The killing fields of Nimbo
Nimbo community in Uzo-Uwani Local Government Area of Enugu State has become a metaphor for the dastardly actions of suspected Fulani herdsmen who have terrorised it for decades. At night and in broad daylight, innocent men, women and children of the community are gruesomely murdered by marauders who desire their homeland for grazing their cattle.
Last Sunday, the marauders paid one more visit to the community and as usual, left sorrows, tears and blood. Not only were four members of the community killed, most of the inhabitants of the village have now been forced to desert their traditional homesteads and run for dear lives. For long, Nimbo has not known peace. Everyone who has lived there in the past two decades has learnt how to sleep with only one eyes closed. Their land is fertile and they are preponderantly farmers; they pride themselves as Enugu State’s food basket. But the vast farmlands have been targeted by herdsmen who crave it, instead, for their cattle.
The gruesome event of last Sunday was not the first of that magnitude but it caught national attention because of its similarity with the carnage of April 2016. They had attacked the villagers at night, killed many and set nearly a hundred houses ablaze. Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, barely a year in office, promptly visited the traumatised community. He came face to face with the wounded, the bereaved and saw wreckage of the burnt homes. The village was empty, save for the few frightened villagers that sneaked in from nearby villages to receive him. The visit was all going well as the governor took in the carnage and empathised with the people, until he was overtaken by emotion, bowed his head and shed a few tears. It earned him much criticism: what would it benefit the villagers that the governor joined the women in crying his heart out? Since then, Nimbo and the larger Uzo Uwani which is the agro-produce base of the state has not known peace. The Commission of Inquiry set up by the administration only scratched the surface; if it made any farreaching recommendations at all, they were not implemented. The killings and displacement have continued with impunity. Such a far-flung community on the state’s borderline, Nimbo has largely remained forgotten, only attracting attention of the government for the wrong reasons. Many more people have been killed, some in their farmlands, while a large number of their homes have been torched. It would appear as if the campaign to displace inhabitants of Nimbo was intensified. Many other villages in and around Nimbo have tasted the bloody attacks, but last Sunday, however, it was at Ugwuijoro that they struck. The villagers had gathered to mourn their dead and deep into the obsequious, the gunmen wielding sophisticated weapons, struck. By the time their operation was over, four men lay dead with many seriously wounded. Those killed, according to reports, are Okeh Simon Ugwu Oruku, Okeh Chukwuebuka, Julius Ogbonna Odiegwu and Gabriel Ugwor Ezea. Those who could afford to run, abandoned their homes for fear of more attacks.
Last Monday, Governor Peter Mbah did what his predecessor did exactly eight years earlier, minus the tears. He paid a visit to the community within 24 hours and condemned the people who have taken the peoples open arms of welcome for granted. He announced a scholarship programme for children whose parents were killed during the attack, and promised that the marauders would be brought to justice and to ensure stronger protection for the people. Whether the people believed him is another matter, considering how previous promises turned out to be meaningless. The police presence Ugwuanyi promised eight years ago is not there, except, perhaps, the near empty building. The influx of strange faces, with trailer-loads of cattle have continued on a daily basis and the promise of monitoring the influx into the forests was not kept. It has been easy for the herdsmen who had reinforced in nearby forests around Adani, Opanda and Ugboda, all within Uzo Uwani Local Government Area, to overwhelm the unsuspecting locals. The people of Nimbo and neighbouring villages have every reason to feel they have been abandoned to their fate. The Peter Mbah administration should go beyond platitudes and give the people reason to live safely in their homestead. Enough, truly, us enough!
