Exclusive: Persecution Of Christians And Traditional Worshippers Rages In South-East Nigeria: 20,500 Religiously Killed Since 2015

InterSociety Special Report
Report Statistics: 34 Pages And 16, 249 Words

Onitsha, Eastern Nigeria, Thur., April 3, 2025: Persecution Of Christians And Traditional WorshippersSweeping The South-East

Fulani Nomadic Jihadism And Attacks On Traditional Worshippers And Freedom Of Religion Enveloping Nigeria’s South-East: Enugu, Anambra, Imo And Ebonyi GovsIndicted For Complicity And Complacency In Religious Violence And Attacks On International Freedom OfReligion Or Belief; Risk Visa Ban And International Isolation Campaigns

…over 40 traditional worshippers languishing untried in illegal detention in Anambra for over 60 days

…silence and refusal to act aided over 20,300 Igbo-Christian deaths since 2015 in Nigeria’s South-East

…international moves to return Nigeria to the “Country-of-Particular Concern” legitimate and overdue

…long overdue for Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen in Nigeria to be listed by the United States as “Entity-of-Particular Concern” or International Jihadist Terror Group

Executive Summary:
Why The Indictment And Planned Visa Ban Campaigns:
The International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (InterSociety); Nigeria’s leading research and investigative advocacy voice in good and inclusive governance, human rights and rule of law, citizens and public security and safety and international religious freedom or belief since 2010, has indicted four serving Governors in the South-East of Nigeria: Peter Mbah of Enugu, Charles Soludo of Anambra State, Francis Nwaifuru of Ebonyi State and Hope Uzodinma of Imo State other than Gov Alex Otti of Abia State who is temporarily exempted.

The four Govs are widely accused and fingered to have been conspiring with the Nigerian Government and external others in threatening and undermining present and future territorial, citizen and property security and safety of their States and defenseless citizens following “silence of the graveyard” or conspiracy of silence and inaction maintained by theirGovernments in regard to increasing secret and unchecked jihadist Fulani Herdsmen attacks in various communities across their States over the years particularly since 2015/16; with a spike since 2020/21, to the extent that today, their States are saturated by jihadist activities of Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in many of their 78 Local Government Areas put together; widely and strongly believed to be facing threats of attack or undergoing secret attacks targeted at defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of their States hinterlands.

The Totality of the above has endangered lives and properties and threatened their defenseless peoples’ fundamental human rights to ethnic and religious identities including rights to be born, develop and live in secured and protected environment; in addition to marking their present Governments out as those promoting religious violence and attacks on international freedom of religion or worship or belief, contrary to Sections 38 and 10 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and globalized international human rights on freedom of religion or worship.

It must also be pointed out that many jihadist activities of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in Igbo Land States of Anambra, Enugu, Imo and Ebonyi under their gubernatorial watch are either rarely reported or covered andsuppressed or censored under the watch. Several reports also abound exposing indiscriminate third-party land purchases for the Jihadists across the South-East by delegated persons or State/Federal Government remotely linked middle persons including top Government officials or appointees or others close to their governments. The indictment of the four Governors is inclusive of the past and serving “Homeland Security Commissioners” and “Special Advisers on Security” or those in charge of “Community Security, Vigilante and Border Conflict Resolution Matters”; appointed since assumption of office by the four indicted Govs. It is also very important to clarify that our soon-to-be organized visa ban and international isolation campaigns against the four indicted Govs will be extended to members of their nuclear families (wives, children and wards).

Photo Of Assembled Jihadists Massacring Tens Of Thousands Of Nigerian Christians And Burning Down Churches

Consequently, the InterSociety, will soon reach out to her international partners for visa ban and international isolation campaigns against the four indicted Govs, targeting to have them banned from traveling to Democratic and Religious Freedom Respecter Countries of the United Kingdom, the United States, the European Union and Canada and their allies particularly those compliant to the dictates of democracy, rule of law and religious freedom. We also make bold to say that those who aid, abet, promote, fund and perpetrate international religious freedom abuses and violations in Nigeria or any part thereof must no longer be allowed any breathing space no matter their pretenses and camouflages. It was also our investigative finding that violators of religious freedom in Nigeria are no longer restricted to armed and unarmed radical Islamists domiciled in the quarters of state and nonstate actors including their aiders, sponsors and instigators. Found to be complicit, aiders and abettors of the raging “Nigerian Christian Genocide” and allied egregious attacks on lives and properties of the country’s defenseless Christians and defenseless members of the religious minorities including members of the Traditional African Religions and the Organization of the African Instituted Churches are many Christian leaders and Christian politicians including political office holders bearing Christian names.

There have been several reports indicting and linking the four serving Govs of Enugu, Anambra, Ebonyi and Imo States to brutal attacks and suppression of “the Fundamental Human Rights” of the citizens to practice African Traditional Medicines (progenitors of modern medicines and practices) and African Traditional Religions (progenitors and forefathers of Christianity in Igbo Land). It is also very important to inform that the four indicted Govs as “Chief Security, Executive and Finance Officers” of their States-with more than 66 constitutional powers and duties outlined in the Concurrent Legislative List and other provisions of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution, are found to have substantially failed to ensure security and safety of their territories and those of their own people and their properties; particularly by failing to have them secured from the hands of state actor and conspiratorial others’ clandestinely protected Islamic Jihadists using cattle rearing and ranching (Nomadic Jihadism) and other disguises as a pretext.

