Stakeholders advocate effective policy to curb communal clashes in North-Central

Lafia – Some stakeholders at the ongoing Regional Security Summit in Lafia have called on the Federal Government and State Governments to put in place a workable and effective policy toward curbing communal clashes in the North-Central.

They spoke in separate interviews on Wednesday on the sidelines of the summit holding in Lafia.

Mr Dogo Shammah, Nasarawa State Commissioner of Information, Culture and Tourism, said the expectation from the summit was for participants to come up with recommendations on how to put permanent stop to communal clashes in the north central states of the country.

“What we are looking forward to is to be able to articulate and identify the root causes of crisis especially between herdsmen and farmers in the various north central states.

“So that at the end of the meeting, participants will come up with recommendations on the way forward to ensure we live in a peaceful environment where everyone can thrive to achieve his or her goals,”he said.

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Chief Agbo Adejoh, Idoma Community Leader in Plateau, also harped on the need for participants to reach a compromise on steps individual states in the zone could take to stop communal clashes in their respective states.

“The conflicts are uncalled for because we have lived together in peace in the past, and if our fathers did it then, we can also do it.

“So, what I expect is for us to look at the past and see what has gone wrong so as to correct ourselves by putting in place an Action Plan on the best way to avoid conflict in the future,”he said.

Sen. Yusuf Nagogo, a one-time senator and politician in the state, said that summit would only be successful if agreement was reached among participants on enhanced Community Policing for states in the zone.

“This summit will be a success if the outcome is an agreement on enhanced community policing that will help us to achieve community policing in the north central zone,”he said.

Chief Peter Apeh, a Benue indigene and the Ter Tiv of the Tiv Community in Jos, described the summit as a political stunt until resolutions arrived at were implemented and yielding the result of peaceful coexistence in the various states in the north central zone.

“We have had series of such meetings before. We had one in Kaduna, but after that killings, kidnappings, rape were still on.

“So, I expect that we will end this summit with a strong resolution on how best to make our communities safer and not just the north central but across the country,” he said.

Various stakeholders made up of heads of various security outfits in the country, politicians, traditional rulers, community heads and religious leaders from the six states in the north central zone are attending the summit. (NAN)