Amotekun better than rampaging armed herdsmen —HURIWA
Tobi Adetunji.
Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) on Tuesday dismissed the criticisms trailing few instances of human errors in the operations of the southwest of Nigeria-based Amotekun security outfit.
The rights group which argued that the few human errors are mere teething institutional problems that will be resolved with better strategic finetuning of training and improvement of manpower capacities of Amotekun security platform urged massive support for the body.
HURIWA said it is better to have a home-grown institutional mechanism to protect lives and property than to permit the hitherto uncontrollable rampage and killing of citizens living in the southwest of Nigeria: “by the rampaging bunch of determined armed herdsmen whose origin are mired in politics and deceit.”
The group said that the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN) had stated that his office couldn’t prosecute Armed Fulani herdsmen because according to him, there is no case file against them.
In a statement jointly issued and made available by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National media affairs director Miss Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA said those at the forefront of irrational criticisms of Amotekun because of the few but avoidable human errors, are suffering from ‘intentionally deceitful amnesia’ because if they think deeply how the southwest came under incessant massive attacks and violence by suspected armed Fulani herdsmen, they would have seen that the errors were the less of the two evils.
Besides, the Rights group backs the order made by the Ondo State Governor Barrister Oluwarotimi Odunayo Akeredolu ( SAN ) on armed herdsmen to quit south west forests.
HURIWA said it expected the rest of the country such as South East, North East, North Central and South-South to Embrace the example set by the Southwest by replicating similar law- based institutional body to protect the lives and property of their people to complement the efforts of the regular policy institution.
It said, “We also do expect that with Better training, retraining and a purified system of recruitment, Amotekun will become a shining example of how the state legislature working in partnership with the executive Governors should protect the lives of their people.
“We support Amotekun 100% and we think it is better than allowing armed Fulani herdsmen to continue to carry out genocide and be left to operate by the Nigerian police which has so far failed to prosecute a single of those armed Fulani herdsmen responsible for the killing of over 6,000 farmers all over the country in the last five years.
“Those now raising their compromised voices against Amotekun, are they saying they are happy with the constant spilling of blood of the innocent attributed to armed non-state actors and particularly the armed Fulani herdsmen?”
HURIWA recalled that the Governor of Ondo State, Rotimi Akeredolu, had asked all Fulani herdsmen in Ondo State to vacate forest reserves within the state. He also issued a seven-day ultimatum to the herdsmen.
The governor gave the ultimatum on Monday while meeting with leaders of Hausa/Fulani and Ebira Communities in the state.
