Who will Rein in These Outlaws?

How would you feel if you woke up one morning to find several members of your community slaughtered and others maimed by strangers who, out of benevolence, were allowed to live in your community’s ancestral land to carry on their business of cattle rearing?
Mad with anger, of course! This is the situation some communities in Benue, Plateau, and Nasarawa states among others have found themselves in recent times, no thanks to Fulani herdsmen. These cattle rearers are currently on the rampage in some communities across Nigeria, killing and maiming people at will as well as raping women.
Just last Sunday, persons suspected to be Fulani herdsmen slaughtered no fewer than 95 persons, mostly women and children in Egba, Agatu Local Government Area of Benue State.
Also on February 11, 2015, at least 30 persons were killed when Fulani herdsmen attacked 24 communities and villages in Logo council area of Benue State.
On and on the list goes. But the sad thing is that leaders of the North and the Fulani ethnic group in particular keep mum on the atrocities of their members. They pretend as if those being killed and maimed courtesy of the herdsmen are not human beings or that the communities did wrong in playing host to the herdsmen and their cattle.
This is unfortunate and well-meaning leaders of the North must rise up and say no to the carnage being perpetrated by herdsmen. Leaders of the North and the Fulani in particular must rein in the outlaws among the herdsmen before things go out of hands. Northern leaders must not make it look as if the murderous acts of Fulani herdsmen are the best way to reward their host communities.
The Federal Government must also stop playing the ostrich with these matters. When herdsmen stop using bows and arrows to fight and begin to use highly sophisticated weapons, it leaves the realm of Rocket Science to know that there are sophisticated, well-heeled sponsors of the murderous acts.