The General Secretary of forward Buhari, Dr. Kayode Ajulo, has raised an alarm over the taking over of security surveillance on some high ways in South-west Nigeria by men who identified themselves as Miyetti Allah Vigilante Group of Ondo State.
Ajulo made the revelation during an interview monitored on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily in Abuja on Monday. The activist lawyer said he was travelling to Ondo State with armed policemen on Sunday when he sighted the armed herdsmen with their cattle.
The former National Secretary of the Labour Party said when he accosted the herdsmen, they claimed they were doing it with the permission of the Nigeria Police Force.
He narrated, “I was in my state yesterday (Sunday) when I saw Fulani herdsmen under the auspices of Miyetti Allah tagged themselves as Vigilante Group of Ondo State in this country, in the South-West. They were all over and nobody is stopping them.”
“We saw Fulani herdsmen with cattle, guns and cutlasses and they showed me their ID cards that they are vigilantes and they are the ones securing the highway. I was with some armed security men and so we stopped them. We were even trying to call the DPO and the police to ask if they were aware of their presence.”
“I took pictures of their ID cards and I questioned them and they said the police were aware of what they were doing.”
An identity card of one of the armed herdsmen which were posted by Ajulo on social media indicated that they were members of MACBAN and they belonged to the Ikare Akoko branch of the association.
The logo of the vigilante group has two guns while the code was MACBAN/NHQ/MSC.
The Forward Buhari convener, however, admitted that the herdsmen did not act violently towards his entourage as they willingly allowed him to take their pictures and photos of their ID cards.
“They looked very bold but they allowed me to take pictures of their ID cards,” he said.
When contacted, the National Secretary of Miyetti Allah, Baba Usman, told one of our correspondents, “I don’t know anything about that. I just heard this from you now. The security agencies should go after them; I don’t know anything about that one.”
Usman also said that the ID card on one of the herdsmen does not belong to his group.
The development comes barely a week after Mrs. Funke Olakunri, the daughter of Afenifere leader, Reuben Fasoranti, was killed along the highway in Ondo State by suspected herdsmen.
