Section 38 (1) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, (as amended) states as follows:

“Every person shall be entitled to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom (either alone or in community with others, and in public or in private) to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in worship, teaching, practice and observance.”

It is a Constitutional right for any Nigerian to choose any religion or any faith to practice. Any attempt to hinder this right in any manner amounts to a violation of the Constitution which is an act of treason. 

Unfortunately, a section of the country, based on misguided religious fervor and zeal, has developed the habit of murdering people of differing faith, particularly Christians. While Christians are not cowards, the doctrine of love and forgiveness in Christianity has over the years restrained them from taking the laws into their hands. Christians have relied on Government to fulfill its statutory obligation of maintaining law and order in the society. Sadly, again and again, Government has failed the nation and it has failed the Christians. 

These acts of impunity and lawless killing of Nigerians on the basis of religious intolerance must stop. Those teaching hate and intolerance must be called to order.

Below is a short catalogue of some of the terrible evils that have befallen Nigeria as a result of religious intolerance.

• 1980 in Bulumkutu, Maduguri where over 5,000 died and 60,000 were displaced.
• Maitatsine riot in Jimeta, Yola and in February 1985, about 586 died
• Pagani ward of Gombe in April 1985 claimed another 165 souls.
• The Easter procession clashes in Ilorin in March 1986
• The clashes between Christian and Muslim students of the University of Ibadan in May 1986.
• Violence in Jos in 1987 and the Kafanchan crises in Southern Kaduna – thousands of people died in Kafanchan, Kano, Zamfara and Bauchi.
• 1988 crisis in Zaria and Kaduna where 107 students of the Ahmadu Bello University were seriously injured during the election of a Christian to the leadership of the Students' Union.
• Shiite uprising in Katsina in 1991 with dozens of lives lost.
• Another clash of Christians and Muslims in Bauchi April 21, 1991 claimed 200 lives and 700 places of worship were burnt.
• Reinhard Bonnke Riot of October 1991 in which hundreds died in Kano.
• Kafanchan crises of 1992 where, at least 60 people were killed in ZangoKataf.
• Several more lives were lost in Funtua, Katsina state during the Kalakato crises of February 1992.
• November 1993 to June 9, 1998, two occurrences of religious riots again in Jos April 1994 and April 1997 where, at least, 200 houses were burnt down and several persons killed.
• During the Obasanjo administration, the Kafanchan crises erupted again in 1999 and dozens were killed.
• There was also the Borno religious riot which left several persons injured in the same year.
• Sharia Law crises in Kaduna in February and May 2000 respectively where many, again, lost their lives.
• The Jos crises also erupted again in 2001 and 2004 while similar riots were seen in Kano and Gombe in 2001.
• Miss World Beauty Pageant riot in Kaduna 2002.
• There was resurgence of the Jos crises in November 2008, January 2010 and March 2010. Hundreds of lives were lost.
• According to Governor Shettima of Borno State, Boko Haram has murdered over 100,000 Nigerians.
• Boko Haram hit Abuja with attacks on the UN buildings on August 26, 2011.
• 7th March, 2010, 501 Nigerians, mostly Christians, were murdered as they slept in DogoNahawa, Jos, Plateau State by religious insurgents.
• From 1996 to 2006, about 121 people have lost their lives in Bauchi and Gombe States alone as a result of Fulani and Farmers clashes.
• 2002 and 2004 clashes in Yelwa Sani Gorowa area of Plateau State between Farmers and Fulani Herdsmen.
• 13th July, 2014, 10 persons were killed in clashes between Farmers and Fulani herdsmen in the Pilagani Street of Langtang, North Local Government of Plateau State.
• 14th July, 2014 over 50 people were reported to have been killed in Pilagani district of Marakun Local Government Area of Zamfara State in a clash again with Fulani herdsmen.
• May 2015, over 100 people died in villages and refugees camps located in Ikura, Benue State from attacks by suspected herdsmen.
• On Christmas day 2011, a coordinated bombing of churches resulted in 41 fatalities.
• January 23rd 2012 another three churches were attacked on the same date in Kaduna State.
• The orgy of death and destruction has reached every part of Nigeria, notably Nimbo in Enugu State, Aba, Port Harcourt, Onitsha and more recently in Ile – Ife, in Osun State, to mention but a few.

According to a research report by Anne Mulder, as of 2014, over 13,000 Christian Churches have been destroyed and abandoned in the northern parts of the country. This is in addition to hundreds of Christian communities that have been destroyed and sacked by the combination of Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen.

