RUGA SETTLEMENT

        RUGA Settlement simply means rural settlement in which animal farmers  would be  settled in an organized place.

    

    As Nigerians were told last by the presidency, the reason for the decision on RUGA settlement is to stop roaming of cattle herders with the attendant clashes with farmers.

Meanwhile, the same presidency had claimed on different occasion in the past that the herdsman involved in clashes with farmers are foreigners. Besides, as the law stands in Nigeria today, the rights to land are vested in the Governors, hence the presidential statement that 

“government at the centre has gazetted lands in all states of the federation” for RUGA settlement also raised serious question.

       If the idea of RUGA settlement is about animal husbandry, there is hardly any part of the country where there no abandoned bushes. Introducing a controversial policy without the house consensus and wide consultations with critical stakeholder will always going to be a problem. The deceitful manner in which the implementation was being handled made it difficult to counter the argument of those who insist there was a sinister agenda behind it.

          

       Given the foregoing, it was no surprise that the process had to be suspended under the prevailing circumstance, a continuation of the “RUGA settlement idea may open up new spaces of conflict- a case of digging a ditch to fill a pothole. Proper consultations so that there could be an elite consensus as a way forward, may make more sense.

       

     That we are faced with economic challenges that require modernization of old modes of production is not in doubt. But the approach to the problem associated with the changing security and social integration challenges in our country is at the root of the current crisis. Somebody ought to have anticipated that whatever its merits, implementing a RUGA settlement scheme demands more than merely awarding contracts.