These, the four indicted Govs are found to have done by way of inaction, complicity and silence of the graveyard and rapacious incompetence; thereby putting their own people and their properties at high risk of insecurity and unsafety including wanton and indiscriminate destruction of their lives and properties.

Under the watch of the four indicted South-East Govs, egregious religious violence and attacks on defenseless citizens of their respective States and their moveable and immoveable properties have ballooned and risen to an apogee since 2015; worsened by their inaction and gross incompetence in the management of crossover Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others’ attacks from neighboring States including Kogi, Benue, Nasarawa, Edo, Delta, Cross River, Rivers and Akwa Ibom.

The Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen attacks on Christians and their properties in the past decade or since 2015 in Benue State; a South-East close door neighbor, including wanton loss of lives, dwelling houses, churches and farmlands, for instance, have uprooted almost half of the State’s Christian population of estimated 6m and generated over 3m Christians and forced them the internally displaced persons (IDPs) camps and sacked over 200 of their communities and villages, with tens of hectares of indigenous Christian lands across the State seized or annexed.

Over 40 Detained Traditional Worshippers In Anambra Have No Case To Answer In Law: Gov Charles Soludo and his Government having failed a litmus test of being a responsible, human rights and freedom of religion or worship respecter Government, has lost legal and moral grounds to continue to detain without investigation, charge and trial of the over 40 detained traditional worshippers held illegally in an illegal detention facility (State Militias’ Lion House at Awka) for more than 60 days.

The above clearly exceeded the constitutionally prescribed 24-48hrs or maximum of 60 days if arrested by police or secret service and detained in any of their custodies for offenses bordering on capital punishments; especially when such detention is for purpose of continuation and conclusion of criminal investigations; more so when Governors in Nigeria including Gov Charles Soludo of Anambra State are constitutionally and statutorily barred from detaining citizens in their militias’ custodies through “Remand Orders” or “Holden Charge”.

Following the failure of Gov Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State to ensure due process and rule of law in the instant case; and having controversially labeled, lampooned, ridiculed, humiliated and degraded them by publicly portraying them as those involved in “fetish and demonic religious practices and violent crimes”; in addition to exposing them to public ridicule and danger, the over 40 arrested and detained native doctors who have been illegally detained without investigation and charge or court trial for over 60 days have no case to answer as it stands and in the eyes of extant criminal laws and their procedures governed by Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution.

In other words, Messrs. Chigozie Nwangwu (“AKWA OKUKO TIWARA AKI), Abuchi Ikechukwu Okafor, Chijindu Nwaeze, Onyeka Onyeji (Vice President of the Umuoji Improvement Union), “Onyeze Jesus”, Ekene Igboekweze (“Eke-Hit”), “Mmili Enwe Iro” and over 34 others must be released unconditionally and freed, having been placed under unlawful custody using hearsay conclusions and false labeling: sobriquet “Trial-by-Ordeal”. Their lawyers and family members should take the advocacy notice of the above by rising to the occasion. Gov Charles Soludo had also on March 8, 2025, banned open gospel preaching in the State and imposed arrest and fine of N500,000 on those engaging in it. The Gov made the ban during his recent visit to Ochanja Market in Onitsha. This above is also nothing short of a clear manifestation of the dictatorial and tyrannical State Detention of Persons Decree 2 of 1984 of Nigerian military’s inglorious epoch.

Add Nigeria And Fulani Jihadists In “CPC” And “TerrorGroup” Lists In USA: The International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law is adding her international advocacy voice by urging the Donald Trump Government of the United States of America to ensure that Nigeria is returned to the list of “Countries-of-Particular-Concern” for egregious abuse and violation of ‘International Religious Freedom’. The InterSociety also strongly calls for inclusion of “Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen” and “Jihadist Fulani Bandits” in the international list of “Entities-of-Particular-Concern”. The InterSociety is in total agreement with the United States Commission on Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and its 2025 annual report in which sixteen countries including Nigeria were recommended for designation as Countries of Particular Concern (CPC). We are also in strong solidarity and agreement with the respected group’s calls for the U.S. to continue to stand firm against threats to freedom of religion worldwide. According to the Vatican News of March 25, 2025, culled from the Reuters, the Commission is a bipartisan federal entity established by the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) of 1998 that makes foreign policy recommendations to the U.S. Government and Congress intended to deter religious persecution and advance freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) internationally. Its recommendations help the U.S. State Department draw up its annual list of governments and non-state actors that engage in, or tolerate “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations” of religious freedom.