On 4th February, 2017, the US Congress officially declared that Nigeria is the most dangerous country on earth for anyone to be a Christian. Meanwhile, we have a Constitution that guarantees freedom of religious conviction. 

Why has the Government failed to defend the Constitution?

For us, as Christians, the deplorable state of insecurity in the nation is no longer acceptable. It does not matter whether it is a Sunni Muslim, Shiite Muslim, Traditionalist, Atheist, or Christian that is killed. Every life is sacred. Every life is supposed to be protected under the Constitution. No one has the right to terminate the life of another human being with impunity. 

Nigeria is a Sovereign state on the basis of its Constitution and not on the basis of any religion. Therefore, no one has the right to murder any citizen of Nigeria on the basis of differing religious belief.

In addition to our concern for the sanctity of life, we detect a grand plan to eradicate Christianity in Nigeria and compel people to adopt a religion that is not of their choice. We are Christians by choice and no one has the right to compel us to worship another god. This attitude of hate must stop and the perpetrators and the sponsors of religious insurgency must be prosecuted. None of them should go scot free.

While the Jihadists have conventional weapons to kill and destroy, Christians have two weapons that evil cannot overcome:

Truth and Exposure. This is why every Christian assembly must come out on 19th March, 2017 and stand in front of its place of worship and speak the Trust to expose the evils going on in Nigeria.

These killings and destructions must STOP. A land flowing with milk and honey shall not become a barren wasteland flowing with human blood and tears.

IT IS TIME TO SPEAK OUT.

Rev. Dr. Musa Asake, General Secretary
Christian Association of Nigeria,Abuja 

http://www.canng.org 

Let’s join with our Nigerian and African brethren to pray for the end of such horrendous attacks against believers and for the government of Nigeria to follow the constitution and protect them. Pray for believers to be encouraged and strengthened in the midst of such awful trials.

Pray also for the persecutors to turn to Jesus Christ, as that early persecutor of the early church, Saul of Tarsus, did after seeing the blinding light that struck him to the ground and made him probably the greatest apostle the world has ever known.

Excerpted from Free Burma Rangers about their recent ministry trip to Syria

13 June 2018

Afrin, Syria

A Burma medic, Joseph, treats Yezidi IDPs from Afrin.

Background

Syria is in its seventh year of civil war; 500,000 people have been killed and over 11 million displaced (over six million people internally and over five million refugees have fled the country). And the fighting escalates: Assad’s regime continues to pound rebel-held areas outside of Damascus, Idlib, and other resistance-held areas. The Russians, who are supporting the Assad regime and who had stationed troops in Afrin to block ISIS as well as Turkish ambitions, suddenly abandoned Afrin at the end of 2017.

In January 2018, the Turkish Army, along with elements of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), who in this area are composed of radical Muslim groups and some remnants of ISIS, launched an air and ground campaign from Turkey against the city and area of Afrin, one of the only peaceful areas of Syria. The Kurds had kept ISIS at bay all through the war and Afrin, which historically was 80% Kurdish with an ancient Christian and Yezidi population, had become a refuge for thousands of fleeing Kurds and Arabs of different groups and faiths. Turkey is now presiding over an ethnic cleansing of massive proportions in Afrin.

The Turkish government has led this onslaught in order to crush the YPG Kurds and block their access to the Mediterranean Sea. They consider the Kurds a threat to Turkish security and have no regard for the Christians or Yezidis there. The Turkish government also supports the FSA against the Syrian government and Afrin has become a base for the FSA. A new reign of terror has descended over Afrin.Joint Turkish and FSA attacks have swept over 200,000 Kurds, as well as 35,000 Yezidi and 3,000 Christians from their villages and towns. Their homes have been appropriated by thousands of radical Islamists brought from southern and western Syria, who have also been pushed out of their homes by Assad’s Syrian Army. The original Muslim inhabitants who did not submit themselves to Sharia law and the FSA have also had to flee. Based on interviews, the only church in Afrin city has been looted, burned inside, and then taken over by two militia factions.

Photo: FSA militants on their position north of Menbij

Christians Who Fled Afrin

In Kobane and at a new Christian church of 20 believers, we met with two Christian families who fled Afrin when the FSA and Turkish Army invaded. After the worship service, we talked with the Christians from Afrin, a mother and her 18-year-old son, Baran, her son-in-law, and her pregnant daughter.

