RUGA May Set Nigeria On Fire, If… – Prof Soyinka

BY AMOS DUNIA – Nobel Laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka on Tuesday declared that any country where cattle takes priority over human life, is definitely at an elementary and primitive stage.

Soyinka, who stated this while adding his voice to the controversy and strong opposition against the President Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government’s proposal to establish Rural Grazing Area (RUGA) settlements across states of the federation solely for Fulani herdsmen, said that humans must be accorded the greatest honour above every other living thing.

This is just as he pointed said that RUGA will develop into an explosion if not properly handled with care, even as he noted that the approach of the government is faulty and totally not the way people and countries deal with issues of cattle.

The Nobel Laureate, who spoke at the launch of the United Nations’ Solutions 17 SDG programme, in Lagos, asked why the Federal Government does not like to consider policies from good models.

He specifically castigated the federal government for the controversial policy which he noted has the potential to cause Nigeria to explode.

In the words of Soyinka; “I travel everywhere. It has to be handled in a way that is logical, comprehensible to the environment. When a cattle walks up to the window of my house in Abeokuta, a house which is located in a residential area, then there’s a problem.

“When cattle goes to Ijebu Ode and eat up their plant seedlings and so on, do you expect the people to be quiet?”

“President Buhari deserved to have lost the last election for the lackadaisical attitude he took to the issue of cattle rearing in the country. People have been killed in hundreds just because of the failure of leadership at a critical time.

“And the cattle herders have been given a sense of impunity. They kill without any compunction. They drive away the farmers, who have been contributing to the food solutions in the country. The cattle eat their crops and then you come up with RUGA.”

The erudite professor continued; “I think that there is going to be trouble in this country if this RUGA thing is not handled imaginatively and with humanity as priority.