We respectfully disagree with USCIRF on the ground that in its list of seven terror entities recommended to be designated as “Entities-of-Particular-Concern”, two of Nigeria’s most atrocious religious terror entities: Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and Jihadist Fulani Bandits and their patron bodies, are omitted or excluded. This is despite the two deadly religious terror groups accounting for over 75% of abductions, disappearances, captivity and open killings and wanton destruction of properties including churches and Christian schools, dwelling houses and farmlands. The above is in addition to the fact that “more than 145 Catholic priests and hundreds of other Christian leaders have been abducted since 2015 and not less than 12 Catholic priests abducted in the first three months of 2025 alone. We therefore urge the Donald Trump Government of the United States and the USCIRF to ensure that Nigeria is returned to the list of “CPC” and Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and Jihadist Fulani Bandits and their patrons enlisted as “Entities-and-their Patrons-of-Particular-Concern” with commensurate international sanctions to deter others and ensure respect for international religious freedom.

Photos Of Eha-Amufu Women Protesting Against Attacks, Rape, Abductions And Killings By Jihadist Herdsmen In Enugu State In March 2025

Nigeria’s Jihadists, Military Religiously Killed 20,300 In South-East Since 2015: The combined jihadist forces of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen, the Niger Delta Jihadist Militants, the Jihadist Fulani Bandits, the Fulani Muslim Killer Vigilantes and the 2017 assembled foreign Islamic Jihadists,waivered into Nigeria or any part thereof particularly in the South-East during the former Central Government of Retired Major Gen Muhammadu Buhari, have since June 2015 accounted for approximately 9,800 jihad-related deaths involving unarmed, defenseless and vulnerable Trado-Judeo-Christians of the South-East extraction and residency. The surge and widespread in the killings followed the emergence of Retired Major Gen Muhammad Buhari (Fulani-MACBAN Life Patron) on May 29, 2015, as Nigeria’s fifth civilian president after Shehu Shagari, Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan.

The approximately 9,800 deaths in the South-East included 8,000 jihad-related deaths across the five South-East States, hacked to death by the Jihadists within the Region and 1000 jihad-related deaths involving traveler-Southeasterners of the South-East residency, killed by the Jihadists outside the Region on their way to different parts of the country in Delta, Kogi, Benue, Edo, Ondo, Cross River, etc. Included in the list are approximately 500 jihad-related deaths representing “the dark figures of crime” and another estimated 300 jihad-related deaths representing sedentary Southeasterners hacked to death in the above named “jihadist killing areas” or within and outside the South-East Region involving defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of South-East extraction and residency killed in the first three months of 2025 or from January to March 2025. This is more so when the State of Edo, a leading Christian controlled State has lost over 200 Christian-farmers and travelers in Auchi and Uromi to the Jihadists in the past three months of 2025 (January-March); leading to recent disproportionate reprisal killing of “Kano-bound armed Fulani Hunters”; occasioned or brought about by selective law enforcements and operations as well as inaction, complacency and alleged complicity of the Nigerian security forces in the South-East.

Apart from loss of approximately 9,800 Southeasterners to assembled Jihadists in the Region in the past ten years, the defenseless Region also lost approximately 10,500 defenseless citizens in the hands of the deployed officers and personnel of the Nigerian Armed Forces or the Military, killed on the grounds of their ethnicity and religion. The operations of the Nigerian Military in the South-East since August 2015 have been greeted with widespread suspicions and rejections following widespread accusations leveled against them indicating that they have been ethnically and religiously radicalized since middle of 2015, which manifested in their operational and law enforcement patterns since. Apart from turning blind eyes to jihadist activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen led Jihadists in the Region, members of the South-East civilian population have been singled out for false labeling, mass criminalization and trump-up charges on the grounds of their ethnicity and religion.

The InterSociety’s Special International Report of Dec 22, 2024 (“Ocean of Innocent Blood Flowing in Eastern Nigeria: 280 Pages) contained damning statistics against the Nigerian Military Operations in the East since 2015; including the fact that “out of estimated 15,300 defenseless civilians killed, not less than 11,000 were killed on the grounds of their ethnicity and religion in the South-East between August 2015 and Dec 2024”. The above therefore brings the total number of defenseless Southeasterners ethnically and religiously killed or hacked to death in the past decade or ten years by the combined forces of the assembled Islamic Jihadists and ethnically and religiously radicalized officers and personnel of the military deployed in the Region to approximately 20,300. The latest figure arrived at was because of reviews and updates associated with our recent advocacy research. Also important to mention is that serious increases recorded in the Jihadists’ attacks in the South-East dated back to 2020’s “COVIC-19” and April 2021 formation of “the EbubeaguMilitias” when Engineer Dave Umahi held sway as Gov of Ebonyi State and Chairman of the South-East Governors’ Forum. The assembled Islamic Jihadists in the Southeast are also found to belonging to “Nigerian Islamic Jihadists Alliance” formed in June 2020 in Niger State with Boko Haram, Ansaru, ISWAP, “Fulani Lakaruwa Jihadists” and Jihadist Fulani Bandits, etc., as members.

