Last January, we wrote a factual article in this pages, in part to counter fanatical Christians who are writing racist lies saying that Muslims were to blame for killing Christians. But many of these bigots did not want to hear the truth, and wrote further lies to discredit the author. Here is the original article so you can judge for yourself, and the official reply from the Australian High Commission.
Who is to blame for Nigeria’s atrocities?
Every now and again we are reminded of the continuing Christian/Muslim conflicts in the Sudan, in Nigeria, and in the Middle East. Most recently blood was shed in Jos, Nigeria, an area close by a seminary for training pastors I have supported.
Most reports of these violent conflicts have blamed the jihadists. The anti-Muslim groups in Australia always describe atrocities in such a manner. But reliable eyewitnesses are now saying that as people lost loved ones and began to retaliate, mistrust widened between the Christian and Muslim communities. Many Christian young people have taken up their machetes to gain revenge.
The majority of people in Jos, Muslim and Christian alike, live in peace and want to continue to live that way. In some areas of Nigeria the two religious groups have co-existed for decades. But the Government media is largely Muslim and their reports are often suspect. At least Christians make that complaint.
The fact is that both churches and mosques had been burned in the conflicts and young men on both sides have been murdered. Sometimes areas are reported as “Muslim” areas, but that is only because all Christians have been driven out. This is the same in the West Bank of Israel where Palestinian Christians have been driven out by Israeli settlers and the areas designated as “Jewish”. During the “Troubles” in Ireland both Catholic and Protestant Christians were involved in killing each other.
Last Sunday a Catholic Church was attacked and burned at a time when attackers could expect worshipers to be gathered. A Church of Christ in Northern Nigeria church was also burned that day. It would not be unlikely that other church burnings and retaliatory mosque burnings occurred during that time.
After Sunday’s violence, many parts of Jos experienced calm on Monday morning, with Muslims and Christians talking with each other like normal in some markets. Nevertheless, killings were occurring, and automatic weapons fire was being heard.
Violence reportedly increased on Tuesday, as word spread about the real numbers killed on Sunday. A seminarian from an evangelical seminary in Jos had been en route to his theological field assignment when Muslim rioters caught him and beat him to death; his body was brought in to the hospital while a group of seminarians was waiting for treatment.
Craig S. Keener, Professor of New Testament at Eastern University’s Palmer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania USA, says we must try to understand the sudden violence experienced by our brothers and sisters in the Middle Belt of Nigeria and to avoid the simplistic blame game. In time of conflict, the first thing to suffer is truth.
Nigerians have a lot to learn from their brothers, the Imam and the Pastor. At a time when many in the world are wondering whether friendly relations are possible between those of Muslim and Christian background, Imam Muhammad Ashafa and Pastor James Wuye are living proof that they are.
In the 1990s, the two men led opposing, armed militias, dedicated to defending their respective communities. In pitched battles, Pastor James lost his hand and Imam Ashafa’s spiritual mentor and two close relatives were killed. Now the two men are co-directors of the Muslim-Christian Interfaith Mediation Centre in their city of Kaduna, Northern Nigeria, leading task-forces to resolve conflicts across the country.
The Australian High Commission in Nigeria replied that Christians were responsible for events leading up to it:
“Unfortunately, the violence in Jos is not restricted to this one incident but is instead a cycle of conflict – thought to have started in 2001 – that has its roots in ethnicity, poverty, rights to land and politics. This recent outbreak of violence appears to have been a reprisal attack by Fulani herdsmen/militia against a village of the ethnic group of Berom, in response to an equally violent and deplorable attack by Berom (Christian) villagers against Muslim-Hausa-Fulani villages in January 2010. Regrettably, on that occasion in January, there were similarly disturbing photographs of Muslim women and children who have been killed by Christians”. (Source: National Alliance of Christian Leaders).
Our article stands confirmed as accurate.
Rev the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes AC MLC