Wednesday, 12 May 2021: Senators from the 17 states in the south on Wednesday applauded the decision of the Southern Governors Forum, (SGF), to ban open grazing in the region.

The senators stated that the position of the governors from the region will help to end kidnapping, killings, and other vices in the region.

The governors of the 17 southern states had in a communiqué after a four-hour meeting at Asaba, Delta State, on Tuesday, resolved to ban the open grazing practice.

In a 12-point communiqué read by the Chairman of the SGF, Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State, the governors also called for restructuring of the country, decongestion of Lagos and others.

In a joint statement by the Chairman of the Southern Senators Forum, (SSF), Opeyemi Bamidele (APC, Ekiti), General Secretary, Mathew Uroghide (PDP, Edo) and Publicity Secretary, Chukwuka Utazi (PDP, Enugu), the forum called on the governors to ensure implementation of the resolutions.

They said the decision of the governors would help to address growing food insecurity across the country.

“At this critical point of our national life when the economy was being bedevilled by galloping inflation, youth unemployment and insecurity, food security is very crucial to mitigate the effects of these diverse evils on the citizens,” the forum said.

“Available records have shown that attaining food security status would remain a mirage in the south owing to ravaging effect of outdated livestock grazing policy being unleashed on farmlands by some unscrupulous herders.

“Most appalling were the seemingly unabated kidnapping, raping and killing of our people by suspected herdsmen, who have become bandits heating up the system.

“With this uniform resolve by our Governors to initiate no-open grazing policy, the region will return to its peaceful and agriculturally self -sufficient status it had assumed even long before Nigeria’s amalgamation in 1914.”