The National Boundary Commission (NBC) said it will leave no stone unturned to nip in the bud any tendency towards inter-community boundary conflicts in order to sustain the existing peace and harmony among border communities in the country.
The commission said it will put up considerable effort to ensure that all frontiers of hostilities which have had negative impact on the socio-cultural, and political and economic groupings among constituent units in the country are thwarted.
NBC Director-General, Surveyor Adamu Adaji, while profiling efforts to curtail incidences of clashes between communities said no fewer than 30 major inter-community clashes were amicably resolved and harmonious relationships restored in these communities.
According to him, the NBC had been confronted with 76 thorny inter-community conflicts which had dire security implications on the economic and political existence of the country, adding though that the commission was able to resolve 30 while still engaging all stakeholders with a view to finally addressing the bone of contention between the 46 others.
“The NBC wants to put a complete halt to the rather unfortunate trend whereby the creation of new state and local government units lead to hostilities along the affected boundaries.
“We want to remove all existing frontiers of hostilities and create frontiers of peace and harmony in which inter-community activities flourish along and across boundary lines. We want border dwellers to interact freely on the basis of mutual understanding and cooperation,” he said.
Tracing some of the painful clashes to the colonial administrators’ poor knowledge of the ethno cultural linkage and the political and economic groupings that existed before the imposition of the colonial rule, Surveyor Adamu Adaji, urged stakeholders to not allow political interest to interfere in the matter of boundary delineation and conflict resolution.
“The good news is that there is a declining trend in the incident of violent clashes arising from boundary disputes as a result of the activities of the NBC. But there are occasional cases of destruction to human lives and properties from internal boundary clashes rather than from clashes over the country’s international boundaries.”
He, therefore, appealed to communities with legitimate boundary issues to cooperate with the commission to use its legal and professional resources to ascertain, appraise and demarcate and establish boundary lines for the good of all involved.
