Taming cattle rustling in Katsina

Cattle rustling and banditry have for many years remained the most teething problems bedeviling the people of southern part of Katsina state especially communities surrounding the dreaded Rugu forest. Rugu forest spanning over 220KM has been a hub for the bandits and no go area for any persons. The forest is also backbone for the […]

Cattle rustling and banditry have for many years remained the most teething problems bedeviling the people of southern part of Katsina state especially communities surrounding the dreaded Rugu forest.
Rugu forest spanning over 220KM has been a hub for the bandits and no go area for any persons. The forest is also backbone for the illicit trade of animals.
Kano Chronicle gathered that hundreds of lives were lost, many women raped, several persons maimed just as thousands of animals worth billions of naira were lost to the activities of such bandits who have made the forest their hideouts.
A renewed effort in the last eight months as promised by state government were about N300m was so far expended is fast restoring hope to the already impoverish communities in Faskari, Safana, Danmusa, Jibia, Dutsinma and Bakori. The communities have for long been bearing the brunt of cattle rustling and banditry.
Kano Chronicle recalled that sometimes last year over 100 lives were killed by the bandits in just one daring attack in Faskari and Sabuwa local government areas of the state.
However, the perceived normalcy as been witnessed now with increase patrols and involvement of community policing as adopted in the fight against rustlers is showing some improvement.
 A breakdown of the statistics obtained from the secretariat of the state standing committee on cattle rustling shows that from July-December 2015 about 11,989 animals were recovered out of which 9,221 were returned to their rightful owners.
Eight thousand, six hundred and seventy six (8,676) of the recovered animals are cows, 2,623 sheep, 571 goats, 55 camels and 74 donkeys.
Also from January to date, 3,509 animals were recovered and 4,028 have been reunited with owners.
Some residents, who spoke to Kano Chronicle on the menace of cattle rustling in the state have expressed appreciation to the renewed efforts so far but still expect more to be done to nip the issues in the bud.
A resident of Tawanka village of Tsaskiya town in Safana local government, Malam Muhammad Salisu said the renewed efforts had drastically reduced cattle rustling and banditry in Safana and environ. He said even though there were still issues of thefts here and there but compared to what was happening before, people were living in relative peace.
“What happened in the past if allowed to continue by now nobody would have been alive in Tsaskiya town, just recently somebody from Wuma village was also attesting to the peace we are enjoying presently,” he added.
Mahmud Hassan of Kankara town said the ills were reducing seriously compared to when bandits in hundreds riding on motorbikes with guns would attack a village shooting sporadically at unsuspecting persons before carting away animals and raping women.
He said, what remains were few petty thieves who engaged in stealing a cow or two unlike when herds of cattle were driven away to the forest with no any effort to get them back.
Speaking during an enlarged stakeholders meeting on cattle rustling, the state governor Aminu Bello Masari said a data bank that would monitor movement of cattle within and outside the state was in the process of development.
The proposed bank, he said would have all the vital information needed for effective tracking of animals and to easily identify owners.
Masari vowed to continue to spearhead fight against banditry not only in the state but in the North west zone, saying that support to security operatives would be sustained giving the results been witnessed.
The commandant of 3rd Brigade Kano, Brigadier General Hamisu Hassan said the feat was recorded following about 93 different operations against cattle rustlers and bandits within Rugu forest in the state.
He said effective collaboration among security operatives necessitated the successes so far recorded, noting that the army would remain committed to the crusade against the activities of rustlers in Katsina state.
The chairman of the state committee on rustling Alhaji Nuhu Abdulkadir said the onerous task was yielding positive result giving the influx of persons coming to retrieve the recovered animals.
“People come from as far as Maradi in Niger Republic, neighboring Zamfara and Kaduna states in search of their stolen animals and this shows how successful the renewed effort is yielding results,” Abdulkadir said.
According to him, enhanced procedures to ensure the animals get back to their rightful owners was another great measure taken by the government, saying that a herder who lost animals must first report to his village head who would then notify the district head and a covering note is forwarded to us in that respect.
“After going several screening on the identity of the perceived lost animal we then allow the owner into our yard to search and if luckily he finds his animal then we compare the proofs and if satisfied he walks away with his animals” he said.
While stressing the need for the affected states to work in unison to achieve more results, Abdulkadir said hope was rising and people were seeing the results.
Speaking on behalf of the Fulani who were mostly affected, the leader of the Fulani socio cultural association Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, Mallam Hassan Kuraye said for long cattle herders had suffered in the hands of bandits.
Kuraye thanked the state government and called for additional efforts to ensure the intermittent killing of people was also check and address.