By Henry Ibya, Makurdi
Kwande United Peoples Organisation, KWUPO, has called on both the Federal and Benue Governments to act with urgency to halt the attacks and killings of people in Kwande Local Government Area of the state by suspected armed Fulani herdsmen.
The group made the call during a press conference addressed by its National Publicity Secretary, Kator Atsaga, in Makurdi.
He said Government at all levels must act with utmost urgency to stop the genocide in Kwande Local Government Area and save the people to prevent the killer herdsmen from occupying the land.
“It has become a matter of urgency that the people of Kwande Intermediate Area to cry out to the Government of Benue under Governor Hyacinth Alia and the Federal Government under President Bola Tinubu and the global community to come to the rescue of the people of the area who are being killed daily in their homes and on their farms.
“More worrisome is that after killing our people they occupy their ancestral lands,” Atsaga said.
He stated that the intention of the invading herdsmen was a genocide of determined and relentless intensity and of a scale targeting the total physical elimination of Kwande people.
He lamented that the recent dimension which the invasion by the herdsmen had taken was worrisome, stressing that they overrun the communities
“This has never been witnessed. If this shocking development is not arrested soon, the people of Kwande will be exterminated.
“The casualty toll is heavy. This is sad, tragic and mournful.
“In Moon Council Ward, almost the entirety of the five kindreds of the area have been overrun,” he said.
He appealed to the Benue State Governor Reverend Father Hyacinth Alia to strengthen his partnership and support for security agencies in the state, both federal and local to protect Kwande from the invading herdsmen, adding that the governor use security vote to provide vehicles, communication gadgets and sundry support to security agencies to boost their capacity to combat the herdsmen.
He also called on appealed the governor to direct the Benue State Emergency Management Agency, BSEMA to undertake urgent humanitarian outreach to those displaced and rendered destitute from the herdsmen invasion to ease their sufferings.