Research and investigative findings made by the InterSocietyfurther showed that the South-East assembled Islamic Jihadists presently threaten or operate from at least 600 communal secret locations and periodically attack or issue them with threats of invasion, attack and conquest. The more than 600 secret locations are out of the estimated 1000 locations occupied by the Jihadists in the entire Eastern Nigeria with estimated numerical strength of 20,000 and in illicit possession and proliferation of estimated 400,000 illicit Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALWs) and their ammunitions; out of estimated 2.7m illicit SALWs in the entire Eastern Nigeria and 1.5m in the South-East. The jihadist attacks in the South-East are divided into: secret killings arising from abductions and disappearances or captivity killings; with travelers and other road users and farmers bearing the brunt; and open attacks or invasions and killings; out of which the former constitutes about 65% and majorly go unnoticed or unrecorded as against the later which constitutes the remaining 35% and are majorly noticeable because of outcries and communal tragedies associated with such attacks.

The Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen accounted for estimated 80% or over 8000 of the estimated 9,800 killings in about 300 open attacks and 700 secret attacks in the South-East since 2015. While the South-East assembled Jihadists accounted for estimated 300 Christian deaths in the first three months of 2025 or January to March 2025, including not less than 20 openly hacked to death in Nkalaha part of Ishielu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State on Sunday, February 2, 2025; the Nigerian military took responsibility for not less than 200 others during the period and controversially labeled them “neutralized (extrajudicially killed) and arrested ESN/IPOB/Biafra terrorists”.

State-By-State Breakdown: :According to statistics available to the Intersociety, the State by State breakdown of the death tolls showed that the five States in the Region are affected asfollows: Enugu, estimated 1,800 deaths (April 2016-March 2025) including jihadist deaths secretly and openly recorded around Ugwu-Onyeama, Ugwuogo-Nike-Opi-Nsukka, Awgu, Nkanu East, Nkanu West, Oji River, Isu-Uzo, Uzo-Uwani, Enugu-Ezike and Four-Corner axis, etc.; Abia, estimated 2000deaths (June 2015/Jan 2020-March 2025) including jihadist deaths secretly and openly recorded around Leru, Uturu, Umunneochi, Isiukwuato and Lopanta Jihadist Fulani Cattle Market axis, etc.; Imo, estimated 2100 deaths (Jan 2020-March 2025) including jihadist deaths secretly and openlyrecorded around Okigwe, Ihube, Arondizogu, Okporo-Orlu, Izombe, Oguta, Ohaji/Egbema, Obosa, Assa, Agwa Land,Ndegwu, Orogwe, Amakohia-Ubi, Enyiogugu, Ihiagwa, Obinze, Avu, Oforola, Obibiezena and Eziobodo axis, etc.; Ebonyi, estimated 1000 deaths (June 2015/April 2021-March 2025) including jihadist deaths secretly and openly recorded around Ndigwe, Ataloga, Odokem, Ekile, Nduobasi,, Ekpufuand Obakota in Izzi and Ohaukwu Local Government Areas of Ebonyi State and others in Ishielu, Ishiagu (Ivo), Ohaozaraand Ikwo axis; and Anambra, estimated 800 deaths (June 2015/March 2022- March 2025) including jihadist deaths secretly recorded around Awka North, Oyi, Dunukofia, Ayamelum, Awka South LGA, Idemmili South, OrumbaNorth, Orumba South, Anaocha, Anambra East and Anambra West axis. End Of Executive Summary

Additional Research-Report Facts: The indictment of the four South-East Govs also followed our investigative finding directly or vicariously linking them to gross misconduct of stifling “demo-religious civic space” through promotion and organization of egregious attacks including crackdowns on Traditional Medicine Practitioners and African Traditional Religionists in manners reminiscent of State terror and abuse of office or power; in fragrant breach or violation of the citizens’ rights to thought, conscience and religion, guaranteed by Section 38 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution. Members of the African Traditional Medicines and African Traditional Religions numbering thousands, have been threatened with arrest and indefinite detention using false labeling, trump-up allegations or charges, campaigns of calumny, class stigmatization and criminalization, hearsay conclusions, trial by ordeal and prosecutorial vindictiveness, etc.

Hundreds have been arrested, falsely labeled without prima facie evidence and detained for several months amidst torture and other inhuman and degrading treatments or punishments. The systematic attacks by the indicted four Govs on African Traditional Religions’ Worshippers and their Belief System are perpetrated even when some of their forefathers and foremothers survived under the ancient protection of traditional religious oracles and deities.

The four indicted Govs and their aides in charge of security particularly the Government of Gov Charles Soludo in Anambra State are found to have gone to the extent of quipping up public and rival religious sentiments and negative social media and local town criers and used them to smear the corporate image and integrity of the African Traditional Medicine and Religious practitioners, criminalize and falsely label them as “voodooists and practitioners of devilish religions and traditional medicines in a Christian environment or State”; yet the same Govs and their security aides have steadily gone deaf and dumb in matters of State-protected coordinated and untamed violent attacks by Fulani-led Islamic Jihadists in their respective South-East States on defenseless Christians and others who belong to minority religious faiths-leading to loss of thousands of lives and wanton destruction of tens of thousands of properties including dwelling houses, farmlands and moveable belongings.

