The presidency has disclosed what President Muhammadu Buhari has in the pipeline to curb the frequent clashes between herdsmen and farmers in the country.
The Senior Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu on Tuesday said farmers would be restricted from roaming around the country.
Adamu said this on Tuesday when he appeared as a guest on Channels Television‘s Sunrise Daily noting that the action would stop animals owned by these herdsmen from trampling and destroying crops and farmlands of farmers.
“We have to stop these herders from roaming and eating up crops all over the country. They drive their cattle into farmlands and they eat up crops and the farmers fight back and the killings follow. This country cannot continue in this way,” he said.
Shehu added that climate change and desert encroachment which is causing grazing lands to dry up is responsible for the movement of the herdsmen with their animals as they have to find greenlands to feed their livestock.
“The encroachment by desert leading to the drying up of a lot of grazing lands in the northern-most parts of the country have put pressure on the herders who are looking southwards for green grass so that their cattle will eat and also have water to drink.
“It’s a global climate change situation which is unfortunate, considering what has happened around Lake Chad basin itself drying to up about only ten percent of its original size.”
The presidential media aide however noted that the government is not relaxing as it continues to seek measures to tackle the problem in collaboration with the state governors.
In other news, the federal government of Nigeria has disclosed it will shut the country’s land borders again if trouble arises.
According to Garba Shehu who made this known on Tuesday, the federal government is studying activities at four of the nation’s land borders which were reopened last week after over one year that they were shut down.
