By joshua 
By Jibrin Ibrahim, Friday Column, Daily Trust, 12th November, 2021
Book published by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. It was co-written by Plangshak Suchi and Salek Yaks Musa of the University of Jos.
I find the title of the project rather surprising. Could there be a root cause for a crisis that has developed and transformed over hundreds of years and within the life spans of at least three jurisdictions – precolonial, colonial and post-colonial?
Such deep and complex processes, it must be assumed, have multiple causes that cannot be reduced to a main one except if the plan is to trap the authors. But then, maybe that was the plan. Secondly, the data for the study is based on key informant interviews of community stakeholders taking a snapshot in October and November 2020 and thus focused on the current evolution of the issue. Nonetheless, I think the authors put a lot of efforts to do an extensive review the literature and adopt a method that would lead them to the multiple perceptions that exist on the matter and they should be assessed from that perspective.
The authors draw our attention to the basic historical and sociological reality of the farmers-herders crisis. That there is a tradition of pastoralism in the area of study that goes back a long time and for much of that history, the relations between farmers and herders have been symbiotic and based on exchange of grazing land for manure with only occasional conflicts and violence. Over the past few decades however, the relationship has become very conflictual and violent. They point out that since 2001, about 60,000 people have been killed in the conflicts, surpassing the death toll from the Boko Haram conflict in a neighbouring zone of the country.
The politics of this research is deep, as is to be expected and there are significant narratives of prejudice that underpin the theme. From page one, the authors set the scene of the herders being Fulani from the semi-arid Sahel in Futa Jalon. So, they are the other, non-indigenes from another country coming with their troubles as it were. Me thinks they are simply typical West Africans, who like the Tiv who migrated into the Nigerian land area from Southern Africa have also migrated from multiple locations. The Futa Jalon appellation suggests that they are like other violent extremists from the Sahel. No, my friends, Futa Jalon is not in the Sahel, it is watershed grassland plateau similar to the Jos Plateau that produces many of the rivers in West Africa including the River Niger. In setting the political scene for the analysis, the authors draw attention to the narrative around President Muhammadu Buhari, who is of course of Fulani origin and whose Government has promoted the implementation and institutionalisation of the:
“Ruga grazing system across the federation. However, the attempts using nomenclatures such as grazing reserves, ranching reserves, cattle colony, etc. has generated heated debate, controversy, and public disapproval as an attempt to forcefully takeover and give their land to the Fulani herders”.
The stage is set. It is a positional issue not one of social scientific research and we are all dragged to take our position – pro or anti Fulani. This is because, as the authors claim quoting sources:
“There appears to be a lack of political will by the government to contain the spate of violence and rebuild the lost trust. in part, some have argued that state forces are often slow to respond to call for distress whenever a community is facing an attack, an act that has encouraged further bloodshed. Numerous instances of such security failings are replete in the literature.“
President Buhari maybe guilty as charged for allowing the Fulani engage in atrocities against people in North Central Nigeria. How then do we explain the fact that he is allowing the same atrocities run riot in his own Katsina State and surrounding Hausa and Muslim States where the Fulani are very much part of the ruling establishment? It might just be the case for example of the incompetence and cluelessness of his Government rather than a conspiracy.
The researchers also argue that the Fulani herders constitute a compelling threat given the fact that they use guns and their conflict with farmers often turn out fatal, causing harm to individuals and ethnic communities in southern and central Nigeria. This has led to the Fulanisation discourse’s tendency to link pastoralism with Islamisation and terrorism in a discursive chain to produce a compelling “regime of truth” about insecurity. The idea here is to emphasise the linkages – Fulani, Pastoralism and Islam. The linkage produces the conspiracy theory that leads to the objective of Jihad, closing the circle on the Sahel and violent extremism. This is ideology and not social science. General Abdulsalam Abubakar has told the Nation that there are over six million small arms and light weapons currently circulating in the country and it has become an equal opportunity practice rather than just a Fulani practice.
The data for the study is derived from Key informant Interviews based on a total of 12 participants who were recruited from each community/Local Government Area making a total of 24 participants in each of the three states studied – Benue, Plateau and Nasarawa. Overall, a total of 72 participants were covered by the study. How representative is this sample? My view is that it is not a scientific sample because it works from the answer to the question. The general narrative is that there are two groups fighting – Fulani and indigenes. The composition of the sample for each local government is that you have 12 respondents – one is from the Federal Government, 2 from Fulani/Islamic representatives and 9 from the indigenous community. Given the political divide referred to above, the answer is clear before the interviews are conducted.
The major findings therefore are about land grabbing by Fulani for the purpose of alienating the heritage of indigenes within a context of a wider Jihadist plan that has been initiated with the on-going mass killings and atrocities in the zone. Research is significant if it can be replicated with the same results. A more balanced sample frame would produce a different result. What then is the value of this research? There is a wider question whether interview of stakeholders is the best way to conduct such research on which people are so deeply divided along bipartisan political and identity lines. Finally, how can a perception study of stakeholders address the key question posed of identifying the root cause of the crisis when most of the respondents are partisans?
The authors however become rather generous in summarising their findings in a more nuanced manner referring to what they call:
“The overwhelming evidence suggesting that the root cause of the farmers-herders crisis in North-Central Nigeria is located in the social structure of the Nigerian society and the inherent contradictions within the Nigerian state. Issues relating to blocking of cattle routes and encroachment on grazing lands by crop farmers; rampant destruction of food crops by Fulani herders; cattle rustling by bandits; and violent attacks on farming communities.”
The defective social structure, they argue, has its roots in the colonial legacy of injustice which elevated the Fulani politically over and above other ethnic minorities in the North-Central region thereby planting the seed of discord, greed, competition, dominance, aggressiveness, ethnicity, regionalism between farming communities and the Fulani herders.
The conclusion is:
“In the light of the findings of this study, it is obvious that the root cause of the farmers-herders crisis in north-central Nigeria is rooted in the historical legacies of injustice against the people of the region including the failure of the British colonialists to adequately protect the middle-belters from Fulani domination; systemic exclusion of ethnic minorities from the socio-political affairs of the country.”
We have known this from the presentations at the Willinks Commission of Inquiry from the 1950s so I guess it is reassuring to conduct a research to confirm the known political conclusion.