Sultan of Sokoto and President-General of the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), Sa'ad Abubakar, has said Nigeria is no longer the way it used to be in the past due to population explosion which according to him, is responsible for reported incidents of clashes between herdsmen and farmers in the country.
The Sultan made the disclosure while delivering the 18th S.L Edu Memorial Lecture on “The Role of Traditional Leaders in Protecting and Restoring the Nigerian Environment” organized by the Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF) in Lagos.
He said: “When you hear people talking about farmers-herders clashes as a religious thing, I most times laugh because it is just an economic issue and we are all trying to protect the meager resources available to us.
“Some hundreds of years ago, there used to be cattle routes across Africa where animals move. Herders from Kanuri for example know where they are going to. They don’t need anybody to guide them because it is very established.
“But these are no longer there because of the population explosion, because of the demand for land. You have to have houses, you have to have hospitals, you have to have schools. The farmer needs his product. The cattle herder needs to feed and feed his animals. So these two are economic issues, not political, not religious, not ethnic or what have you.
"But presently our politicians have turned it upside down and everything is given ethnic and religious colouration and that’s the danger we are facing in this country.
“Any insecurity issue has been given ethnic and religious colouration and that is very bad because as I have said criminals are criminals, call him by his name, criminal, don’t bring his religion where he comes from.”
