A New Dawn in Southern Taraba
Southern Taraba, once known for its fertile fields and thriving harvests, now bears the scars of violence and abandoned homes. However, a quiet shift is underway as a peace push led by former Bauchi Governor, Isa Yuguda, and backed by Taraba State Governor, Dr. Agbu Kefas, begins to replace fear with cautious hope.
Largely reputed for its fertile fields and thriving harvests, southern Taraba is still marked by the scars of violence, abandoned homes, and shattered livelihoods. But in a quiet and uncertain shift, a peace initiative led by former Bauchi State Governor, Isa Yuguda, and backed by Governor Agbu Kefas is beginning to reshape the story of the region.
In communities once emptied by gunfire and fear, a cautious calm is returning — tentative, fragile, but deeply significant for residents who have lived through months of deadly clashes between farmers and herders.
In communities where fear once dictated daily life, residents are now reporting cautious calm, tentative returns to deserted homes and farmlands, and a slowly growing sense—however uncertain—that peace may once again be possible.
These days, in the early hours of the morning in Peva community, Takum Local Government Area, and Tor-Damisa community in Donga Local Government Area of Taraba State, something unusual has been happening: people are beginning to breathe again.
Not long ago, these two major farming communities would wake to the sound of gunfire and panic. Mothers grabbed their children and fled into the bush. Men abandoned their farms. Entire villages emptied overnight. Today, though fear has not completely disappeared, a cautious calm has returned—an unfamiliar but deeply welcome shift for residents who endured months of deadly clashes between herders and farming communities that left a trail of death, grief and destruction.
“We buried our people, we fled our homes, we watched our farms rot,” said Chief James Bakah, President General of the Tiv Cultural and Social Association in Taraba.
“What happened to Chanchanji and the surrounding communities was not just an attack on land. It was an attack on our existence as a people. We lost farmers, we lost elders, we lost young men who had done nothing wrong. The pain is still very raw.”
At the centre of this emerging calm is Mal. Isa Yuguda, former Governor of Bauchi State and President of Tabital Pulaaku International, an elder statesman whose renewed intervention, backed by Governor Agbu Kefas, is gradually restoring a semblance of peace across troubled parts of southern Taraba.
For Yuguda, this is not a first attempt. Two years ago, he was in Taraba mediating between Fulani herders and Kuteb farming communities in Ussa and parts of Takum Local Government Area. That earlier intervention, though modest in scope, helped temporarily ease tensions and opened fragile channels of communication between groups that had long viewed each other with suspicion.
But violence resurfaced, this time spreading wider and hitting Tiv farming communities across Kofai Amadu, New Gboko, Demevaa, Adu, Sabe, Facii, Gbundu, Mbayevikyaior, Tor-Damisa, Atar, Abiem, Orkura, Igbum, Tor-Tsee, Akenawe, Tompo, Ansua, Atsanger, Ayiase, Tyopaa, Tor-Musa, Tor-Iorshaegher, Torluam, Ayu and several others. The scale of the crisis demanded a broader, more structured response. Yuguda returned, this time with stronger backing and a more comprehensive strategy.
Community Brought to Its Knees
Before the latest intervention, communities across southern Taraba were reeling. Residents described a pattern of attacks that left villages deserted and farmlands abandoned. In Chanchanji and surrounding settlements, farming activities halted almost entirely. Families who had tilled the same soil for generations found themselves sleeping in displacement camps with nothing but the clothes on their backs.
Local leaders, clerics and lawmakers raised alarm over the scale of the unfolding humanitarian disaster. At the Taraba State House of Assembly, lawmakers led by Hon. Abubakar Tanko Jolly, voiced deep concern that the violence had escalated far beyond isolated incidents into sustained and coordinated insecurity.
From the pulpit, Bishop Mark Maigida Nzukwein, the Catholic Bishop of Wukari diocese did not mince words. He warned of a growing catastrophe, marked by mass killings, large-scale displacement, and the systematic collapse of rural livelihoods that had sustained families for decades.
“What we witnessed was a humanitarian emergency,” Bishop Nzukwein said. “Communities that fed this state, that fed their neighbours, were being wiped out. The church could not stay silent.”
The Ter Taraba, Zaki David Gbaa Tela, who serves as the central Tiv traditional leader in Taraba, described the atmosphere in affected communities as one of total despair.
“Our people lost everything; their loved ones, their homes, their sense of safety,” Zaki David Gbaa Tela said. “For months, nobody was sleeping. Nobody was farming. Children stopped going to school. Old men and women sat in the open with nowhere to go. We kept asking: when will someone listen to us?”