They had fled Afrin as the FSA and Turks assaulted the town and region, barely getting out with their lives. The mother told us that there were over 3,000 Christians who used to live in Afrin but now almost all had fled. She only knew of two people who remained: her husband who was too sick to make the walk out and another man who was wounded during attacks.

The Christian mother and her son, Baran, tell their story of fleeing Afrin.While holding back tears she said, “I am a Christian. My husband was too sick to walk out and escape [with us] and he is in hiding in Afrin now. I only have my son and daughter left with me and nothing else in the world. Can you help us? Thank you for coming to see us and for the help you have given. We pray with you for God’s answer and we trust Him.

The FSA and Turks had pushed into Afrin in a brutal series of infantry and armor attacks supported by artillery, helicopter gunships, and jet fighters. Hundreds of civilians were killed and homes destroyed. Many of the Kurd YPG forces were killed and the rest were forced to retreat. The FSA and Turks closed in, killing and looting. People tried to flee.

“Our worst fears were confirmed when Sharia law was installed, homes looted, and people who resisted killed. We Christians fled and most of the 35,000 Yezidi fled as well, fearing a similar annihilation that had occurred in Sinjar, Iraq,” continued the mother.

She went on to share how one woman was captured by the FSA, raped, and then murdered, a video being sent to the woman’s husband.

“My niece, a small child was killed as well,” she shared. “Her name was Riven KhandofanHamdoush and she was killed near us in the village of Kafarganeh. The village is located on the edge of the city of Afrin. On 27 April 2018, when the child was playing in the street, she was shot dead when the Islamic factions were quarreling with each other on the property. Here is her picture.”

The niece, Riven KhandofanHamdoush, shot dead by FSA militants.

“We are very sad and feel hopeless but keep close to Jesus and put our hope in Him. I used to be a Muslim myself but four years ago I got tired of it and asked Jesus to help me. Most of my family are still Muslim but that has not spared them from attack. My niece who was killed was Muslim with Muslim parents,” she said.

Her son, Baran, told us:

“I became a Christian recently when Jesus appeared to me in a dream. In Afrin I worked at a computer shop until the FSA and Turks invaded. It became impossible to stay as airstrikes and artillery hit us. Then the Turkish infantry joined the FSA and, supported by tanks, they destroyed anyone in their path as they advanced. We had to flee and we barely got out, going on foot day and night. I thank the Lord Jesus for helping us to meet with you and sharing our prayers with each other. When we see you, we feel we are humans standing together. I would like to tell you frankly that my mother and I would like to get out of here but there are obstacles that stand in the way. May the Lord take care of you, and that when you shall die it will be with a thousand good things.”

The Church of the Good Shepherd in Afrin

Photo: The church destroyed by an ISIS car bomb.

Baran went on to tell us about a church in Afrin:“The Church of the Good Shepherd was taken over by the FSA and the Turkish Army. The armed factions of the Turkish occupation fought with each other for control and confiscation of the church. The fighting that took place between the two factions of ‘Sultan Murad’ and the ‘Army of the East’ ended with a settlement between the two parties about sharing the church building and surrounding buildings as well as its assets.

They burned the inside of the church and wrote the names of their factions on the outside walls. Before the FSA and Turks arrived, more than 250 Christian families were still in the center of the city of Afrin and [surrounding] villages. Before Afrin was overrun, the priest of the church, Rev. Valentin Hanan, issued a statement of distress to the international community after the start of the Turkish attack on Afrin. He asked for the urgent international protection of the believers in Afrin and the cessation of Turkish bombardment. He said, ‘We are at this moment subjected to heavy shelling and Islamic factions vow to enter the region and we as a church ask the Lord first protection and then the brothers to pray and help.’

Of the estimated 3,000 Christians in the Afrin area, Rev. Hanan said there were 190 families in the city center of Afrin, 45 families in the area ofGendressa, and 15 families in the area of Maabtli. Now that the invasion is complete there are almost no Christians left at all.”

Praying in the church damaged by ISIS that now hosts Yezidis who fled Afrin.

For the rest of this moving report, go to FreeBurmaRangers.org and look for the post: “Syria Report, Part One: Ethnic Cleansing and the Persecution of Yezidis and Christians in Afrin, Northwestern Syria”.

Pray for the Syrian Christians and other innocent civilians to be protected and strengthened in the midst of unimaginable hardship and trial.

Pray that their persecutors and the governments involved in this horrific, ongoing conflict will repent and stop the carnage.

Pray especially for the Assad regime, Turkey, and the Russians in this regard and for a way to be found for the re-establishment of peace and the rebuilding of this ruined country.