YAOUNDÈ, Cameroon – A Catholic-inspired think tank has accused the Nigerian government, at various levels, of complicity in the killing of Christians by jihadist forces, while some observers predict that Africa’s most populous country could be on the verge of a “religious war”. »
At least 500 Christians have been killed in Plateau State since January, according to Intersociety, a democracy and human rights group founded in 2008. Over the past 14 years, at least 52,250 Nigerian Christians were brutally murdered by Islamist militants, according to the group.
Intersociety director Emeka Umeagbalasi accused the government of encouraging bloodshed.
“The level of violence is expected to continue and it continues to increase because the authorities are fueling the crisis,” he said.
“The authorities are behind these murders. The authorities have injected jihadist blood into the security forces, to the point that the security forces abandoned what they were supposed to do and started targeting people who are not lawless citizens “, Emeka said. Node.
He said that in addition to infiltrating security forces, jihadist elements have also penetrated other government structures, which may explain what he called the “nonchalant attitude” of the current administration.
He said officials from different branches of government are now “singing jihadist Islamic songs” and called the central government in Plateau State “jihadist-oriented.”
Those who do not support jihadists, Emeka said, are removed from power and replaced by “stooges who may have Christian names, but at the same time work for the (jihadist-oriented) government.”
The persecution of Christians is not limited to Plateau State. According to Emeka, Kaduna and Benue are also hotspots of Christian persecution in Nigeria’s predominantly Muslim north, where the state appears complicit.
For example, a former governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, was filmed telling Muslim clerics that he had excluded Christians from government because they did not support his All Progressives political party Congress (APC).
The statement was widely condemned, with the Southern Kaduna Rulers Council calling on the international community to investigate allegations of “genocide and discrimination against the people of Southern Kaduna during the eight years of Nasir El-Rufai’s administration , the former governor of Kaduna State”.
Describing the governor as a “fanatic,” the group said the terrorist attacks in the state were carried out “with the aim of enabling El-Rufai to implement jihadism in Kaduna State.”
The statement alleged that El-Rufai had a strategy of Islamic domination and that this was the reason why Christians were killed and mutilated, as well as the burning of their homes and the destruction of their communities from 2015 to 2023.
Franklyne Ogbunwezeh, senior researcher and director of genocide prevention at Christian Solidarity International in Switzerland, recently told a Nigerian media outlet that the Christian population in central Nigeria was facing a campaign of genocide. He declared that the massacres, which had not stopped, demonstrated the intention to annihilate them.
He also warned that the country was on the brink of a religious war and accused the Nigerian government of ignoring the cries of victims and allowing jihadists to shed innocent blood.
“The situation is getting worse because nothing seems to have been done,” Emeka told Crux.
“The security forces are still carrying out pro-jihadist instructions to protect Islam,” he said, explaining that everything is done to make Muslims turn their backs on Christians.
Emeka said that while attacks on Christians are downplayed by authorities, an attack on a member of the predominantly Muslim Fulani people attracts widespread attention.
“In Plateau State or Northern Nigeria, in any troubled area, if a Fulani man is killed, you will see the security forces and the government spending millions to fund the big publicity around that Fulani man kill. »
“When hundreds of defenseless citizens are killed, the government does not bat an eyelid. That is to say, in Nigeria, there are those who are created to be killed, and there are those who are created to live. »
Emeka stressed that sectarian violence in Nigeria is not new, but asserted that with de facto state sponsorship of violence, the situation has reached “a very dangerous level.”
“That is why the numbers have increased and state actors, that is, the government of some states, as well as the government at the national level and the security forces of the country, are fueling or even conspiring in the butcheries. “
A member of the Nigerian House of Representatives, David Lalu, has suggested that communities take up arms against jihadists, but Emeka is not particularly enthusiastic about the proposal, pointing out that it could open the floodgates to even more killings.
“If the government can go so far as to kill unarmed people and label them ‘armed terrorists,’ what can’t it do?
He accused the international community of doing little to help and suggested that foreign aid be linked both to ensuring that Christians can worship freely without fear of attack and to fighting more vigorous against jihadism.
