Plateau clergyman Reverend Gideon Para-Mallam says Fulani herdsmen are Boko Haram in disguise

INTERNATIONAL Fellowship of Evangelical Students (Ifes) regional secretary Reverend Gideon Para-Mallam has purported that many of the Fulani cattle herdsmen currently unleashing mayhem across Nigeria are Boko Haram members in disguise.

Over recent years, Nigeria has been wracked by bloody communal violence as repeated clashes between herdsmen and local farmers, particularly in the Middle Belt, has led to hundreds of deaths. Heavily-armed herdsmen have spread mayhem across rural Nigeria, attacking farming villages, killing hundreds, mainly in the Middle Belt.

Upon assuming office in 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari clamped down hard on Boko Haram insurgents operating in the northeast of the country but has shown a reluctance to deal with the herdsmen as decisively. Himself an ethnic Fulani who also owns cattle, President Buhari has been accused of being sympathetic to the herdsmen and his body language has not indicated he is willing to take the herdsmen on.

Speaking in Jos against the backdrop of the recent violence in Plateau State which resulted in the death of over 200 people, Reverend Para-Mallam urged the government to take drastic measures to arrest the killers. He added that this needs to be done if the government wants the country to remain an indivisible nation beyond 2019.

Reverend Para-Mallam said: “What happened in Plateau State over a fortnight ago is sad. It is disappointing that the circle of violence and bloodshed has been visited again on the peaceful people of Plateau.

“Plateau State has become not just a killing field through the years but now a land flowing with rivers of blood, which is history repeating itself. In 2010, the Dogo Na-Hauwa massacre took place in which over 500 people were killed in a single day and this has been a pattern that has continued between 2010 through now."

Among other things, Reverend Para-Mallam is the founder of the Citizens Monitoring Group, which works with Muslims and Christians in Nigeria. He added that the killings in Plateau State always involve attacking several villages at once, adding that a grand total of 11 villages were attacked during the most recent massacre.

 “We need to understand these killings as this is another Boko Haram in disguise, Fulani herdsmen are Boko Haram in disguise. These same Fulani people that had been living peacefully with the farmers have suddenly changed from using sticks to tend their cows, all of a sudden going to farmlands, killing farmers, surrounding whole villages, wiping out Christian farmers, killing their wives, children, burning their homes, displacing them? Very clearly an agenda is emerging.

“Why Jos? For the simple reason that these attacks began in Jos, spread to other parts of Nigeria, particularly the Middle Belt  and it's now coming back to Jos with mass horrible killings in large numbers are taking place, a dozen villages wiped out within days. It’s a pointer, it’s a reality. Because Jos is the epicentre of Christianity, Plateau State is the epicentre of Christianity in the north and the Middle Belt," Reverend Para-Mallam added.

He pointed out that unless something is done, Christianity and Christians in Nigeria will become history. Furthermore, Reverend Para-Mallam added that these attacks and killings, depopulation, decimation of Christians and ethnic nationalities in the Middle Belt point to something coming in the 2019 elections.

Reverend Para-Mallam said: “In 2015, we were told that the security situation can only be handled by the current APC government and particularly by the military strongman General Muhammadu Buhari. However, Buhari came with a promise to silence Boko Haram but right now, we are not just dealing with Boko Haram,  we are having two hydra-headed demons, who are killers in our midst – Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen."