Fighters of the Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP) have henceforth stopped the transportation of farm produce in trucks in some communities in Niger State.
The affected communities are Bana,
Bana, Kwapaena, Unguwan Madaki, Koppa and Kurebe in Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, warning that there would be dire consequence, if the ban was flouted.
According to FIJ, the jihadists also collect levies to grant farmers access to their farms.
The FIJ, a media outlet close to their operations quoted a source lamenting that some communities have gone into agreement with terrorists which they raised money in millions of naira foe terrorists not to encroach into their and tomalao allow them access to their farmlands, but after sometime,
they would come back. This always comes when the farmers want to cultivate.
A source was quoted: “They would divide our farm produce and give us little to take home. Let us say out of 100 bags of maize, the gun-wielding fighters may decide to give the owner 20 bags after strenuous negotiations,”
The terrorists described it as being greedy to use trucks to evacuate farm produce, hence, the told farmers in the affected communities to use motorcycles for transportation of the portion of your crops.
Some villagers quoted the criminals to have issued them the directive.
A resident of Bana said the terrorists’ statement is law. “We dare not go to our farms with a lorry for cultivation,” he said.
Governor Abubakar Bello reacting to the development in a statement issued by his media team warns of food scarcity if farmers were not allowed transportation of their farm produce.
“The worrisome part of the security challenges is the inability of the farmers to harvest their farm produce, which may likely trigger food scarcity in the state.
“We are worried by the nefarious activities of these terrorists. Desperation has been noticed among them as a result of the onslaught of security agents, which has made them target unsuspecting rural inhabitants.”
