Former Vice President and three-time Presidential candidate of the People Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar has responded to the bloodshed in Benue State.

Atiku, who spoke through his X handle, says people of Benue who protested should not be treated as rebels. ”When citizens take to the streets to protest this injustice, they are not inciting rebellion, they are crying for help. They are demanding what every Nigerian is constitutionally entitled to: the right to life and the protection of that life by the state. But what do they receive in return? Tear gas. Brutality. Disdain. It is pouring hot oil on an open wound.

‘To unleash force on grieving, defenseless citizens is not governance, it is cruelty. It is a betrayal of the sacred duty of leadership. What kind of government meets a cry for safety with the barrel of a gun and a canister of gas?

‘The silence, the indifference, the lack of urgency, it is all damning. It speaks to a deeper rot in the conscience of leadership, a frightening normalisation of violence against the very people they swore to protect’.

More than 100 people have been killed, with 6,527 displaced, following a series of coordinated attacks by gunmen in Benue state.