GRAZING AND THE NOMADIC CHALLENGE
The age of nomadic herding belongs to the past
Under the various laws that have been enacted in many of the 36 states in recent years, it is illegal to have the highways taken over by animals while cattle rearers who invade farmlands for grazing purposes commit trespass. But enforcing such laws have been difficult because of a socio-cultural issue that has not been addressed. Yet, when the farms are destroyed the criminal offence of willful destruction of property is committed. In many instances, the clashes between cattle rearers and farm owners have led to serious communal disturbances. While dealing with this perennial problem will task any government, what is needed is for all critical stakeholders to come together to address the challenge.
As we have always argued on this page, it is indeed one of the curious tragedies of modern Nigeria that we have come to accept the category ‘nomadic’ as a permanent description of a vital segment of our populace. The tragic consequence has been the ever frequent bloody clashes between nomads and settled landowners and farmers in nearly every part of the country. And now we also witness almost on a daily basis the involvement of nomads in aspects of our emerging national crime culture: kidnapping for ransom, armed robbery, etc. Now that we can see the manifestation of this state of affairs in violent clashes in several theatres across the country, it is evident that we cannot allow it to continue.
Beyond the fatalities and the disruption to national peace, there are other fundamental issues. First, by accepting the category of nomad as a norm, we are vicariously denying these citizens of the benefits of settled human civilisation which include the right to a place to call home, the right to own land and other property, and above all the full citizenship rights enjoyed by other Nigerians. By allowing them to roam the length and breadth of the country, often herding evacuated cattle, we violate the rights of these animals and endanger the health of citizens through exposure to the elements and a cocktail of diseases.
More importantly, we are encouraging the violation of the rights of settled landowners and farmers whose crops bear the brunt of cattle grazing. In the process we endanger national security because both settled crop farmers and migrant herdsmen have economic interests to protect sometimes with dangerous weapons. The nation must therefore bring to the front burner how to resolve the issue of herdsmen and the concomitant destruction of farmlands that in turn engender crisis in several places across the country.
However, there is an obvious solution, if only the authorities are serious. States with migrant cattle herding culture and populations have a ready agricultural harvest waiting to be reaped if we encourage cattle farmers to establish large farms and ranches. We can then employ and re-train the herdsmen in modern settled cattle farming. The animals will be healthier; the handlers will earn decent incomes, have decent accommodation, own property and have schools for their kids. Ancillary industries will also emerge, and employment opportunities will blossom. Some states, especially in the North, have already keyed into this idea but there is a need for them to do more.
In the history of humanity, the stage of development at which man wandered for a livelihood belongs to the stone age. Let us stop insulting ourselves with romanticising the ‘nomadic culture’ by beginning to reap the fullest benefits of our natural endowments through aggressive modernisation of our modes of agricultural production. Brazil and the United States (Alabama) which are some of the world’s largest cattle producers do not have the menace and insult of ‘nomads’.
