AFRICA/NIGERIA – Bishop of Sokoto: “Every day there are massacres in Nigeria: How can such a country move forward?”

Abuja – “There is no other country where 10 people are killed on Monday, 50 on Tuesday, 100 on Wednesday, and it continues every week. How can such a country move forward?” asked Msgr. Matthew Hassan Kukah, Bishop of Sokoto. “What is happening in Nigeria cannot happen in Sudan, Cameroon, Niger, Ghana or any other country in the world,” he added, speaking in Yola, the capital of Nigeria’s Adamawa State, at the presentation of Governor Ahmadu Fintiri’s biography.
The Bishop of Sokoto also criticized what he sees as the growing tendency to categorize murders and massacres according to religious criteria, warning that such narratives increase mistrust and widen the divides between communities.
Msgr. Kukah was particularly critical of the way Western media describe the massacres in his country: “Only in Nigeria do people die as Christians and Muslims. The Western media is fuelling the killings along religious lines – 20 Christians killed, 30 Muslims killed.”
According to Msgr. Kukah, the problem must be addressed at the political and institutional level, with the involvement of religious and community leaders, emphasizing that peace cannot be achieved without collective responsibility. He specifically called on political and religious leaders to work to strengthen institutions so that they can guarantee security, justice, and national unity. Msgr. Kukah concluded by warning that a country riddled with everyday violence and growing divisions risks losing its moral and institutional orientation if its leaders do not choose unity over sectarianism.

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