By Godwin Agia, Jalingo
The displaced Christian population of Tiv extraction in Wukari LGA of Taraba state, have staged a peaceful protest after 7 years in IDP camps.
The displaced Christian farmers called on the federal and international communities to intervene and ensure justice in their situation to enable them return to ancestral homes.
The IDPs said life has become unbearable, since their means of livelihood have been denied since 2019.
Addressing journalists after the protest in Kyado Benue state, Hon. Terhile Ahur, leader of the displaced persons taken refuge in the area, blamed the Taraba State, Wukari LGA and the Wukari traditional council for their uncooperative stands to ensure the return of displaced Tiv population.
Ahur said that while over one hundred and fifty thousand Tiv people in the Local Government have been displaced and are taken refuge in Benue state, over 300 churches, 70 schools and 30 primary health care facilities belonging to Tiv have also been destroyed.
“It started like a mere clashes between Jukun and Tiv in Kente village of Wukari in 2019. The situation escalated to what we are seeing as a deliberate genocide against the Tivs in the area.
“The crisis has also been transform into genocide against christian, particularly of Tiv extraction. The attackers cooperate with bandits and destroy churches belonging to Tiv”. Ahur said.
The IDP leader lamented that all efforts made to resolve the crisis and enable displaced persons return to their ancestral homes were unsuccessful, due to the Seeming complicity of both Wukari and the Taraba State governments in the crisis.
Hon. Ahur also alleged that the Tiv people are being tagged in the local government as “settlers”, while their ancestral lands have been taken over and shared allegedly by the Jukuns and their allies.
“For the past seven years, all efforts to return to our ancestral homes and farms in Wukari Local Government have proved abortive due to the seeming complicity of both the Local and State governments in the crisis.
“Our ancestral homes and farms have been taken over and shared by the Jukuns and their allies, with tacit support by both the Local and State Governments. Today, we have been tagged as “settlers” in Wukari Local Government Area”, he lamented.
The IDP leader said that political history of the area has proven beyond any contradiction that the Tivs were genuine indigens of Wukari LGA and Taraba at large.
“The history of our indigenship in Wukari and Taraba in general is clear”, he said.
He added that the history in most part of the state was beyond the colonial period.
“In most parts of Taraba State, the history of Tiv existence is much beyond the colonial period. In the 1959 General Elections during the colonial era, Hon. Charles Tangul Gaza, a Tiv man, contested along with a Jukun man, Hon. Ibrahim Sangarı Usman, for the Wukari Seat in the Federal House of Representatives and won under the UMBC.
“Similarly, after independence, Hon. David Tagherga Mtuem and Hon.
Simon Ảwua contested and won as Members of the defunct Gongola State House of Assembly in 1979 and were re-elected in 1983. Hon. Iyoltyer Musa, a Tiv man, was appointed by late Governor Abubakar Barde of the defunct
Gongola State, as Chairman Wukari local government in 1982. Similarly, Hon. Shinja Abako, a Tiv man, was also elected as Vice Chairman Wukari Local Government Area in 1986. We demand an answer to the settler status”.
The IDPs also alleged: “We want the entire world to know that the Nigerian army are being complicit in our situation. In most of our villages in Wukari Local Government, Military Check Points have been strategically located, not for general peace but to deter our people from returning to their homes.
“We wish to inform the world that the killings against us in the local government is not just an eviction agenda, but a well-coordinated genocidal agenda against the Tiv and the Church. We call on the international Community, the Federal Government of Nigeria to act fast in order to stop the gross abuse of our Fundamental Human Rights.
“We wish to draw the attention of the International Community to the United Nations convention on prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide in 1948. We wish to state that our situation is more than genocide, and we want the authorities to act fast.
“We call on the Chief of Army Staff to investigate the activities of his men deployed to Wukari Local Government for peacekeeping”, the IDPs said.
While appealing to President Bola Tinubu to facilitate their safe return to their ancestral homes and farms, the IDPs called for the replacement of an independent and unbiased security personnel to protect the Tiv on their return.
They also called for the provision of relief materials to ease their hardship.
