By Engr. Tsekaa Friday Shuur  
(An Independent Thinker from Yelewata)

Let this be on record, Governor Fr. Hyacinth Iormem Alia, is deliberate and desperate in denying the genocide in Benue State for only God-knows-why. I witnessed it firsthand yesterday in Yelewata, and I wept for our people. 

I can bet that under Governor Alia, the future of our people feels uncertain and unsafe. The evidence is so glaring. The disappointment in Yelewata was so deep and visible in the face of our people. 

Ordinarily, I wouldn’t have been in Yelewata to witness this painful denial that I have been hearing about. But our elder brother, Barr. Franc Utoo, gave us an assignment to do which will serve as a memorial for our slain family members and kinsmen, and that was what brought us there.

What I saw broke me.

That morning of yesterday, while traveling to the village with my brother Andy Nomsoor, we received a notification that the Deputy Secretary of the United Nations, Hajiya Amina Mohammed, was visiting Yelewata alongside with the governor 
 
By the time we arrived Yelewata, Governor Alia, his cabinet, and the UN representative were already at RCM Primary School, holding a meeting with some community members.

The turnout was embarrassingly low. The RCM School field was scanty, a clear sign that the people have lost faith in the government. 

We did not stop there. We proceeded straight to our project site, the very place where our people were massacred in their hundreds. Because we had no business with his visit. 

After the meeting, as Alia was heading back to Makurdi, he stopped briefly to show the UN representative what he claimed was the scene of the attack. 

What followed was nothing short of a disgrace.

He deliberately avoided taking them to the real locations where our people were massacred, burnt to ashes, where bones and ashes still lie on the ground, where bloodstains still mark the broken walls, and where empty bullet shells remain shallowly buried. 

These are places that speak the truth no one can erase. (I excavated an empty bully shell yesterday sef). 

Instead, he took them to an uncompleted building at the outskirts of the market, where he staged videos, and presented a false narrative to the world, as if nothing serious had happened in Yelewata.

I stood at a distance, furious, yet had to restrained myself from causing a scene. In that moment, I understood the depth of the callousness of a man who is supposed to be a servant of God.

We all know Alia would not have come to Yelewata under normal circumstances. Even on the very day of the massacre, he refused to visit or identify with our grieving people. He rather downplayed the death toll, reducing it from over 270 to just 58.

He only showed up days later, after the issue gained global attention.

So why come now?

It is obvious. Personal interest.

He came because of what he believes the United Nations will bring in terms of relief funds, not out of compassion for the people, but for self-serving reasons.

And what did he offer the victims?

No hope. No relief but additional pains. 

He advised our people to farm okra and other vegetables behind their houses and fence it to keep cattle away. 

That statement alone speaks volumes. 

It is an indirect admission that our lands are no longer safe, that our farms and ancestral homes are no longer ours to access freely they've been handed over to our k!llers.

Today, our people are ranched within Yelewata town like cows while Foolanis graze freely on their farms. 

Even farmlands close to Ushongo stream are abandoned. 

Communities like Tse-anyam, Tse-iortyer, and others cannot return to their ancestral lands. Those lands have effectively been taken over for grazing.

Imagine Yelewata that in the past, on every market day, more than 10 trailers loads of yam, maize, Garri, Egussi, Guinea corns and the rest do come out, feeding the nation and generating revenue for the state has been reduced to vegetable farms. 

Yet they are saying we should shut up and not talk. But I, wan u Shuur Tsekaa, won't keep quiet. 

How do you hide the truth the whole world has already seen?

Visit Yelewata today and you will see it yourself. Burnt homes. Ashes. Bloodstains. Silent evidence of horror. 

But these are the things Alia does not want the world to see. He would rather showcase irrelevant  structures and create a false narrative.

The pain in Yelewata is real. The disappointment is overwhelming. Even members of the press who initially visited the actual massacre sites were disappointed. 

They knew the exact places these Massacre took place but Governor Alia has to divert them to an uncompleted building just to deliberately prevent the world from seen what happened. 

Deliberate denial of genocide and the pains of the victims. Everyone was visibly disappointed. It was so obvious in the face everyone. 

Yelewata is just 15 minutes from Makurdi, along the Makurdi–Lafia Road, surrounded by multiple military barracks. Yet, for over three hours—from 10:45pm to 1:00am—our people were slaughtered in their sleep, especially those in the IDP camps in the market place without any security intervention.

And now, instead of justice and truth, we are given denial and deception in the broad daylight.

Alia did not just deny the genocide. He denied the victims dignity, truth, and the genuine support that people of goodwill are willing to offer. As can be seen in the 4 billion donated for our people. 

What we received is a permanent IDP camp that's not even up to 500million. The rest has gone down the drain. 

What we witnessed yesterday was not leadership. It was a calculated attempt to protect an image while the people suffer in silence. It's clear that the government of Fr. Alia is using our pains to cash out steadily. 

The man continues to insult the people of Benue State, especially we the people of Yelewata, even in the face of the tragedy that befell us.

“Kpa I lu tsô.”

Aôndo hemba ku dondo.

Eternity will right the wrongs and injustices of time.

Ka mo, 

By Benue Info-pedia