A disturbing investigation claims that governments in Nigeria are enabling Fulani jihadists to seize Christian farmland and murder its inhabitants.
Reports of Fulani jihadist persecution of Christians in Nigeria—especially in the Middle Belt—have circulated for years. But an investigation by Catholic criminologist Emeka Umeagbalasi, Director of the Catholic-inspired NGO <em>International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law</em> (Intersociety), suggests the situation is worse than previously believed.
According to the report, the project is allegedly backed by federal funds and suspected external jihadist financing. It employs various deceptive tactics—disguised ranching schemes (RUGA), land procurement, and state-led land ceding programmes—to target communal lands, often obtained through coercion and inducements offered to local leaders.
“Fulani Jihadism Conquest Project in Igbo Land and the entire Five South-East States is openly and undeniably coordinated by the Federal Government holding brief for jihadist Fulani herdsmen and their patrons,” the report states.
“The project is also heavily funded using federal public funds and suspected external funds believed to have allegedly come from a ‘World Jihad Fund’, said to be channelled into Nigeria through the Islamic Development Bank,” it continues.
The report condemns the government’s role in enabling land acquisition for jihadist Fulani herdsmen in the South East, noting that the region lacks sufficient land even for its own growing population.
The total landmass of the South East (29,525 square kilometres) is dwarfed by that of Niger State alone (76,363 square kilometres), which could reportedly accommodate all of Nigeria’s Fulani cattle.
Yet the initiative continues. In Enugu State, a large farm settlement in Elugwu-Achi, on the Oji River, is allegedly being cleared and fenced by the state government for a covert federal cattle ranch, despite early community resistance. Likewise, a vast stretch of communal land between Aguata and Orumba in Anambra is suspected to have been ceded.
The investigation claims that South-East governors are trapped by conditions orchestrated by the “Caliphate”: namely, being installed through rigged elections and militarised processes, and retaining power via manipulated election tribunals and courts.
“That was how Governor Alex Otti of Abia State got trapped and allegedly forced into compliance after having won the poll on the field. He was said to have nearly been removed by electoral courts using legal technicalities,” Umeagbalasi told <em>Crux</em>.
“The South East is already saturated by the jihadists,” he added. “The Islamisation of the South East is no longer a false narrative—it is now real.”
He warned that Anambra could follow the same trajectory as Benue State after its governor, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, declared Anambra a Fulani RUGA or ranching state.
“You know the implications. Some years ago, the people of Benue were begged to let the Fulanis settle—just to rear cattle, nothing more. But look at what is happening in that state now,” Umeagbalasi told <em>Crux</em>.
He cited the latest massacre of Christians to underline the danger. On 13–14 June, Fulani jihadist herdsmen stormed Yelwata, Benue State, during the night, killing more than 220 people—most of them Christians.
“So those people are not ones you allow to settle anywhere in your community,” he said.
“I don’t know why the governor of Anambra—a Christian state—has invited the Fulanis to settle and begin attacking Christians now or in the future, just as they turned against Christians in Benue,” he added.
He expressed concern that the entire machinery of government was complicit in the conquest of South-East land by Fulani herdsmen.
“The Federal Government is funding the national Fulani ranching or RUGA programme. It has also coerced Anambra State into joining. Anambra, in turn, has pressured some communities into ceding communal lands, which will then be transferred to the Federal Government and ultimately handed to Fulani jihadists,” Umeagbalasi told <em>Crux</em>.
He also pointed to private ranching as a tool of Islamisation.
“There is the example of Alhaji Sali Friday Nnamane. He was a Christian a few years ago but was taken to Zamfara in the North, where he was Islamised and equipped with multi-billion naira business ventures. He returned to Enugu with that wealth and is now converting locals to Islam on a large scale,” he said.
“Right now, the South East is sitting on a keg of gunpowder,” Umeagbalasi concluded, accusing federal and state authorities—as well as security forces—of complicity in the Islamisation agenda.
(Photo credit should read LUIS TATO/AFP via Getty Images)
<a href="https://www.gettyimages.es/license/492466941?adppopup=true"></a><a href="https://www.gettyimages.es/license/1125421344?adppopup=true"></a>