Such well-coordinated and unchallenged Jihadist attacks against defenseless Southeasterners and their properties included and still include abductions-for-death, abductions-for-radical Islamism and abductions-for-ransom and their allied raping and open killing of defenseless South-East men, women and minors in their farmlands or during traveling or in their homes during hours and pre-hours of the blue law; with the most beastly part of it all being same-sex raping of the abducted Southeasterners in Jihadists’ captivity and savagery insertion of sticks and metal objects inside the male victims’ anuses and women’s private parts. In all these, not only that the four indicted Govs have kept sealed lips, but they have also severally been conspiratorially involved by refusing to speak out or act or take charge. Several reports further indicate that the four indicted Govs and their aides have often pretentiously and deceitfully denied knowledge of such egregious Jihadist attacks and totally absolved the Jihadist Herdsmen and allied others of involvement; during which journalists and community leaders who accurately reported such attacks, and their perpetrators are threatened with sanction or outrightly blacklisted.

Abia Gov, Dr. Alex Otti, Exempted But Still Under Our Watchlist: Gov Alex Otti of Abia State luckily escaped the indictment and planned visa ban and international isolation campaigns following his commendable sanitization and digitalization in October 2023 of the “genocidal LokpantaFulani Cattle Market” and environs; deadliest den of Jihadist Fulani genocidal activities in Igbo Land since 2016; where more than 2000 sedentary Igbo-Christians and adherents of other religious minorities including women, children and their breadwinners were abducted and disappeared or brutalized killed and have their bodies sliced into parts or savagely dismembered in captivity in the area between 2019 and 2023.

It was also in the area that the Government of Dr. Alex Otti of Abia State shockingly discovered no fewer than 80 dead bodies of children, women and men at various stages of decomposition in October 2023 and went further to take bold and bravery steps at sanitizing and digitalizing the area till date. The discovered dead bodies were strongly believed to be those of Igbo-Christian travelers and farmers abducted and disappeared or killed in captivity by the Jihadists composed of assembled Nigeria-born Fulani Jihadists and Shuwa and Baggara Jihadist Arabs and Jihadist Mercenaries from Libya and other Maghreb countries; wavered and cleared in 2017 to invade Nigeria or any part thereof with prohibited assault rifles and other illicit Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALWs) and their ammunitions. Gov Alex Otti is not fully exempted as he is closely under our watchlist.

Universality And Sanctity Of The Right To Freedom Of Religion: Contrary to anti-religious freedom activities of the four indicted South-East Govs who also go about parading and dramatizing themselves as “devoted Christians” before their bishops, priests and pastors; the “Religious Freedom” and its International Freedom of Worship or Belief is the world’s “First Human Right” and one of the most sacred and divinely instituted and inviolably respected “Human Rights in the World”. Apart from Section 38 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution guaranteeing “Fundamental Human Right to Freedom of Conscience, Thought and Religion”, Section 10 of the same Constitution forbids the Nigerian State or any of its Sub-National Entities (State) from recognizing or adopting “any religion as State Religion”. The Fundamental Human Right to Freedom of Religion or Worship is also historically recognized and universalized as far back as in February AD313 through the Edict of Milan under Emperors Constantine and Licinius. Religious Freedom includes right of the traditional religionists to freely practice their faith.

The sacredness and universality of freedom of religion or worship or belief are also recognized under the United Nations; violation of which is listed as a “the War Crime” or a “Crime Against Humanity” or both in situations of interstate or intrastate warfare or non-war environments using the spirit and letters of the International Criminal Law including the International Criminal Court (ICC) Statute of 1998, ratified by Nigeria in September 2001. The International Freedom of Religion or Belief is further contained or provided in major UN Human Rights Charters or Treaties including Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR, 1948) and Article 18 of UN’s International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR, 1976), ratified by Nigeria in 1993.

The UDHR and the ICCPR had clearly affirmed the right to freedom of religion, including “the freedom to choose or change one’s religion or belief, and to manifest in worship, practice and teaching”. Similarly, Article 8 of the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR), ratified and domesticated by Nigeria in 1983, sacredly provides that: “freedom of conscience, the profession and free practice of religion shall be guaranteed”. Also worthy of mention is the fact that Right to Freedom of Religion or Worship or Belief is included in over 70 Human Rights Documents around the world.

And was legally delegated and elevated with a special status in the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights with a “Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Religious Freedom”. Clearly provided in the Laws of the United States of America are the “Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993” and the “International Religious Freedom Act of 1998” (22 U.S.C. 6401 et seq.). The US “International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 went further to criminalize act of “engaging in or tolerating, and systematic, ongoing egregious violations of religious freedoms”. Under the above, countries and their central and regional leaders responsible for promotion, perpetration, aiding and abetting religious violence and attacks on freedom of religion or worship are designated by Government of the United States and placed under “Country of Particular Concern”-with a flurry of sanctions including visa ban and international isolation to deter the perpetrators.

Genesis Of Recent Government-Backed Nomadic Jihadism InIgbo Land: South-East Region of Nigeria is presently under siege by radical Islamism and has become a major target of the promoters, executors, aiders and abettors of Jihadism using “Fulani Cattle Rearing (Nomadic Jihadism)” as a cover or pretext. The Nigeria’s South-East Region is also historically home to the largest number of Christian churches and schools and host the largest concentration of Christians in Nigeria particularly Catholics and adherents of African Traditional Religions and Organization of the African Instituted Churches, a distinct branch of the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN.

