CATTLE DESTROY FARMS, POLLUTE STREAM IN AHABA IMENYI COMMUNITY. · FARMERS DEMAND N10m COMPENSATION . FULANI HERDSMEN ACCUSE COMMUNITY LEADERS OF STEALING COW - By Jacob Aguomba

Farmers in Ahaba Imenyi community in Isikwuato council area of Abia state are demanding a compensation of ten million naira for their farms destroyed by herds of cattle which entered their villages last October, destroyed farms and polluted the Eri Mano stream, their only source of water.

Chief Ernest Kanu, a farmer and chairman of the community’s Elders’ Council told this correspondent during the week that the farmers are particularly worried because most of them had borrowed money to cultivate the farms. “We are now in a quandary as in how to pay back the loans since we have lost the farms to the insensitivity and wickedness of the cattle herdsman. So the farmers have decided to ask for a 10 million naira compensation to off-set the loses we have incurred.
In addition to that, the people of this community are now facing very hard times as their only source of water has been polluted. Yes, the Eri Mano Spring Water is the water we drink and use for sundry purposes but now the Fulani herdsmen has deprived us this precious source of life. Even, now they still consider it more important and proper for them and their cows to go into the stream drink and then pollute the water by defecating and urinating in and around the pool. Isn’t this absurd and inhuman? They did not stop there, when the police blamed them for the destruction which their cows had caused, they turned round to accuse some prominent leaders of the community of stealing one of their cows. Can you imagine your guest becoming a pain in your neck?”

But when asked how a normal interaction before now become this sour?

Chief Kanu’s answer is quite an instructive narrative: “You see, we have always had the Fulani herdsmen and their cattle coming and going, in and out of season. The previous generation of herdsmen respected our rights to own farms in our land and we never disturbed them when they took their cattle to the fallow sections of the lands to graze. But this time, one Alhaji Yussuf is the new leader of the herdsmen and he has refused to draw a line between cultivated farms and empty lands. For him, it does not make a difference that his cows invade farms, trample upon newly germinating crops or eat up a whole field of cassava, yams and all manner of vegetables.

To add salt to the festering injury, Alhaji Yussuf and his co-travelers has decided to abuse the privilege of using the pool of water from the only stream within the reach of the inhabitants of this community. He has refused to engage us in discussion to find an alternative way to provide water for his cows. There is no way a cow and human beings could drink from the same cup. Again, for deliberately destroying our farms, we had to call in the police who after visiting the farms and seeing the extent of damage done, blamed the herdsmen and we had to beg angry youths from retaliating in like manner; they listened but the Fulani herdsmen did not conform with the terms of settlement collectively reached with the police authorities. Instead, they have continued to conduct themselves in manners that can only provoke crisis. All these were issues of mid last year. But on October 10, 2014, Alhaji Yussuf and his herdsmen, again strayed into the rest of our farms, destroying our means of livelihood so that theirs may prosper. I think it is a calculated act of provocation; otherwise the cows could conveniently be grazed in the bush instead of cultivated farms.

To top up the embarrassment, the herdsmen has taken over the spring water to the point that women and young girls are harassed whenever thy come to the stream to fetch water. It was after the onslaught of last October that we decided to get our lawyer to put up a petition to the commissioner of police at Zone 9, Ehimiri, and Umuahia to complain against these incessant acts of intimidation, trespass and threats to life which are all calculated to cause a breach of peace. But ironically, what we saw next was a summons to appear in a court at the premises of the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) on January 28. It was addressed to our community chairman Mr. Kalu Okorie, Mr. Achie Ikea and Mr. Chima Orunta, vice chairman and youth leader respectively. They are being accused of stealing a cow purportedly belonging to Alhaji Yussuf.

This reporter could not find neither Alhaji Yussuf nor the herdsmen to get their response as they are said not to have a fixed address. It is noteworthy however, that the government in Abia state had earlier in 2013 set up an ad hoc court at the state SCID to settle the numerous and incessant cases between farmers and Fulani cattle herdsmen; these cases had often arisen from the unwholesome manner of untamed cows which frequently run out of the control of the herdsmen.