Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue state has disclosed that a team of the United Nations delegation led by the country representative who were billed to visit the state on a humanitarian visit to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) of Fulani herdsmen attacks were yesterday denied landing permit at the Makurdi airport on the orders of the Federal government.

According to New Telegraph, the team was interested in carrying out an on-the-spot assessment of the plight of the displaced persons in the designated camps as well as pry into the security and healthy challenges confronting the IDPs.

The UN team, it was further gathered were interested in knowing those behind the attacks and killing of innocent people of the state which began from January this year resulting in the killing of scores of people.

Governor Ortom disclosed this at the swearing-in ceremony of the nine newly appointed Commissioners into his cabinet at the new banquet hall of the government house in Makurdi.

Governor Ortom who lamented the level of corruption bedevillling the country regretted that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has become a department in the All Progressives Congress-led government.

He lamented what he called selective persecution of political opponents by the EFCC, especially those from the opposition parties, saying he will never succumb to intimidation from the anti-graft agency.

•Excerpted from a New Telegraph report

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