HOW ALIA KILLED THE ANTI–OPEN GRAZING LAW TO PLEASE FULANI
…Governor sold Benue people for N7 billion
Let us stop pretending. What is happening in Benue State today is not an accident, not fate, not “misunderstanding.” It is the direct consequence of a conscious political decision by Governor Hyacinth Alia to dismantle the legal shield protecting Benue farmers from armed herders.
In 2017, when blood was flowing across the state, Governor Samuel Ortom did what leadership demands in moments of existential danger: he chose law over cowardice. The Anti-Open Grazing Prohibition Law was not cosmetic legislation; it was a declaration that Benue land is not free territory for roaming cattle and gunmen. The law banned open grazing, mandated ranching, imposed harsh penalties, and created Livestock Guards to enforce compliance. Later amendments increased fines because the threat was real and deadly.
That law told farmers: the state is on your side.
That law told criminals: Benue is not yours to overrun.
Today, that message has been deliberately reversed by a man who deceived even the church.
Governor Alia has crippled, neutralized, and effectively killed the Anti-Open Grazing Law. The Livestock Guards have been disbanded. Their impoundment trucks which were instruments of law have been converted into commercial cargo vehicles for Benue Links. This is not policy reform; it is institutional sabotage. The state under Alia, a supposed priest, did not merely look away from illegality; it cleared the road for it.
And we are told this was done to promote “peaceful coexistence.”
This is not coexistence. This is surrender.
Since this reckless policy shift, Fulani pastoralists now move across Benue like a conquering force. Farms are invaded. Crops are destroyed. Villagers are attacked, displaced, and killed. The farmer, once backed by law, is now a fugitive on his own land. Meanwhile, there is no law, none that criminalizes open grazing or restrains armed herders.
Last year, the Alia administration paraded a new security outfit before the cameras and named it “Anyam Nyor”. What the government did not parade was any law empowering it to stop open grazing or protect farmers.
Security without legislation is theatre. Uniforms without authority are costumes. The result is predictable: violence without consequence. Anyam Nyor disappeared from IBB Square with the hired Hilux vehicles that were paraded shortly after their inauguration and have not been seen in any part of the state for one full year!
Let Governor Alia answer these questions, not with fake sermons but with facts:
Who authorized the suspension of the Anti-Open Grazing Law?
Was the law repealed by the House of Assembly, or assassinated quietly by executive action?
Under what law are herders currently regulated in Benue State?
Or is the state now officially open territory?
Why was the Livestock Guards outfit dismantled at the peak of insecurity?
Why were enforcement trucks repurposed for business while rural Benue burned?
Is this government governing for the people of Benue or managing comfort for armed pastoralists?
Let us be clear: no government has the moral right to place the interest of killer invaders above its own people. No governor can dismantle a protective law and wash his hands of the blood that follows. When a government removes deterrence, it invites violence. When it destroys law, it licenses terror.
This is no longer about policy disagreement. It is about betrayal.
Benue people voted for protection, not pacification. Benue voted for law, not lawlessness. Benue voted for leadership, not capitulation. If the Anti-Open Grazing Law was flawed, the answer was amendment, not annihilation. If coexistence was the goal, the path was law-backed regulation, not open grazing by stealth.
Governor Alia must stop hiding behind vague slogans and confront the consequences of his actions.
The people of Benue State demand truth, clarity, and accountability now, not tomorrow. Because history is watching. And blood remembers.
Signed,
Aloysius Gbakaan
President, Alliance for Truth and Justice (ATJ)