Irrespective of pretenses, cover-ups, disguises and camouflages of the Government of Nigeria and allied others, the promotion and nationalization of Jihadism using “Fulani Cattle Rearing and Southward/Middle-Belt Rural Conquest Settlements” is called “Nomadic Jihadism”; which is also called different cover or disguised names by the Government of Nigeria. Nigeria’s Federal Government is also widely believed or suspected to be leaving no stone unturned at promoting a flurry of pro jihadist policies, actions and projects in Igbo Land. Despite South-East Region having the lowest landmass of 29, 525 km2 in Nigeria, over two-and-a-half less than that of Niger State (measuring 76,000 km2), a highly fertile North-Central State; the South-East Region’s smallest portion of land is targeted for forceful grab by Nigerian Government, its allied Miyatti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, South-East Govs and external others.

It has further been investigated and found by the InterSocietythat six local government areas in Niger State, alone, can contain all the cows in Nigeria with all their natural feeds, pastures and modern facilities to rear them in the next fifty years. This is outside the fact that pastoralist cattle grazing and ranching methods being pretentiously applied by Nigerian Government particularly since July 2015 are globally outdated but forcefully retained in Nigeria for propagation and spread of radical Islamism using nationalization of (Fulani) Cattle Rearing (Masqueraded Jihadism) as a cover or pretext. As a matter of fact, South-East Region of Nigeria has already been captured in Nigeria’s Federal Government’s 417 (Fulani) Cattle Ranches and Settlements across the country, a widely suspected decoy for propagation and spread of Jihadism or Radical Islamism.

There are indiscriminate direct and indirect land procurements by Federal Government in the South-East for “Cattle (Fulani) Ranching and Settlements”, using various State Governments and their Local Governments and communal authorities as well as highly placed persons as middlemen including traditional rulers, Government contractors and appointees as facilitators. Such Government masqueraded policies are not only widely believed to have become political and conditions for “wining governorship elections and prosecuting post governorship litigations”, but also shockingly discovered was the fact that such lands when procured are handed over to members of the Fulani Muslim Population and have them violently occupied as “permanent settlements” and enclaves from where jihadist and genocidal attacks are indiscriminately carried out, targeting South-East rural and traveling Christian population and members of the religious minorities and their properties; during or after which the host State Governments and Governors kept sealed lips or found blaming such attacks on wrong parties particularly “ESN/IPOB”.

Several claims by Nigerian Government and the indicted South-East Govs that “cattle ranching measures are geared toward ending herders-farmers’ clashes”, have been found to be outrightly deceitful and false; and have escalated untamed such organized jihadist attacks on South-East Christians and other religious minorities and their properties. Tensions have been generated in several communities scattered across the five South-East States particularly in Enugu, Anambra, Imo and Ebonyi following attempts by their Govs to force them to give up their lands for disguised (Fulani) Cattle Ranches under the influence of the Nigerian Government and the country’s Fulani Cattle Owners Association and other actors.

As a matter of fact, the leadership of the Association of Igbo Town Unions led by Chief Emeka Diwe recently cried out and strongly opposed the Federal Government’s Cattle Ranching policies, describing them as promotion and nationalization of “a Fulani Ethnic interest, despite paucity of lands in the South-East. The InterSociety has further found that more than 300 Igbo communities in the South-East spreading across over fifty local government areas have been attacked by Fulani-led Jihadists or are facing threats of such attacks. The situation is compounded by manifest biases and discriminatory intelligence gathering and law enforcement operations by the drafted security forces of Nigeria who hardly go after or apprehend the jihadists or link them to such attacks even when pieces of intelligence or law enforcement information available to them strongly link Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others to such attacks.

It is investigative finding of our Dec 22, 2024 Special International Report (“Ocean Of Innocent Blood Flowing In Eastern Nigeria: 282-Pages)” that “Fulani Jihadists and allied others have since the Ukpabi-Nimbo rural Christian massacre of April 2016 to date, violently occupied not less than 1000 secret locations in the South-East and Igbo South-South, with numerical strength of over 20,000 Jihadist Militias who are armed with estimated 400,000 illicit Small Arms and Light Weapons and their ammunitions, out of estimated 2.7m illicit SALWs being proliferated and in wrong hands in Eastern Nigeria”.

Further discovered was that as of June 2015, there was little or no Jihadist Fulani Settlements or Killing Camps in Igbo Land; but four years later or as of 2019, there were 113 Fulani Jihadist Settlements and Killing Camps in the Region, which further rose to not less than 700 in April 2021 and 1000 as of end of December 2024. “Fulani Herdsmen with AK-47 rifles occupied not less than 336 locations in the South-East as of 2020”-DIG Celestine Okoye.