Jalingo Turning Point
The answer came on April 22, 2026, when a decisive meeting was convened at the Jolly Nyame Stadium in Jalingo.
Led by Mal. Isa Yuguda and supported by Governor Kefas, the gathering brought together Fulani and Tiv leaders, traditional rulers, security agencies and government officials in an atmosphere that was tense but purposeful. Unlike previous engagements that skirted around hard truths, participants say this dialogue confronted both the symptoms and root causes of the conflict head-on.
There was a shared acknowledgment, remarkable in its honesty that Fulani and farming communities, including the Tiv and Kuteb, had coexisted peacefully for generations, and that the current crisis was driven not merely by resource competition but by criminal infiltration and a catastrophic breakdown of trust between neighbours.
“This was not just a farmers-herders problem,” Chief James Bakah told this reporter. “Criminal elements on both sides have been exploiting the tension for their own gain, rustling cattle, burning farms, staging attacks and hiding behind ethnicity. We needed to name that clearly and deal with it. What happened in Jalingo was that people finally spoke the truth.”
From the meeting emerged firm and far-reaching resolutions: an immediate cessation of hostilities, the disbandment of armed groups, active collaboration with security agencies, and the establishment of structured dialogue mechanisms at all levels of the affected communities. Equally significant was a collective agreement on justice, ensuring that criminal acts are prosecuted without ethnic or political favour.
“Justice is the foundation of any lasting peace,” Chief James Bakah said firmly. “If those who killed our people are allowed to walk free because of who they are or who they know, there will be no peace. Our people are watching. They need to see that the law works for everyone.”
Early Signs of Relief
Weeks after the Jalingo meeting, early indicators suggest the initiative is beginning to gain traction on the ground.
Community leaders report fewer violent incidents in some of the worst flashpoints, while communication between herders and farmers once completely severed has cautiously resumed in certain areas. Perhaps most significantly, there are early, tentative movements of displaced persons returning to assess their homes and farms, a development many describe as unthinkable just weeks ago.
“I went back to my compound last week for the first time in months,” said Tersugh John from Adu village. “The house is damaged. The farm is overgrown. But I went back. That means something.”
Security sources attribute part of this progress to improved cooperation and intelligence sharing between communities and authorities a direct outcome of the trust-building initiated at Jalingo.
Mr. Solomon Igba who has been closely involved in the follow-up process, says what distinguishes Yuguda’s approach from previous efforts is not simply mediation technique but credibility.
“Yuguda is a Fulani leader of the highest standing. He can walk into a herder camp and be heard. But he also speaks the language of justice and coexistence that farming communities respect. That combination is rare and it is powerful,” he said.
Chief James Bakah echoed that assessment, while striking a note of caution. “We appreciate what Yuguda is doing. We appreciate the Governor’s support. But our people have seen peace agreements before that dissolved like morning dew. What we need now is implementation. We need to see armed groups disbanded. We need to see perpetrators prosecuted. We need to see our displaced people safely return to their homes and farms.”
Fragile Road Ahead
And therein lies the real test. Peace agreements in Taraba have historically struggled with implementation. The warm words of dialogue tables have too often failed to translate into action on the ground. Armed groups have persisted. Perpetrators have gone unpunished. Displaced persons have remained in camps long after ceasefire declarations.
There is also the deeper, slower work of rebuilding trust between neighbours who, until recently, shared land, markets, and daily life. That kind of trust, once broken by bloodshed, does not return with a single meeting, however historic.
“We are not asking for miracles overnight,” said Chief James Bakah. “We are asking for consistency. Keep the dialogue going. Hold the criminals accountable. Bring our people home safely. Restore their livelihoods. Do those things, and trust will follow.”
Zaki David Gbaa Tela put it plainly: “The Tiv and the Fulani have lived together for generations. We are not natural enemies. We are neighbours. What we need is leadership that reminds us of that, and systems that protect us when bad people try to tear us apart.”
Back in Chanchanji, farmers are beginning to look at their fields again not with certainty, but with something they had almost forgotten: hope. The soil still carries the scars of violence. Burnt homesteads. Overgrown farms. Graves that should not exist. But beneath those scars, the land still holds the memory of harvests and the possibility of renewal.
Yuguda’s intervention, strengthened by the political will of Governor Agbu Kefas, has not ended the crisis entirely. The guns have not all fallen silent. The wounds have not all healed. The displaced have not all returned. But what it has done is something just as important: it has changed the direction.
And in Taraba, where for too long conflict has felt not just inevitable but inescapable that shift in direction may yet prove to be the most significant breakthrough of all. And for the Tiv people of southern Taraba, peace is all they want and they hope it will last.
