Elders of Sansani Community in Gassol Local Government Area of Taraba on Monday petitioned the state governor, Darius Ishaku over alleged excesses of their traditional, the Lamdo Gossol, Idris Chiroma.
They alleged that Mr Chiroma was promoting indiscipline by pitting village heads against district heads.
With 16 elders of the community appending their signatures, they copied the petition to the Speaker, Taraba House of Assembly, security agencies and other traditional rulers.
A third class chief, Chiroma, the petition said, had confiscated lands and fish ponds belonging to peasant farmers, leaving them without any means of livelihood.
Another allegation labelled against the ruler was the confiscation of a cultivated farm belonging to the District Head of Sansani, Nuhu Abdulmutallib, an act he repeated a week ago by sending palace guards to plant rice on a land belonging to seven peasants at Sarki Dukku village.
They accused the ruler of selling peasants’ farms to herdsmen, pitting the farmers against the buyers of the farms.
They petitioners urged the governor to intervene in the matter so as to avoid clashes and bloodshed.
The ruler that had been on the throne for 10 years had not heeded appeals for a just treatment of his subjects, the community elders said.
In his reaction, Mr Chiroma, dismissed the allegations as “falsehood put together by my enemies who do not mean well for my chiefdom”.
“The allegations are all lies. This is not the first they are cooking up such lies against me.
“The petitioners are bad elements that have not contributed anything to the growth of the chiefdom.
“They are only bent on causing trouble. I have told them that the long arms of the law will not spare any of them,” he said.
