PLATEAU: Lalong laments proliferation of arms as farmers, herders now carry AK-47

GOVERNOR Simon Lalong has said the only solution to farmer/herder crisis is to ban opening grazing and  embrace cattle ranching in the country.

The governor said this is solution should be urgently implemented as the growing crisis has led to proliferation of arms, including AK-47, rifles amongst herders and farmers in the country.

He stated this while featuring on Channels Television’s ‘Sunrise Daily’ today.

He said, “Today, we are now seeing the hazard of allowing people do open grazing here and there. But they (herders) also want solution; by the time you explain to them, they also want to stay in one place, they would also want to keep away from carrying AK-47. I’m not justifying anybody to carry AK-47 but don’t forget that in the course of our deliberations and investigations, it was not only Fulani herdsmen that were carrying AK-47, even farmers were carrying AK-47.

“It is just proliferation of arms in respect to guarding themselves. Everybody is trying to protect himself, we shouldn’t allow self-help.

“At the time there were farmers-herdsmen clashes here (in Plateau), we arrested people, farmers also had AK-47 and the herdsmen were also holding AK-47 too. But if you want all of them not to hold AK-47 again, you must put deliberate efforts to curtail the influx of light arms and secondly find ways to take these people away from the old type of farming and then introduce them to the modern system.”