around freely and molesting citizens.
“Therefore, the traditional rulers, religious leaders and stakeholders of all communities should have community police to complement the conventional security forces, report and also investigate presence of strangers, the raising of structures and bring to relevant authorities all criminals within the community”, he implored.
The Forum, however, recommended that governments at both federal, state and local government levels should avoid selective response to alarms and tip-offs of a possible attack, calling on government and legislators both at the state and national level to revisit the establishment of the North Central Development Commission.
According to the forum, “this would facilitate the rehabilitation, reconstruction and resettlement of IDPs to their ancestral lands”
In a similar vein, the Plateau State Transition Implementation Committee Chairmen of the Seventeen Local Government Areas, have expressed worries and sadness over the loss of numerous lives due to incessant attacks in Mangu, Bokkos, and Barkin-Ladi LGAs.
Led by the TIC ALGON Chairman, Hon. Hamisu Anani, who is the Transition Committee Chairman of Wase LGC at the press briefing organised by ALGON and held at the NUJ State Secretariat Jos, Friday, the Committee said, “these senseless and unprovoked acts are unnecessary and unjustifiable.
“We are appealing to the sponsors of these attacks to reconsider their steps as there is nothing to gain from such violence. The spirit of the Plateau people will not be broken. We ALGON, express sympathy for the affected families and communities and urge citizens to stand strong. They assured them that the government is actively working to address the situation while calling for calm in the affected areas”, Anani assured.
