By EMMANUEL OGEBE, ESQ

The weekend atrocities in my home state of Benue which claimed hundreds of lives is gut wrenching but the presidency statement calling for dialogue with warring parties is blood boiling adding insult to injury. The Nigerian presidency's response - calling for dialogue with “warring parties”is not just tone-deaf; it is an insult to the dead and a betrayal of the living.

Let us be unequivocal: This was no “clash.” A clash implies two equal parties in combat. What happened in Benue was a calculated mass slaughter - armed terrorists burning displaced local families alive in the very shelters where they sought refuge.

The One-Sided Nature of the Violence

Only two groups “warred” that night. First, the police, who reportedly defended themselves without killing a single attacker when their station was ambushed. Second, the terrorists, who massacred over 200 unarmed villagers - many in their sleep. This was not war. This was extermination. So is the police the “warring side” who should embrace “dialogue” with terrorists? If so the FGN should kindly identify the terrorists and produce them for dialogue.

Government Neglect and Complicity

Today, Benue has over a million internally displaced people - my medical team has treated families who have languished in camps for more than a decade. One in particular has children and grandchildren in the IDP camp. Is that a life?

Meanwhile, the Nigerian government builds housing for cattle while leaving human beings in penury and squalor. This is not mere neglect. It is ruinous complicity - by choice or by cowardice.

Leadership Failures at All Levels

The Benue State Governor has failed the victims. The Secretary to the Government of the Federation has failed. The President has failed. They offer no solutions - only the same fraudulent appeal for reconciliation that was false under Buhari and is still false now. The governor claims it’s Abuja politicians sponsoring the killings. He should name them for arrest or is the ex-man of God afraid to speak the truth?

If the attackers are foreigners as Buhari a General and Fulani himself said, why isn’t the army defending Nigeria’s territorial integrity and innocent citizens?

The ruling APC recycles this false narrative while the genocidal cycle ravages unchecked.

Twisted Priorities: Cattle Over Citizens

While Nigerian farmers - the backbone of the nation's food supply - are left dead, defenseless and displaced, their killers operate with impunity and even state support. Who does that to cultivators of its life source? A government that values cattle over citizens while sane nations subsidize and nurture their farmers.

The Injustice of Nigeria's System

In Nigeria today, essentially you have the right to be killed - and nothing will happen. And you have no right to protest killings. Even worse, the death sentence of Sunday Jackson means if you exercise your right of self defense, Nigeria will prosecute you, jail you and kill you. Cows are the real citizens of this country. After all Benue farmers were arrested because cows grazed on their farms and died.

The plight of minorities in Benue is despicable. The Tiv will not let them be governor and then they will not govern properly themselves. You have a sorry situation where the Governor and SGF are in a Cold War - APC v APC - and the people are the proverbial ground that suffers as the elephants fight. These political “warring sides” must stop.

The anti-grazing bill was a popular people-powered bill. If the will of the people codified in law cannot protect lives, what more can the people do?

The message is clear: A cow's life matters more than a Tiv person’s life and the life of a minority tribe’s person is lesser than a Tiv’s. In both cases, humans are 2nd and 3rd class to cows!

Minority groups in Benue suffer twice over - denied political power, yet also failed by those who hold it. The state's leadership has been both exclusionary and incompetent, leaving all citizens vulnerable.

When Laws Fail to Protect

The Nigerian government must stop negotiating with terrorists - and start dismantling them. It must prioritize human lives over cattle - end the hypocrisy. It must secure farming communities - before famine completes what killers started. And it must hold leaders accountable - for their failures.

Until then, the blood of Benue's children will forever stain the hands of those in power

while FGN is building housing for cows and killers on the graves of martyred indigenes across the middlebelt.

It’s hard to argue that the government is not complicit either by omission or commission. They know what to do to avoid international sanctions but are betraying human lives for what exactly?

•Emmanuel Ogebe is a US-based Nigerian international human rights lawyer.

PHOTO CAPTION: •Ogebe with his team of America medics saving a dying child during a medical mission to an IDP camp in Makurdi, 2023