I was in Port Harcourt, Rivers State of Nigeria on the 5th of November, 2024, when I received a call about the unfortunate and callous beheading of my Cousin, Chief Obey Umogane and his two friends in Okpekpe, Etsako-East local government area of Edo State, by suspected Fulani herdsmen.
Just three months after this gruesome incident, precisely on Monday morning of February 24th, 2025, another Nephew of mine, Christopher Bello and an old age mate friend of mine, Philip Batemue, were murdered by the same suspected Fulani herdsmen in the same village of Okpekpe.
I have had a sister-in-law Kidnapped on her way to Port Harcourt from Warri in Delta State and a bosom friend and Classmate kidnapped with his daughters from his home in Kaduna. Another friend of mine was kidnapped from his home in Kaduna together with his neighbour, who never came back up until now for four years.
As someone who has had his fair share of the trauma associated with losing someone to the growing menace of insecurity in our nation, I stand the chance to understand the collective trauma of a people bedevilled by fear, trepidation and the feeling of security threat and the temptation of finding Justice by all means, which in itself is wrong and condemnable.
It is based on the above and with this dispassionate prism that I want everyone to look at what happened in Uromi, as an avoidable yet understandable error of judgment on the part of a people who have for long been seething with discontent even though no one is allowed to take the laws into their hands no matter the provocation.
Uromi and all the surrounding communities of Edo Central and especially Edo North have been under siege by the atrocious activities of suspected Fulani herdsmen and their collaborators for the better part of last year up until now with no tangible solution in sight. In Okpekpe since November last year, nobody dared go to the farms freely as before, as farmlands have for long been abandoned to herders to harvest while the farmers remain in penury and hunger.
This is the reality on the ground and the experience throughout the communities in the hinterlands of Edo State. It is high time the Federal government in collaboration with the Edo State government of Senator Monday Okpebholo does something drastic and sustainable to curb this menace that is putting the collective psyche of every villager in Edo State on overdrive.
A mistake definitely has been made with the jungle justice meted out to the innocent Hausa hunters in Uromi. “Another mistake” must not be made by those who are threatening reprisals from the North on social media.
The activities of both predators and victims are a reflection of the Nigerian failing system which must not be interpreted, in this case, only from an ethnic prism. While calling for justice for the dead, may the souls that have been lost to the general insecurity in Nigeria rest in peace.
