January 2018 Persecution Magazine

Feature Article
oning each other to leave. It appears they
distributed themselves to different houses.
When I peeped into my parent’s room, I saw
them on the floor motionless, dead.”
To add to the Ancha villagers’ trauma, the
attackers left the bodies of the people they
killed in the streets. This means that families
that returned to the village from their hiding
places were surrounded by dead friends and
family. Sometimes, however, there is no one
left in the family to return. One entire family
was killed in the attack on Ancha. They
were the last surviving members of their
direct line.
When ICC asked why the Fulani attacked,
Rev. Nanchwat stated, “We didn’t have a
quarrel [with the Fulani militants]. Some
of the herdsmen [would] relax among the
villagers, sometimes way into [the] late evening,
when the local vigilante would advise
them to go home. Of course we have had
issues from time to time with the herdsmen
letting their cattle graze into our farms and
destroy our crops. It would appear [that] the
Fulanis [launched this] attack because they
had…some provocative attitude [about] their
cattle graz[ing] on our farms.”
While some observers will use the agricultural
dispute to downplay the religious
nature of the conflict, it is important to
recognize that Fulani militants don’t attack
Muslim communities for grazing land.
Fulani herders allow their cattle to graze
on land owned by Christian farmers and
militants use violence to ensure that herders
keep the land. Militants use the justification
that Christians are infidels who are not worthy
of the land that they own.
Nkedoron Attack
The attack on Nkedoron on October 16,
2017 was just as horrific and violent as
Ancha. Fulani militants killed 29 people,
mostly women and children. The victims
were led to the local elementary school by
military personnel to hide. Unbeknownst to
‘[Islamic] Fulani militants
have increased their
attacks against defenseless
Christian farmers and they
must be held accountable
for their actions.’
them however, the military personnel fled
the scene and provided no protection during
the attack.
Rev. Andrew Okebe, the Zonal Coordinator
of Christian Association of Nigeria, Miango
District, told ICC, “The soldiers had told the
women and children to go and hide in the
primary (elementary) school class at night
while the men in the village constituted a
vigilante group and join[ed] the soldiers in
patrolling the area. Sadly, the [Fulani] militia
descended and the soldiers fled, leaving
the defenseless villagers to be massacred by
the terrorists.”
According to Rev. Okebe, these persistent
attacks have left villagers feeling like the
security agencies and personnel assigned to
protect their communities are not committed
to protecting their villages from aggressors
whom they believe to be Islamic jihadists
who want to occupy their land. These soldiers
are a part of Operation Safe Haven,
which is the government’s attempt to confront
the Fulani militant violence and reprisal
attacks in the Middle Belt. Even though
these soldiers were on the scene before the
attack, and the entire area was under curfew,
their only action was to gather all of the
women, children, and elderly into a central
20 PERSECU ION.org
JANUARY 2018
INTERNATIONAL CHRISTIAN CONCERN