Buhari Counters NEF Directive To Fulani Herders: Stay Where You Are

By Rufus Ike

President Muhammadu Buhari has countered the directive issued by the Northern Elders Forum, NEF, to Fulani herders to vacate the South saying that the body does not have the authority to so divide Nigerians.

The president in a statement late on Wednesday lamented the role of the NEF and those he said were playing similar divisive roles in the polity and exploiting such for political gains.

In the statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, the president said:

“All citizens of Nigeria are free to move and live within any part of the country they please, whether or not they are originally from there.

“In line with our country’s constitution, the government of Nigeria and the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari will protect citizens of Nigeria wherever they find themselves.

“No one has the right to ask anyone or group to depart from any part of the country, whether north, south, east or west.” 

Questioning the intentions of the NEF and similar groups, he said:

“They have no one’s authority to make such pronouncements.

“The polarising role of the Northern Elders Forum and all those other groups dabbling into issues of security to score cheap political points has for long been a sore point in Nigeria’s body polity.

“They should not be allowed to mislead anyone, least of all the Fulani herders.

“The Buhari administration is fully devoted to finding a lasting solution to the herder-farmer clashes in different parts of Nigeria- one that would be acceptable to all the parties involved.”

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