Anambra May Pass Anti-Grazing Bill Into Law 

Raymond Ozoji, Awka

The Anambra State House of Assembly may pass Anti-Grazing Bill into law to forestall herdsmen encroachments into farmlands to wreak havoc on farmers.

Majority Leader of the House and representative of Anambra-West state constituency Hon. Victor Jideofor Okoye disclosed this to newsmen at the state assembly complex Awka on Wednesday.

He said herdsmen no longer kept the terms and conditions they entered into with the state government and as such there should be a legislation in place to prevent the herders from bringing their animals into the state for grazing.

Okoye said, “The Anti-Grazing law is at the committee of the whole. We thought we had an agreement with the herders but they are no longer abiding by the agreement they had with the state government.”

He further explained that Anambra-West, Anambra-East, Ayamelum and Ogbaru local government areas were victims of Fulani herdsmen incessant gruesome attacks, noting that it was time the federal and state governments proffered permanent solutions to the atrocities of cattle rearers in their host communities.

The lawmaker also stated that the issue was no longer clashes between herdsmen and farmers; that what they were suffering currently were herdsmen militias who according to him applied guerrilla tactics and invaded his constituency killing some people in the recent past.

He recalled that prior to the general elections, the Fulani militiamen invaded Anambra-West and killed one person and after the elections, they reinforced and returned to his constituency killing four persons in the area.

The lawmaker therefore suggested that the security agencies should find lasting solutions to the guerrilla tactics being employed by the killer herdsmen to save his constituents from the brutality and incessant annihilation by the Fulani militia.