Why we stoned Akume’s Motorcade – Benue IDPs

Internally displaced persons. (IDPs) in Benue State have cited intense anger and frustration as the reason why they pelted with rocks and rotten tomatoes the motorcade of Minister of Special Duties and Inter-Governmental Affairs, Senator George Akume in Makurdi yesterday.

The IDPs some of who spoke to journalists on anonymous conditions said they are angry at the federal government for failing to protect them from killer herdsmen who have killed their loved ones and displaced them from their homes.

Some of them also expressed frustration at the failure of the Buhari administration to fulfill it’s promise made to them in 2019 through Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, that the sum of N10 billion was going to be made available for their return and rehabilitation in their homes.

One of the IDPs who accepted to be quoted openly in the person of Iorpenda Ubii, wondered why Senator Akume should turn against the people of the state by taking sides with those he described as sponsors of killer herdsmen.

Mr. Ubii lamented that rather than Akume calling on the federal government to beef up security for the terrorised people of the state they were shocked to see heavy security presence escorting the Minister to Makurdi without even stopping to say a word of greeting to them.

It was gathered by this reporter that it was at this point that the angry IDPs started throwing stones and rotten tomatoes and other items at the motorcade of the Minister which was led on the journey by a detachment of heavily armed policemen with an armoured personnel carrier in tow.

Elements of the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), however, had reported j some quarters that those who pelted the Minister’s motorcade were from the PDP, a claim which the ruling party dismissed throught its media handlers as untrue.