The presidency has proposed a meeting between President Bola Tinubu and his United States counterpart, Donald Trump, to discuss allegations of Christian genocide in Nigeria.
Spokesman for the president on policy communication, Mr Daniel Bwala, disclosed this in a post on his X handle.
The proposed meeting came in the wake of Trump’s description of Nigeria as a “disgraced country” and designating it as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’ (CPC) for alleged Christian killing.
“Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria. Thousands of Christians are being killed. Radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter. I am hereby making Nigeria a ‘COUNTRY OF PARTICULAR CONCERN’ — but that is the least of it. When Christians, or any such group, are slaughtered, like is happening in Nigeria (3,100 versus 4,476 worldwide), something must be done!” Trump wrote Last Friday.
On Saturday Trump said he had asked the Defense Department to prepare for possible “fast” military action in Nigeria if the country fails to crack down on the killing of Christians.
“If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, “guns-a-blazing,” to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities. I am hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action.
“I am hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet…” Trump stated.
Reacting, Bwala played down the threat, saying the American and Nigerian presidents have shared interests in the fight against insurgency and all forms of terrorism against humanity.
He said both leaders could either meet at the State House or the White House to have an elaborate discussion on whether attacks by terrorists and other criminal elements in Nigeria were targeted at Christians only.
“Both President @officialABAT and President @realDonaldTrump have shared interest in the fight against insurgency and all forms of terrorism against humanity.
“President Trump has assisted Nigeria a lot by authorising the sale of arms to Nigeria and President Tinubu has adequately utilised the opportunity in the fight against terrorism for which we have massive results to show for it.
“As for the differences as to whether terrorists in Nigeria target only Christians or in fact all faiths and no faiths, the differences, if they exist, would be discussed and resolved by the two leaders when they meet in the coming days, either in the State House or White House,” Bwala wrote.
Meanwhile, many Nigerians as well as organisations have expressed diverse views about the US stand on Nigeria.
For the former minister of foreign affairs, Mr Sule Lamido, the repercussions of such action being contemplated by Trump are too grave to be imagined.
He urged Tinubu to convene a meeting of Nigerian past leaders to fully discuss the matter while also calling on all Nigerian leaders to set aside whatever personal differences with the president and come up with pragmatic ways of averting the looming danger.
He advocated a “quiet diplomacy” led by former presidents and heads of state without the prying eyes of the media, to resolve whatever the concern of the United States is.
For former presidential candidate of the National Conscience Party (NCP), Mr Martin Onovo, there is the need for the federal government to deploy full national capacity to end insecurity in the country.
He said decisive action and coordinated efforts are critical to restoring lasting peace across affected parts of the country.
Onovo who is the head of policy positions at the Movement for Fundamental Change also said that the government should focus on comprehensive security response rather than prolonged debates over the characterisation of the violence.
“There should be political will to crush the insurgency. The facts are clear that ordinary Nigerians die of terrorist attacks, let us forget about creed or religion. Why should there be killings at all?
“There should not be killings. We cannot deny that the terrorists kill Muslims also. Why should anybody be killed?
“The government should act against the insurgents with full national capacity. Everything is not military,” NAN quoted Onovo to have said.
Also reacting to the planned attack by the US, the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) said in a statement that God used the US president to expose further the mass killing of Christians in Benue, Plateau, Taraba, Borno, Southern Kaduna and other parts of Nigeria.
“Christian communities have been targeted in unabated mass killings in Benue, Plateau, Taraba, Borno, Southern Kaduna and other parts of Nigeria.
“The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has put out the statistics online that all of us are aware.
“As the Lord has stirred up President Trump to blow the trumpet on this evil, we join all peace loving and right thinking Nigerians to call on the federal government to put an end to this genocide.
‘’Romans 12:19 NLT says ‘Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, ‘I will take revenge; I will pay them back,’ says the Lord. God will determine how to avenge us in this matter based on scripture,” spokesman for the organisation, Dr Sylvanus Ukafia, wrote in the statement.
In its reaction, the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, CISLAC, said Trump’s declaration of Nigeria as a country of particular concern was due to Tinubu’s failure to appoint ambassadors who would have informed the world on the true state of affairs in Nigeria.
The executive director, CISLAC, Mr Auwal Rafsanjani, said: “The absence of having ambassadors and high commissioners has created this condition for people to also go and do things without actually government coming up with an authentic and genuine response, because ambassadors would have organised a session to brief, for example, the State Department, even the presidents of other countries about the true situation in Nigeria.
“Some people have felt that they have not been protected against people that carry arms against them, therefore, they felt there’s no justice, and because so many commission of enquiry have been set up in terms of this killings with the violence against Nigerians.
“There was a congressional hearing in the U.S., where some people alleged that they are being targeted. The Nigerian government was not even in that congressional hearing. The Nigerian Embassy was not there. Therefore, the U.S. Congress believes people have been killed.”
Also speaking on the issue, the director, programmes at Yiaga Africa, Ms Cynthia Mbamalu, said: “As a Nigerian, I wouldn’t even focus on this declaration, but rather on the fact that the government has consistently failed to address a growing pattern of citizens’ lives being lost.
“We have had increasingly lots of Nigerians who are killed and murdered, some in their sleep, and there’s been a pattern of people within different parts of the country, and every day these lives are lost, and there’s been nothing to address that.
“So, I wouldn’t call it a religious genocide or a Christian genocide. I would say it’s just a disregard for human life and dignity, and we do not need the U.S. to make a declaration for us to call a state of emergency on the lack of dignity to human life in Nigeria.
“Thousands of Nigerians are killed, and whether we like it or not, there is a pattern to genocide. It may not be religious per se or ethnic, but it is a genocide because a category of people within a space, a category of people have been subjected to constant fear, and we have people losing their lives.
“I know that in Nigeria, we are used to pushing things under the carpet or pretending like we are not in a bad situation that the average Nigerian cannot guarantee or speak confidently about the safety of their lives.’’
Meanwhile, the ministry of foreign affairs has denied Trump’s claims of mass killings of Christians.
Spokesman for the ministry, Mr Kimiebi Ebienfa, in an interview with Al Jazeera said Nigeria is not proud of the security situation it is going through but to go with the narrative that “only Christians are targeted is not true.”
“There is no Christian genocide in Nigeria. We’ve continuously made our point clear that we acknowledge the fact that there are killings that have taken place in Nigeria, but those killings were not restricted to Christians alone. Muslims are being killed. Traditional worshippers are being killed… The majority is not the Christian population,” he said.
Ebienfa further said Nigeria was ready to work with its partners to “fight this scourge of terrorism, but not any passive action that will undermine the sovereignty of our country”.
He also vehemently denied that the Nigerian government has allowed the killings to take place.
“The killings are not sanctioned by the Nigerian government. The killing of any Nigerian in any part of the country is a loss to the country … The perpetrators of these killings are terrorist groups Boko Haram and other al-Qaeda and (ISIL) ISIS-affiliated groups that are perpetuating this crisis,” he said.
