Lorine Emenike
A Port Harcourt-based legal practitioner, Lekia Baridoo has called on the southern governors to ensure that their ban on open grazing is backed up with legal instruments.
The lawyer also urged that the governor of the seventeen southern states to also call for a meeting of stakeholders of the region to dialogue on security.
He noted that much as the ban on open grazing is commendable, the resolution must be translated into laws in the various states so as to punish offenders.
“This is the right step, the right direction because of the insecurity staring at us. So if southern governors can come together to take this common position, it is very well welcome.
“I want to add to say that we cannot begin to meet at this point of our critical national life about this kind of resolution without translating it to the legislation in various states, we should begin to think of how we can check this resolution by way of having the legislative framework and the law so as to work out the talk.
“Because if we just meet as the southern governors without having what it takes to pursue it, legally speaking, it will be a kind of colleagues and nothing more”
The legal practitioner further called on southern states to activate various legislation and community policing outfits for proper information gathering in the fight against emerging crimes.
