The Oyo State House of Assembly has allayed the fears of the Fulani cattle rearers in the state that the anti-open grazing law being put in place will terminate their means of livelihood.
The Assembly is currently working on the bill which has passed Second Reading.
Moved by fear, a Fulani group, the Gan Allah Fulani Development Association of Nigeria, on Friday appealed to the Assembly to consider an alternative grazing space for their members in the law being put in place. They described it as settled grazing.
Addressing reporters in Ibadan, the state capital on Friday, the group led by its National President Alhaji Sale Bayari, called on the Assembly to give the law a human face by allowing an alternative grazing space for the Fulani in the state should the law become absolutely necessary.
But the Chairman, House Committee on Information, Hon. Kazeem Olayanju, told The Nation on telephone on Sunday that the Fulani in Oyo State have nothing to fear about the law because it was aimed at regulating grazing in the state in a way that will protect them and other members of the society.
Olayanju explained that the Assembly recognizes that the Fulani in the state have lived together peacefully with indigenes for several decades, adding that the lawmakers are aware that they have fully integrated into the various communities where they live and do their business.
According to him, rather than ban open grazing totally, the bill is proposing registration of all Fulani in cattle rearing for issuance of permit.
The lawmaker further explained that the Assembly believes that most of those involved in criminality are foreigners and Fulani who came from other parts of the country to infiltrate the resident Fulanis, thereby giving the entire stock a bad name.
To resolve this, the lawmaker said the bill will make it compulsory for all involved in grazing to get a permit such that they can be traced as full residents with known addresses and antecedents.
He said the permit will make it easy to identify and arrest infiltrators, stressing that the bill will also protect peaceful cattle rearers residing in the state.
His words: โOur people have been living together peacefully with the Fulani for ages. But the popular claim now is that Fulanis are criminals. It is also believed that the Fulanis that are committing crime are those coming from other countries. So the bill will make them register and get permits and identity cards. So if they are accosted anywhere in the state, their ID cards and permit will clear them as well known Fulanis who are free to practice their trade. This will help check influx of foreigners into their midst. It will also protect them. We just want to regulate them so that nobody will harass them. It will also enable them live peacefully with farmers. This law will also enhance peaceful relationship of all stakeholders in the farming system in the state.โ
The Fulani group had pleaded: โWe are pleading with the Oyo State House of Assembly to ensure that as interested and affected citizens of the pending law, we deserve to be heard and listened to during the public hearing of the bill so that our views and opinions as Nigerians are heard and considered without bias against or favour.โ
The Chairman, Bayari noted that though members of the Assembly have a constitutional right to make laws for the good of the people of the state, who include the Fulanis, and for the good and peace of the state, he said the law needed a human face.
He said: โWe plead for an alternative grazing space for our means of livelihood, which is the cattle, which we are rearing as peasant traditional stock owners, not as commercial livestock or cattle business stakeholders, ours is the hereditary and traditional family life sustaining cattle rearing, not done on commercial basis.โ
โIn the continuation of our national assignment as a Fulani ethnic association disturbed by our present and current security problem in the country especially as it affects a section of our members who have come under fire, hail and thunderstorm some Nigerians, especially the farming communities which has resulted in tensions of ethnic crises of various dimensions in the country.
โThese are allegations that should have been leveled against all criminal elements within our society but unfortunately they are allegations that have been made against an ethnic, religious and a sectional group that have led to the profiling, stigmatization and harassment of Fulani ethnic group as a whole.โ
Bayari pointed out that during the meeting that was held with former president Olusegun Obasanjo in Abeokuta on the August 3 where eight states were in attendance, a lot of the problems between herders and farmers were discussed, particularly the criminality that was attributed to the Fulani ethnic group as a whole.
He recalled: โAt the end of the meeting, it was all agreed that there is a national problem that needed to be addressed by all well-meaning Nigerians interest in having a prosperous, peaceful and one country that is the home of all that must be secured and protected for yet unborn generations.โ
The Fulani leader noted that Fulani ethnic group had both the good and the bad like any other tribe, pointing out that the action of one bad Fulani should not be taken against other Fulanis.
The group called on security agencies and other well-meaning Nigerians to cooperate to fish out all criminals in the country and ensure their prosecution to serve as deterrent to others. The group added that members of the public should watch out for suspicious behavior and report such to the law enforcement agencies and community leaders as may be applicable.
โWe pledge to continue to work with the security agencies to flush the criminals from our communities, and to ensure that our members are law abiding, obedient and respectful to constitute authorities while promising to go all out to ensure that criminal elements were flushed out of our communities and ethnic group which may even make the enactment of the anti-open grazing law no longer a necessary absolute.โ The Fulani leader said.
Hon. Olayanju said that a Publix hearing might hold on the bill before the Third Reading of the bill.