Remotely speaking, it must be remembered that the road to nationalization of “Fulani Jihadism” (sobriquet State Jihadism) in Nigeria or any part thereof including South-East Region; is widely believed to have dated back to July 2015 following the emergence of Retired Major General Muhammad Buhari; a Fulani Daji, as Nigeria’s fifth Executive Civilian President; which has been continued into the present Government of Senator Ahmed Bola Tinubu. It is widely feared in several informed quarters in the East that if no strong measures are not taken to checkmate or stop the Fulani-led Jihadist incursions into the Old Region particularly in the South-East, there may be no traces and practices of Christianity and other religious minorities in the Region by 2075 or in the next fifty years from this 2025; reminiscent of the Islamized post Christian eras in Turkey and Egyptian Asyut Region; Africa’s first and oldest Christian region dating back to AD60s-AD200s during which the “Hanging Church of Egypt” (Saint Virgin Mary’s Coptic Orthodox Church) was also built.

Fulani-Led Jihadism Sweeping Off Christian Dominated African Countries

It must be stated that two types of Jihadism are presently raging and sweeping across African Christian-dominated countries through genocidal activities of radical Islamists or jihadists drawn from the Fulani Population (founders of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen since 2010, Jihadist Fulani Bandits since 2011 and Jihadist Fulani Lakaruwa since 2018 in Nigeria) and allied others including radical Islamists drawn from Shuwa and Baggara Arabs; Kanuri Islamists (founders of Boko Haram insurgency since 2002 in Nigeria) and others recruited from African Maghreb Region. Empirically, the two types of Jihadism are: “dar al-Islam” or “the realm of Islam or lands under Muslim rule where Shariah must prevail” and “dar al-harb” or “the realm of war or lands not under Muslim rule but where under certain circumstances, war in defense of the radical Islamic faith can be sanctioned”. While several Muslim African countries are presently ravaged by “dar al-Islam” version of Jihadism or lands under Muslim rule where Shariah must prevail, several Christian African countries are presently ravaged by “dar al-harb” version of Jihadism or lands not under Muslim rule but where war in defense of radical Islamic faith must be sanctioned or waged. It must further be pointed out that “the Fulani Jihadist Uprising in Nigeria (“State Power Conquest Jihadism”) since 2015 using “Fulani Cattle Rearing” under different deceitful names and disguises is modeled after that of the Islamic Republic of Sudan where Jihadism is promoted and executed using Camel Rearing called the “Janjaweed”.

Christian-dominated African countries presently under Fulani-led jihadist attacks or their jihadist influences are Democratic Republic of Congo; Africa’s largest Catholic country with estimated 95% Catholics; and Republics of Congo, Benin, Togo, Gabon and Burkina Faso; world’s most Islamically terrorized Christian dominated country in 2024. Others are the Centra African Republic-where Fulani Seleka Jihadists drawn from the country’s about 5% Fulani Muslim population triggered a civil war and toppled the country’s 95% Christian population and their Christian Government in 2013 (later countered and ousted by anti-Fulani Seleka revolution); Mozambique, Namibia, Uganda, Kenya, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Chad; a country of estimated 44% silenced Christians, Nigeria, a country of roughly 50% Christians and 50% Muslims and Republic of Ghana, where estimated 400 Jihadists were recently recruited and sent to Burkina Faso’s jihadist training camps for near-future Islamic Uprising in the country. The above is to just mention but a few. The Fulani-led Jihadism across Africa including Nigeria is also widely believed to be heavily funded from a multibillion-dollar trust fund funded by Middle East oil sheiks or empires and other global Islamic caliphates or sultanates as well as from the national wealth of countries where they have risen and seized State power (. i.e. Nigeria since 2015).

Our Grouse Against Anambra, Enugu, Ebonyi And Imo Govs: Statistics:

Anambra: Over 40 Traditional Religious Worshippers Languishing In Illegal Detention For Over 60 Days AsJihadist Herdsmen Secretly Saturate Eleven LGAs. The Prof Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State has been widely accused of conspiring with the Nigerian Government and external others in threatening and undermining present and future territorial, citizen and property security and safety of Anambra State and its citizens following “silence of the graveyard” and inaction maintained by the State Government over increasing secret and unchecked jihadist attacks by Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen in various communities across the State over the years or since 2015.

The above is to the extent that under Gov Soludo’s watch and inaction, armed Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others are dangerously saturating and threatening major forests, bushes and farmlands in not less than eleven of the State’s 21 Local Government Areas including ongoing traces of heightening jihadist activities in many boundary communities located in Awka North and South LGAs, Orumba North and South LGAs, Idemmili South LGA, Oyi LGA, Ayamelum LGA, Anambra East and West LGAs, Ogbaru LGA, and DunukofiaLGA-where they have a big terror camp behind the Zone 13 Headquarters of the Nigeria Police Force as well as the Ukwulu Forest and environs. As a matter of fact, there have been resurgence of secret activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others’ in various boundary communities spreading across eight local government areas of Ogbaru, Ayamelum, Awka North, Orumba North, Orumba South, Nnewi South, Anambra East, Anambra West and Ihiala, in addition to Anambra offshoot of the Okigwe-Ihube-Arondizogu-Ihite-Umuchukwu-Umunneochi boundary axis of Imo, Abia and Enugu States (South-East Triangle).

