Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, has paid the medical bill of one Mr Jerome Obayemi, a victim of herdsmen attack in Ojah community in Akoko Edo Local Government Area of the state.

The governor on Thursday released N500,000 through his Chief of Staff, Taiwo Akerele, at the Government House in Benin City, the state capital.

The amount is also to provide him with relief materials, assured that measures are being put in place to forestall clashes between farmers and herdsmen in the state.  A representative of the Okogie of Ojah clan and the Traditional Head of Okurogho, Oba Daniel Suru Lawani, Mr Phillip Eguarogie, told journalists that the attack was one in a series of attacks in the community. 

He explained that Obayemi narrowly escaped death on January 4 by the group of suspected herdsmen while going to his farm.  Eguarogie said, “On January 4, there was a Fulani herdsmen attack in Ojah community. A young man was going to the farm and saw a group of herdsmen coming towards him.  “He greeted them and they requested for food items and money from him.

He told them in the Hausa language that he was going to the farm and did not have food, nor money on him.  “Immediately he left them, he felt an impulse to look back. He saw that they had brought out a cutlass to behead him. But he used his right hand to shield himself as a form of defence and screamed. That caused him that hand. He was rushed to Poly Clinic in Ososo by farmers who heard his call for help.”

He, however, added that the governor’s intervention would go a long way in easing the financial burden of the victim.