The Deputy Governor of Kogi, Mr Yomi Awoniyi, said on Friday that rumour mongering and misinterpretation of gestures were the reasons responsible for the border crisis between communities in Kogi and Anambra.
Awoniyi stated this in a statement by his Press Secretary, Mr Michael Abu, in Lokoja.
The deputy governor was quoted to have stated this while speaking with newsmen on the crisis.
He said that Kogi was now in constant touch with its counterpart in Anambra on the need to maintain peace.
Awoniyi blamed rumour mongering as major reasons causing crisis between boundary communities in Kogi and Anambra.
?He disclosed that there was misinformation that there was war between the boundary communities, saying that this was not true.
Awoniyi said that the discovery of oil around Odeke area by a company wholly owned by Anambra citizens and the need to protect the assets of the company from vandals was a major reason for the crisis.
He said the crisis started when the joint patrol team set up by the government of Anambra was moving around the land.
However, in the heat of the controversy, some Kogi indigenes in the area felt they had come to take over the oil well.
?He noted that some people misconstrued their movement as an impeding attempt to take over their farmland.
?Awoniyi said that the Kogi Government would continue to impress it on the people not to take laws into their hands.
?He said the crisis in the disputed area which first started over fish ponds and farm lands became intense with the discovery of oil wells on the land.
Awoniyi said that until the National Boundary Commission was able to decide, using legal and ethnographic notices, where the oil well was situated, no clear demarcation could be made as to where the oil belonged.
Awoniyi noted that Gov. Idris Wada had sent top government officials, council of traditional rulers, to relate and liaise with their counterparts in Anambra.
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