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VI. Deadly Post-Election Violence in Kaduna State in 2011
Despite the paucity of prosecutions, Kaduna State remained relatively calm from 2002 until 2011,
when presidential elections between Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian from southern Nigeria, and
Muhammadu Buhari, a Muslim northerner, largely divided the country along ethnic and religious
lines. The April 16, 2011 presidential election was a significant improvement over the two previous
national elections, and many heralded it as perhaps Nigeria’s freest and fairest. Still, campaign
violence, allegations of vote rigging, and inflation of results—particularly in the rural areas of
southeastern Nigeria, Jonathan’s stronghold—marred the election. Buhari, who contested the
election on the ticket of the opposition Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), swept the northern
states, while Jonathan, the candidate for the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP), won an
overwhelming majority in most of central and southern Nigeria. 320
As election results began to trickle in on April 17, and it became clear that Buhari was set to lose,
opposition leaders alleged that the vote had been rigged. Buhari’s supporters took to the streets
in towns and cities across the north to protest what they alleged to be a stolen election. The
protests soon turned violent. The rioters, nearly all Hausa-Fulani Muslims, attacked the property of
prominent ruling party stalwarts in the north—most of whom were also Hausa-Fulani Muslims—
and northern traditional leaders seen as having backed the PDP. Rioters also torched police
stations and offices of the electoral commission.
The rioting quickly took on a deadly sectarian and ethnic dimension. Mobs of CPC supporters
attacked Christians and members of ethnic groups from southern Nigeria, burning and looting
their homes, businesses, and churches. As one Christian leader put it, “It was politically
motivated violence, but religiously executed.” 321 The damages suffered by Christians were
widespread and catastrophic. The Christian Association of Nigeria, the umbrella organization
representing the majority of Christian denominations in Nigeria, estimated that at least 170
Christians were killed in northern Nigeria, while more than 350 churches and hundreds of homes
and businesses were burned or destroyed. 322 A panel of investigation, set up by the federal
320 See, for example, “Q&A: Nigeria elections,” BBC Online News, April 22, 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12941582.
321 Human Rights Watch interview with Yunusa Nmadu, Kaduna State CAN secretary, Kaduna, November 14, 2011.
322 Human Rights Watch interviews with Sunday Oibe, CAN northern states, public relations officer, Kaduna, April 2011.
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