This is Mrs Duras speech; Verbatim: Mr chairman, the conference management, fellow delegates, I stand on the existing protocol. My name is Dr Magdaline Mbazenda Dura, a delegate representing Benue State. Mr Chairman, I have gone through Mr president ’s speech and picked 3 key things that have observed run across; these are the issues of inclusiveness, peace and unity which in in words, are important to national development. In looking at these things, I have done on the basis of what the president expects of us which is to articulate and synchronised the views of our people in other to proper solutions to our problems. I will therefore comment base on the wishes of my people. Speaking of inclusivity and as a Tiv woman; the Tiv people; when I grew up, were known as the fourth largest ethnic group in Nigeria, today we are being relegated to the background, because of arbitrary state creation, arbitrary boundary demarcation that has Balkanized us in different states of the country. In these states we have found ourselves including Taraba, Nassarawa, Plateau, Niger, Cross River, among others, our people are taken to be second class citizens. They are denied the rights of citizenship , access to education, employment, even economic sustenance. During election periods, in some of these states, one of the strategies that is used is to displace the Tiv people, or by killing them to ensure that the do not contest the elections or do not vote. When these scenarios play out, we ask, why are we different, when other tribes are conveniently found and enjoy equal rights in five or even six states? Why are we limited and tagged as people who should remain in Benue state? We therefore want the issue of indigene ship and settlers resolved. BECAUSE we are also seen as settlers even when our ancestral homes are in these places. I move on to the issue of peace. Mr Chairman, talking of peace from the perspective of a Tiv woman from Benue State, Benue State which is the food basket of the nation which sustains the nation by providing the yams, rice etc has been turned into a blood basket. Our men, children, women are slaughtered on daily basis .in fact the people who are killing us do not even respect the rules of war; there is no even war. In ancient time, or under international humanitarian laws, you don’t kill women, children anad the elderly. Here, our women , children and the aged are being slaughtered. The most dehumanizing part is that are pregnant women are killed and their foetuses are removed and dump on the women. As a matter of fact, our people are being subjected to chemical and biological weapon. And we are asking what have we done? When we are talking of unity then, we must address the plight of the people who are gradually being extinguished from the Nigerian geographical map. We can have unity when a house is divided against itself; we demand that the Nigerian nation should supply answers to this genocidal onslaught. It is in doing that that we shall have an inclusive, peaceful, prosperous and a united nation.
Posted on: Thu, 03 Apr 2014 08:39:04 +0000
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