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Claim: A Facebook user shared a video of the Emir of Muri, Abbas Tafida, giving Fulani herdsmen a 30-day ultimatum.
Verdict: Misleading! While the video is authentic and does feature the Emir making the statement, it is not recent. It dates back to July 2021, when the Emir issued a 30-day ultimatum to address the ongoing attacks and kidnappings by suspected Fulani herdsmen.
Full Text
Since 2018, Fulani herders and the people of Muri in Taraba State have clashed repeatedly over land and grazing routes. These confrontations have led to deaths, displacement, and widespread destruction.
Despite peace efforts, the violence continued through 2024 and poses a serious concern in 2025. Amidst these, several claims have surfaced, some accurate, others completely false.
On April 10, 2025, a Facebook user, @Ade Adedokun, posted a video featuring Abbas Tafida, the Emir of Muri Kingdom in Taraba State. The 2-minute, 15-second footage shows the monarch speaking on issues related to Fulani herdsmen.
He expressed frustration over ongoing kidnappings allegedly linked to some Fulani groups and questioned: “If you truly follow Islam as we do, why then are you kidnapping fellow Muslims?”
He then went on to declare, “We’re giving the Fulani herdsmen 30 days to leave Taraba State. If they fail to comply, we’ll track them down one by one and deal with them. They’ve been abducting our people repeatedly; this must stop.”
He also questioned why the southern regions have been more tolerant of the same groups, saying, “If people in the North can ask them to leave, why are Southerners treating them with leniency?”
As of April 10, 2025, the video had only 57 views, two likes, and one comment. Just hours apart, different accounts shared other versions of the post. You can find them here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
The same content appeared on X, where it gained more attention. A post by @ChuksEricE, for example, had 2,300 likes, 178,000 views, 980 reposts, and 124 comments.
DUBAWA observed that most of the X posts appeared on April 7 and 8, 2025, while the Facebook posts showed up on April 10. Given the spread across platforms and the likelihood of it gaining more traction on Facebook, we decided to verify its authenticity.
Verification
We subjected the clip to a reverse image search, which traced back to a 2021 event where the Emir addressed a crowd after Eid prayers. He spoke about the rise in kidnappings and attacks in July 2021, which were believed to be linked to herdsmen’s activities in Taraba State. Reputable news outlets like Channels TV and TVC reported this.
According to Punch’s report, the Emir issued a 30-day ultimatum due to an increase in kidnappings, killings, and other violent incidents attributed to criminal herders in the state’s forests. He voiced his frustration over these crimes’ impact on residents, calling the situation unbearable.
The Emir urged Fulani leaders in the state to identify and remove those responsible, stressing that the community could no longer endure the ongoing insecurity and hardship.
Searching for related incidents in 2025 using relevant keywords yielded no new information. Instead, it led back to the same 2021 reports and videos, indicating that the footage was reused to spread a misleading narrative.
Conclusion
DUBAWA’s findings show that the video shared as a recent post is from 2021. Therefore, the claim is misleading.
