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Published 15 June 2021
The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd), has often referred to the gazette which published the grazing laws in Nigeria. In his television interview to mark his sixth anniversary in office, he made reference to the so-called gazette, once more. The President was echoing what his Chief of Staff, Professor Ibrahim Gambari, said on April 1, 2018 when he was the Chancellor of the Kwara State University in Ilorin. On that day, Gambari referred to existing laws on grazing and that the major problem facing us now is the non-implementation of the grazing laws as contained in the gazette. My understanding is that both the President and his Chief of Staff were equating the laws of Northern Nigeria on grazing as if they were laws passed by the central government. The grazing laws which the two men referred to were passed into a decree by the then Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto. The laws were not operative in the Western, Mid-West and Eastern regions.