Prof Gundu made the declaration in response to the demand by Governor Sule, through his Counsel, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) Ahmed Raji and Company, that Gundu apologise to him for his utterance within seven days or risk legal action.
In the letter earlier demanding for a retraction, dated 22nd July, 2025, Counsel to the Nasarawa state governor, Raji, SAN, and addressed to Prof Gundu, Governor Sule, said he would however be assuaged if the University don tenders unreserved apology to him in at least five national dailies.
But in reaction to the letter, a Professor of Law, Prof Sebastine Hon, SAN, who is also Counsel to Prof Gundu, emphasized that his Client would not apologise to Governor Sule, under any guise.
In the letter which was addressed to Raji, dated, 28th July, 2025, and made available to Daily Independent in Makurdi on Monday, Prof Hon, insisted that his Client (Gundu) spoke the truth and advanced reasons to support his argument.
Therefore, he urged the Counsel to Governor Sule, to advise his Client accordingly, stressing that there was no way his Client would detach himself from the “accusation.”
According to the letter signed by Prof Sebastine Hon, SAN, he decried the situation where Governor Sule, has been making conflicting statements over the attacks, adding that at a point he would say there are “influx” of herdsmen and terrorists into Nasarawa and at the drop of a hat, would say, there were only a “few”
He said, “Your letter on the above subject matter, dated 22nd July, 2025, refers. Our services have been retained, and we are Solicitors to, Professor Zacharys Anger Gundu. We hereby write this reply to your said letter of 22nd July, 2025 on his behalf.
“Our Client’s instruction is that he spoke the truth and nothing but the truth. He is specifically relying on the defences of fair comment and justification, amongst other defences available to him.
“For the avoidance of any doubt, the following fact is sacrosanct: Our Client addressed your Client as the Governor of Nasarawa State, meaning he addressed him as the Chief Security Officer of that State. That was why our Client kept referring to ‘Governors,’ including the former Governor of Nasarawa State, Al-Makura, and even the current Benue State Governor, Hyacinth Alia (albeit, the latter’s name was not expressly mentioned).
“To prove further that your Client is not free from our Client’s accusations, your Client told Channels TV in June, 2025 after the recent Yelwata massacre that Nasarawa State has only a few Fulani herdsmen; hence the State could not have been habouring the large number of those murderers who move to Benue to kill, maim and recoil back to Nasarawa.
“This is a sharp contrast to his famed ‘there is an influx of Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram members into Nasarawa State.’ This was the additional shocking lie shamelessly told by your Client on that day, as reproduced by Daily Post June 27, 2025:
The problem comes with the terminology of harbouring and things like that because there is nothing like that. Nasarawa State don’t (sic) even have enough Fulanis that we can say that (it is harbouring anybody).
“On harboring of armed bandits in Nasarawa State: Just as our Client stated at that public outing, your Client’s predecessor, Tanko Al-Makura, once claimed that the bandits operating in and from Nasarawa State were “hunters,” when there are no hunting forests or ranges in Nasarawa State.
“Between 2020 and 2025, your Client (Governor Sule) has been consistently raising alarm over the “influx” of murderous bandits into Nasarawa State.
“We wonder why this sudden reversal in public representation from a person who had been saying for the past five years at least that there has been a consistent “influx” of armed Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram elements into that same State. Kindly enquire from your Client whether at any point since announcing such “influx,” he has also announced “expulsion” or “voluntary migration” out of Nasarawa State of those criminal elements.”
Prof Hon, further stated that “The volume of evidence our Client has to establish beyond all shadows of doubt that the murderous Fulani herdsmen attacking Benue State on several fronts are always housed in Nasarawa State by successive State Governors of that State, including your Client, will shock your Client.
“We shall, however, release all of those pieces of evidence when we meet you in court; but remind your Client of the following indelible and incontrovertible facts”, he stated.
Furthermore, Prof Hon, said “With respect to land grabbing, our Client stands his grounds, based on facts available to him. Also, upon reading your letter being replied to here on the internet, our Client made discreet efforts to augment his position and, consequently, discovered the following chilling facts.
“Tiv Community leaders in Awe, Doma, Keana and Obu LGAs of Nasarawa State, led by Jerry Aondo, SAN, in a recent press conference in Abuja, alleged that your Client has seized and is still seizing large swathes of lands from Tiv people in Nasarawa State, under a so called “agricultural mandate.” What sense lies in seizing farmlands belonging to farmers under the guise of a contraption labeled “agriculture mandate”?
“To justify your Client’s illegality of seizing ancestral lands belonging to Tiv natives of Nasarawa state and handing same to the invaders or to some foreigners, your Client proclaimed that “all lands in Nasarawa state belong to the state.”
“In a swift and sharp response, Senior Lawyer and civil rights activist, Dr. Monday Ubani, SAN, wrote in the Loyal Nigerian Lawyer of May 6, 2025, inter alia, that your Client’s proclamation “is fundamentally misleading, constitutionally flawed, and legally inaccurate within the framework of Nigeria’s extant laws, particularly the Land Use Act of 1978.
“By Suit No. NSD/LF 44/2025, seventeen (17) persons of Tiv origin in Nasarawa State have sued your Client, several agencies of the Nasarawa State Government and the Nigerian Army, seeking judicial reliefs against forceful seizure of their lands and eviction from their ancestral farmlands running into thousands of hectares. This Suit is still pending; hence we say no more about it. Your Client who has already entered appearance should be able to furnish you with the court processes in this Suit”, he stated.
“We can go on and on; but these are less than a tenth of the evidence we have to establish that your Client as the Chief Security Officer of Nasarawa State is/has been aware, for a period of more than five (5) years, that the State he is superintending is habouring murderers and land grabbers, without any meaningful effort by him to curb or stop this serious menace. We have decided to withhold some of our arsenal, for obvious reasons.”
Summarily, he said, “In the light of the above, therefore, we have the firm instructions of our Client to dismiss the demands made in your letter of July 22, 2025. Our Client cannot, under any guise, comply with those demands.
“We do hope you will advise your Client accordingly”, he declared.
