The last time the term “genocide” was applied to Nigeria, it involved a brutal civil war from which she has yet to recover.
And now, it is back, United States President Donald Trump, on October 31 designating Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” over severe violations of religious freedom and genocide against Christians.
He followed up with a social media post in which he threatened military action and the suspension of US aid to the country if the government of Bola Ahmed Tinubu “continues to allow the killing of Christians.”
Tinubu is himself a Muslim, as is his vice-president, an electoral ticket that was designed to ensure that Tinubu, who affirmed not his credentials but that it was his “turn,” collected it in 2023.
To that end, the obvious Nigerian danger of two Muslims on one ticket was dismissed. Two and a half years later, both men are still in power, but with the revulsion of Trump now trained against their leadership.
Tinubu was sauntering along blissfully, having defied all the odds, including legal, ethical and academic controversies in the U.S, though lingering fears that persist that the U.S. government may still publish adverse reports about him.
Still, he had spent 30 months with no disruptions to his agenda, particularly in terms of a second term, except to studiously avoid setting foot on US soil. From his perspective, that could not have been a bad price to pay.
In Nigeria, therefore, everything stayed normal: citizens and observers and journalists lamented his government’s complacency and the cost of living, but the Tinubu narrative was that all was well.
“We have stabilised our economy and are now better positioned for growth and prepared to withstand global shocks,” he celebrated at his second anniversary in May, adding that “inflation has begun to ease, with rice prices and other staples declining.”
When people cited the galloping corruption, Tinubu said he had abolished corruption.
When Nigerians complained about widespread insecurity, officials lied that it had been brought under control. National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, tried to substitute the concept of “Tinubu Gains” for a popular local phrase, “Tinubu Pain.”
It was at the same event, the Comptroller General of Customs’ Conference in Abuja in November 2024, that Ribadu vowed to silence not only the terror group Lakurawa, but also critics of the Tinubu administration.
“Boko Haram today is running out. Most of them have moved to Chad,” Ribadu claimed. Lakurawa, he warned, “will definitely be crushed and will be kicked out of Nigeria”.
He assured the group that they were making a mistake, as “Nobody ever dares Tinubu and wins. Nobody…Nobody has ever defeated Tinubu.”
And he datelined 2024 as “a Nigeria where the critics will be quiet. And one after the other, things will change. And things are already changing. Many parts are safe, especially in the Niger Delta…”
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The only problem is that vowing to crush insurgents is merely cliché among Nigerian leaders. Even Abuja, where the political elite hides behind presidential and federal structures, has not been safe for most of the Fourth Republic.
How unsafe? Federal officials prefer not to know. I have drawn attention to:
The Nigerian military is emptily declaring that it has deployed its special forces across the country in a renewed onslaught on insurgency and other security threats
DSS Director-General Adeola Ajayi saying that Nigerians should defend themselves and not expect the national defence mechanisms to do so; and,
Former Chief of Air Staff Hassan Abubakar announcingthat the Air Force flew 15,915 hours in 18 months, as if air miles scare kidnappers!
With the self-importance displayed by top national security chiefs and the mass media’s failure to provide accurate and sustained on-ground reporting across the country, Nigeria has remained a jungle—punctuated only by occasional official claims of strikes against insurgents. Vast swathes of the nation remain abandoned to criminals who loot, burn, and kill at will.
So, is there a genocide against Christians in Nigeria? Predictably, the government’s response is: NO! That is because it has never truly confronted insecurity, preferring instead the comfort of merely asserting “security.” It cannot admit to a Christian genocide without simultaneously confessing that it has failed in its primary responsibility of governance.
Only last April, I urged the government, obviously lacking both commitment and a strategy, the same weakness that had doomed the Muhammadu Buhari administration, to deploy “a comprehensive, professional, multi-dimensional field offensive” against insecurity.
“Like the [World] Bank, the world continues to warn Nigeria, as have many others, such as the London Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, The Economist, and the New York Times,” I said.
As part of its general emptiness and cluelessness regarding governance, it did not. That explains why it was shocked when Trump, last week, raised the spectre of possible military intervention. The truth is not only that the Tinubu government rejects the accusation of genocide—it simply refuses to accept the responsibility of governance, period.
I am not saying that the US should invade Nigeria—not to protect Christians, anyway. If the US truly wishes to advance Nigeria’s democratic interests, violence is a cynical choice that would benefit neither the US, where democracy is also under strain, nor Nigeria.
What Nigeria needs is a sustainable mechanism by which those who govern the country can truly be held accountable, first through free and fair elections, and then by the rule of law.
What is currently happening is a kakistocratic conquest in which the vilest and most offensive are herded into power in a political pantomime that mimics elections and decent judicial review.
And then, when that is done, the beneficiaries travel the world. They are the ones who can send their wives shopping in the finest shops and malls in Europe and Asia; their families to schools in the U.S., while they buy real estate wherever they please.
The U.S. does not need to protect Christianity against anyone by force of arms, with the possibility of leaving communities eternally injured, resentful and distrustful.
If the U.S wishes to do the right thing, it is humanity, not religion, that needs protection. Let Trump show leadership in that regard by reinstating the broken international programmes, such as USAID, that he abruptly terminated this year.
Let him extend security assistance, as well as generous economic and educational opportunities, to troubled regions and nations, not merely to feed degenerate leaderships, but to nurture the growth of vibrant and hopeful ones. Let him cut off the paths to international prosperity for the villains who feast on their own people.
The truth is that Nigerians have been in tears for years, in a nation where soothsayers make far more sense, and advance further, than truth-tellers. There is tremendous violence, including against Christians, but it is the violence of many different blades cutting at many different targets.
In that sense, the deepest genocide happens in broad daylight, against the most vulnerable, perpetrated by powerful politicians and governments.
And a hundred US armies cannot win that one.
Sonala Olumhense