The Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum and the Christian Association of Nigeria have clashed with the Jama’atu Nasril Islam, led by the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar lll, over a radio licence acquired by the Federal Government to reach herdsmen.
The Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, had in an interview with journalists on Wednesday said the Federal Government had acquired an Amplitude Modulation broadcast radio licence for the herdsmen as part of efforts to end perennial farmers-herders’ clashes.
According to Adamu, the radio station will operate on frequency of 720 KHz and will broadcast in the Fulfulde language, mainly spoken by the Fulani people.
CAN has faulted the plan by the Federal Government to set up a radio station purportedly to reach out and persuade Fulani herdsmen to stop killing farmers.
It described the plan as a confirmation of the allegation by former President Olusegun Obasanjo about the planned Fulanisation of the country by the Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government.
The CAN spokesman, Pastor Bayo Oladeji, faulted the government approach to the herdsmen-farmers’ crisis, noting that setting up of a radio station could not be the solution to the challenge.
He accused the FG of pampering the Fulani herdsmen, whom he said, had been described as one of the deadliest terrorist group in the world by the Global Terrorism Index.
But the Secretary-General of the JNI, Dr Abubakar Khalid-Aliyu, disagreed with CAN and all those who opposed the Federal Government’s decision to acquire the licence.
The JNI secretary told one of our correspondents on the telephone that the Federal Government’s decision was a right step in the right direction.
Khalid-Aliyu, therefore, wondered why Nigerians would oppose everything “positive.”
He noted that it would not do Nigerians any good to always criticise virtually everything based on ethnicity or religion.
He further argued that there was nothing wrong if the government aided the Fulani race “who suffers the problem of not being well informed.”