Dr. Ezuma is the Los Angeles-based contributor to the platforms of USAfricaLive.
Special to USAfricaonline.com
While the world’s attention is drawn to U.S politics, war in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, an ongoing humanitarian disaster is unfolding in Nigeria’s Middle Belt (Benue and Plateau States).
In this traumatized region hundreds of innocent men, women, and children have been slaughtered in cold blood by alleged Fulani herdsmen, in a relentless wave of ethnic cleansing. Villages have been razed to the ground. Entire communities turned to ashes. Yet, most of Nigeria’s leadership, both state and federal, have remained deafeningly silent, showing a brutal disregard for the lives of its own citizens.
This is an appeal for justice, truth, and security for the voiceless victims of this unfolding road to ethnic cleansing.
Benue State, known as one of the food baskets of Nigeria, has become a graveyard.
Fulani herdsmen have executed and coordinated attacks on farming indigenous communities. Men are butchered. Women are raped and mutilated. Children are burned alive inside their homes.
The scale of the atrocities committed rivals to any war zone in recent history.
Sadly, they receives no national mourning, no genuine government intervention, and no justice!!
Nigeria’s hapless President Bola Tinubu has not lived up to his basic responsibilities.
The current Governor of Benue State, Hyacinth Alia, has failed his people. His silence and at best, merely passive responses (just like those of the Governor of his neighbo ring Plateau State) in the face of these horrors make them complicit.
A governor’s first responsibility is to protect the lives and property of the people. Alia’s administration has shown no tangible security strategy or decisive policy response to these recurring attacks. His leadership is marked not only by inaction but by a betrayal of the trust placed in him by the people of Benue.
Profoundly, the Federal Republic of Nigeria, under successive administrations, has completely failed to protect its citizens from the bloody and deadly attacks by the Fulani herdsmen and gun men. The security architecture is either paralyzed or deliberately passive.
Nigerians have watched Fulani militias murder, pillage, and destroy with impunity.
The Nigerian governments of Buhari and the current one led by Tinubu have demonstrated greater urgency in defending cows than in saving human lives.
In the halls of Nigeria’s National Assembly, tribal loyalty often supersedes the support for the national interest. Motions meant to investigate or address Fulani killings are watered down, sabotaged, or rejected outright, particularly by lawmakers of Fulani descent and some other politicians from the North. This betrayal is not just political – it is criminal. Legislators who should defend all Nigerians instead protect their own ethnic militia by ensuring there is no serious accountability or security reform.
The unprecedented terror is not confined to Benue. From Southern Kaduna to Plateau, Nasarawa to Enugu, Ondo to Delta, Fulani herdsmen have unleashed terror, leaving blood trails and shattered communities in their wake. Churches have been burned. Schools attacked. Markets and farms destroyed. The ethnic cleansing campaign is systematic, organized, and deeply rooted in an ideology of dominance and impunity.
Nigeria’s two dominant political parties, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC), have failed woefully. For decades, they’ve taken turns ruling the country with political bandits selfishly crisscrossing party platforms, but none has shown the courage or sincerity to end the herdsmen violence.
The political class is more invested in elections and power struggles than in the safety of the Nigerian people. The bipartisan silence on Fulani atrocities is evidence of a deeper rot and inhumane treatment in the Nigerian system.
Nigeria is intentionally divided by politics and religion. Nigeria is dangerously polarized. Religion and ethnicity have been weaponized by the elite to divide, dominate, and distract the masses. Policies are judged not on merit but on who proposed them. Tragedies are mourned or ignored depending on the victims’ religion. This division has eroded the very idea of a united Nigeria. It is a system where cows are protected with armed escorts, but villagers are left to die without even a warning.
Now, it is a global call to action.
Human rights organizations, global media, and world governments must demand accountability from Nigeria.
We cannot allow a nation of over 250 million people to become a failed State where lives are worthless, and justice is a myth.
To the victims inside Benue and every community impacted and destroyed by Fulani violence, your pain should not be silenced. The world should stand with you!
