Nigeria--The Untold Story

As I write this blog, I’ve now been in Nigeria for a full week.  My workshops and seminars have gone great—a subject for my next blog post. But what has overshadowed everything else on this trip has, of course, been the news story of the kidnapped girls of Chibok.  Even as I write, the CNN channel in my hotel room is broadcasting a live report being made just a few miles away here in Abuja, an interview with a Major General of the Nigerian Army. It’s clear that this story is finally making its impact on the world, as it should have weeks ago right after the kidnapping happened.

But what has been most interesting to me is to listen to the comments of my local Nigerian friends and contrast them to the international news stories I’m seeing on TV. That contrast can be summed up in one missing word: Christian!

Absent from virtually every broadcast I’ve seen is the element that concerns local citizens the most—the fact that the Boko Haram has again and again specifically targeted Christian populations of Nigeria. Do you ever hear it reported that the school where the girls were taken from was specifically a Christian school? Or that a similar Islamic school not far away was not touched at all?  Or that several girls who were able (allowed?) to escape were all Muslim? Why is it that these facts never seem particularly relevant to the international media?  I can tell you these and other key facts about recent Boko Haram attacks on Christian villages, churches and schools have certainly not been missed by the population here in Nigeria.

One reason for this is the backdrop of growing frustration Christian populations in the middle of the country have about the slow by steady progression of Muslim Fulani tribal people moving down from the north. During the past several years, these nomadic cattle people have slowly, but surely, taken over traditional farming areas, pushing the non-Muslim farmers farther south. I’ve heard reports that sometimes the Fulani intentionally set fire to farmers’ fields as a tactic to dominate the land for their herds. As their numbers expand in a given area, they get key Imams elected to government offices who, in turn, support legislation that favor further Fulani expansion.

Now, they have moved into the rich, fertile Plateau State and in just the past year and people report seeing herds of their cattle on the outskirts of the city of Jos. Increasing civil disturbances and “incidents” in the city’s outlying areas have caused Christians to fear for their safety and therefore move out of those areas which are immediately back-filled by newly arriving Muslim Fulani. All of this has made many of the Christian ministry leaders I’ve been speaking with this past week more and more concerned and nervous about the future stability of their country. “The Fulani may not be as radical as Boko Haram,” said one friend, “but their ultimate intention is definitely the same—rid Nigeria of all Christian presence and turn it into an Islamic State.”

With 170 million Nigerians in this country, more than half of which are Christian, that is probably not going to happen anytime soon. But what could certainly happen is a bloody civil conflict not unlike what caused Sudan to be split up into two competing nations.

Is it any wonder that these local Nigerians are more than concerned when they perceive that the full story of Christian persecution does not get reported about the kidnapped Chibok girls?