President Muhammadu Buhari said on Monday in Abuja, that poverty, injustice and unemployment were mainly responsible for inter-communal and intra-communal conflicts in Nigeria. The president stated this when he received a delegation from the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, an organisation active in the promotion of peace in Nigeria. He said that to achieve enduring peace in the country, greater effort must be made to eradicate poverty and injustice.
The president described ethnic and religious conflicts in parts of the country as outward manifestations of underlying problems of joblessness, injustice and poverty. On conflicts between farmers and herdsmen, Buhari said that a proposal to map out grazing areas would soon be presented to the Nigerian Governors Forum, as a temporary solution to the frequent conflicts. He, however, stated that the cattle owners would continue to be persuaded to adopt other means of rearing their cattle. The president commended the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, for the relative peace that had returned to Plateau as well as their on-going activity in Southern Kaduna. He agreed with the centre that dialogue was always preferable in the resolution of conflicts.
Executive Director of the centre David Harland, had told the president, that following their success in facilitating the settlement of inter-ethnic and inter-religious conflicts in Plateau, the group had moved to Kaduna State. He expressed the hope that the techniques used in bringing peace to Plateau could be deployed to deal with the Boko Haram insurgency and other conflicts in Nigeria.
(NAN)
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