Monday, 15 July 2013

A Widow’s Lamentation: I Watched Them Kill My Two Sons

A widow’s lamentation: I watched them kill my two sons
•Baby whose mum was shot dead a week after delivery by Fulani herdsmen, others in camp
For Mama Mbawuan Faga, life has simply come to an end. Her light has turned to darkness and her morning to night. The glory has departed from her life. In fact, she has been stripped naked with no one to cover her up anymore. Things have fallen apart for her and the center can no longer hold.
This is the  lamentation of a widow of over 30 years whose two sons, Iorhemba (34) and Tyorver (32) were recently killed in a renewed hostility between  Fulani herdsmen and Tiv farmers in Guma Local Government Area of Benue State.
Mama Faga is now taking refuge at the St. Francis Pilot Primary School, Daudu, alongside over 5,000 others who have been displaced from their various villages across the local government area.

Speaking to Sunday Sun at the heavily congested camp, Mama as she is popularly called by people, said she watched helplessly from her hiding place as  Fulani invaders hacked her two sons to death.
“The Fulani herdsmen had stormed our village that night and people were running helter-skelter. My son, Tyorver, quickly rushed to my room and dragged me into hiding and was about going to hide when the messengers of death caught up with him and in my very presence, they hacked him to death.”
“As soon as they killed him, they left him in the pool of his own blood and continued ransacking our compound for more people. It was in that process that they discovered my eldest son who was hiding somewhere in the compound. They wasted no time in shooting him to death.”
Mama who said she did not know how she managed to escape being killed by the Fulani marauders said for many days, her mind was blank and she couldn’t fathom what really  happened.
“It was like I was going out of my mind. My two sons both killed on the same day by the same people? What have I done to deserve this kind of bad omen? For about 30 years now when my husband died, I have been bringing up these children all by myself with no help from anywhere. Now that I should be reaping the fruit of my labour, they are suddenly cut off by the Fulani.”
Just like Mama Faga, the story of Baby Gbavan is very pathetic. Sunday Sun gathered that barely one week after she was born,  Fulani herdsmen invaded their Yeluwata village and killed her mother. Now she is left in the care of her grandmother in the camp.
Narrating her ordeal to our  reporter at the IDP camp in Daudu, the baby’s grandmother, Madam Torkwase Kwaghaondu who was moved to tears said her daughter, Mbazooga Gbavan could not run when  Fulani herdsmen stormed their compound that fateful day.
“She tried to run but fell along the way and started bleeding. As soon as the Fulani herdsmen sighted her, they just opened fire and rained bullets into her, killing her on the spot. I was lucky to have escaped with my granddaughter, which she just had a few days before then. Now, I am in camp with the baby.”
Also, Regina Ihumbahan, a young mother of two children could not hide her sorrow when she was approached at the camp to tell her story. According to her, her husband was killed in May, this year in the Tiv / Fulani crisis when  Fulani herdsmen attacked their Ayere village and unleashed terror on the people.
Ihumbahan noted that the camp was merely a place to hide  from the incessant attacks of Fulani herdsmen as they still faced the challenge of fending for themselves. She and the other victims, however, appealed to government to come to their aid.
“We don’t have food to eat. Some of us had to assist the locals here on their farms to be able to feed our children. Nothing is provided for us here apart from the school that is being used as a camp. Even at that, a lot of us usually sleep in the open field because the rooms are too congested. We appeal to government to come to our aid.”
Meanwhile, the state Governor, Dr. Gabriel Suswam in a recent chat with newsmen decried the persistent invasion of the state by Fulani herdsmen, describing it as a problem that had defied almost every solution.
While noting that his government had made several efforts in the past to tackle the situation, the Governor said he would continue to do his best in that regard and urged the Federal Government to find a lasting solution to the incessant invasion of Benue by the Fulanis.
Culled from : Sunnews

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