The Jukun Development Association of Nigeria (JDAN) has called on farmers and other tribes in the Middle Belt to intensify the supply of all kinds of foodstuffs to the Southern part of Nigeria.
The apex socio-cultural and political organisation of the Jukun people worldwide in a press statement in Abuja faulted the stand of a certain group of individuals who said food supplies to the Southern part of Nigeria should be halted.
The association’s national president, Chief Bako Benjamin, said those individuals calling for the boycott of food supply to the South speak for themselves and not the entire population of the North which the Middle Belt is part of.
Bako said it is the duty of security agencies to give maximum security to all the foodstuff traders coming to markets in the Southern part of Nigeria for legitimate businesses.
Bako, who further said those calling for the boycott of Southern Nigeria on food supply may have genuine grievances, but added that the method adopted through punitive and systematic starvation of the Southern part of the country is too extreme and dangerous for a united Nigeria.
Bako said the security agencies should identify the criminals that burnt trucks and destroyed properties in Shasha and prosecute them accordingly.
“All Nigerians need to thank the Yoruba people for their hospitality and kindness for hosting all tribes in Nigeria. So, they should never be repaid with evil.
“The individuals calling for the boycott of foodstuffs to the Southern part of Nigeria may be unaware that millions of Northerners, including their leaders that escaped hunger, poverty, starvation, banditry, Boko Haram and collapse of almost all the extreme Northern states of Zamfara, Kaduna, Katsina, Sokoto, Yobe, Borno, Bauchi, Adamawa, Kano, Niger and others are now taking refuge in the South West.
“So, such calls to stop food supply to the South is not only reckless, irresponsible and dangerous but lacks logic and understanding of the true situation in the country,” Bako said while calling on the security agencies to move quickly and arrest, prosecute those making such divisive calls.
“The situation may degenerate into a national unrest which may be difficult to handle,” Bako said, warning Nigerians against taking divisive actions.