The Presidency has accused Governor of Benue State, Samuel Ortom, of lying in his recent interview claiming that high ranking security personnel had informed him personally that President Muhammadu Buhari had ordered security forces not to move against the Fulani herdsmen responsible for recent violence.
According to a statement by Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, the Presidency said: “These ridiculous claims are patently untrue. If he is as brave as he claims to be, let him name names. Let him name the military personnel who told him this story or forever shut up.
“It is disappointing that Ortom, who in the same interview describes himself as a child of God who believes in being lawful and respects the Nigerian constitution, felt the need to spread such a divisive lie.
“In a period of heightened insecurity, our politicians should be working to bring us closer together, not risking further violence by dishonestly seeking to further divide us along ethnic or religious lines.
“Fortunately, the cheap, dog whistle politics behind Ortom’s falsehood are plain for all to see.
“He is not the first opportunistic politician who has attempted to sow discord amongst his country’s people in the run-up to an election; sadly, he will not be the last.
“The Nigerian people will see him for what he is: an opportunist flaunting his wares as the country prepares to elect its next president; a man fond of posing in military fatigue who expects the country to believe Nigeria’s top security personnel would share high-level confidential information with him. To be clear: they do not.”
The Benue governor claimed he received confidential information from top security personnel that the regime had ordered them not to go after the killer herdsmen.
Ortom’s claim in an interview with the ICIR published on Monday.
“I have spoken to some security men who told me the federal government gave them directive that they do not have to move against these Fulani men,” the Benue governor claimed.
He added, “That is why I keep saying that the federal government’s action and inaction clearly show that they are complicit in the criminality that is going on in Nigeria. They call them bandits because they do not want people to call them Fulani herdsmen.”
Ortom further claimed that he would have taken up arms to lead the fight against killer Fulani herdsmen in Benue if he were not a child of God.
“If I were not a child of God, if I did not believe in being lawful, if I did not have respect for the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, I would have taken arms myself to go there and fight,” Mr Ortom asserted.
“Because this impunity is too much. They (Fulani herdsmen) think that as their brother is there, nothing will happen to them, and they do anyhow and go scot-free.”