It must further be pointed out that many jihadist activities of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in Igbo Land States of Anambra, Enugu, Imo and Ebonyi are either rarely reported or covered, suppressed or censored under the watch of the four indicted Govs including the Prof Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State.

Gov Soludo’s Homeland Commissioner Allegedly Procured Lands For Jihadists: The serious allegationsabove were brought to the fore on May 28 and June 4, 2023, and leveled against Gov Charles Soludo’s immediate pastCommissioner for Homeland Security; Mr. Chikaodili Anara (Igba-ka-Igba) by the leadership of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). Mr. Chikaodi Anara who was holding sway as Gov Charles Soludo’s Homeland Affairs Commissioner until early March 2025; was accused of “running a hit squad andhigh-profile kidnap-for-ransom gangs using Government connections as a back-up” and “clandestinely purchasing acres of lands for Fulani Herdsmen as middleman for the Miyatti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) including facilitation of their incursions into Awka North Local Government Area and environs including Oyi, Dunukofia, Ayamelum and Awka South LGAs”.

Among those in the four Local Government Areas (LGAs)witnessing the surge of the Fulani Herdsmen’s incursions,according to the leadership of IPOB through in a statement signed by Emma Powerful are Igbariam town, Achalla town, Amanuke town, Ugbene town, Ukwulu town, Nando town, Urum town, Mgbakwu town, Isuanaocha town, Ebenebetown, etc. The above is to the extent that “thousands of acres of farmlands belonging to such communities were forcefully taken from them and sold or ceded to MACBAN through the former Homeland Commissioner. Regrettably, the InterSociety’s statement of June 5, 2023, calling on Gov Charles Soludo to investigate the Commissioner (as he then was) was ignored and never acted upon till date. Apart from the above, the Government of Gov Charles Soludo is also accused of serious involvement in abuse of power and public office by way of egregious attacks on citizens’ rights to religious freedom and its practices.

Gov Charles Soludo is specifically accused of abuse of power and public office; particularly going by his Government’s gross disrespect to citizens’ fundamental human rights and religious freedom regarding their rights to freedom of worship or belief; a clear case of fragrant violation and abuse of Sections 15 (5) of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution (abuse of power and public office), 33 (right to life), 34(right to personal dignity or dignity of human person), 35 (right to personal liberty), 36 (right to fair hearing including presumption of innocent until proven otherwise by a High Court of Justice), 38 (right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion), 39 (right to freedom of expression), 40 (right to freedom of assembly and association). Others are Constitutional Sections 42 (right to freedom from discrimination), 43 (right to freedom to acquire and own immoveable property) and 46 (right to seek redress and compensation before a High Court of Justice in the event of violation of any or all the above highlighted fundamental human rights).

Gov Charles Soludo and his Government of Anambra State have all the above observed in gross breach; and as if that was not enough, his Government is also found to have gone to the extent of quipping up public and rival religious sentiments through negative social media, public speeches and local town criers and used them to smear the corporate image and integrity of the African Traditional Religion and the African Traditional Medicine and their practitioners including criminalizing, falsely-labeling, demonizing, designating and having them publicly portrayed as “voodooists and practitioners of fetish religion and traditional medicine in a Christian State”; yet the same Government under him has steadily kept sealed lips over violent attacks by Fulani-led Jihadists on defenseless Christians and adherents of the religious minorities across the State, resulting in loss of lives and wanton destruction of properties including houses and farmlands.

It is recalled that the Government of Governor Charles Soludo in Anambra State had on January 27, 2025, announced sweeping unconventional security measures to stamp out rising insecurity and other unsafe conditions across the State particularly kidnappings-for-ransom and captivity killings and disappearances through amendment and activation of “the Anambra Vigilante Law 2000”, which his government renamed “Anambra Homeland Security Law 2025”. The amended Law also contains a flurry of obnoxious, extralegal, extra jus, unconstitutional, anti-human rights and anti-religious freedom provisions, contrary to the provisions of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and the country’s Human Rights Treaty Laws.

In a manner reminiscent of brazen abuse of power and public office and religious persecution, Gov Chales Soludo of Anambra State on the same January 27, 2025, issued a directive and ordered a State-wide clampdown on Traditional African Religious and African Traditional Medicine Institutions, their worshipers, practitioners and symbols. As widely expected, the Anambra Governor’s sweeping measures carefully evaded incessant jihadist attacks by Fulani Herdsmen and allied others across the State including farmland, bushland and forest and roadway-based abductions, ransom payments, wanton destruction of farm crops and produce and sexual violence including sex-related abductions, captivity rape, disappearances and secret killings.

In the end, over 40 Traditional Medicine practitioners (herbalists, native doctors) and oracle chief priests and priestesses and their wards and servants were targeted, arrested and detained using unconventional security operatives and methods. Hundreds of their Sacred Sanctuaries and Religious symbols were also razed or burned down or wantonly destroyed. As if that was not enough, Gov Soludo further went round the State and delivered public speeches during which he generalized and falsely labeled their worship centers, in addition to publicly portraying them as fetish practitioners involved in kidnappings and cultism or those preparing demonic charms used by kidnappers, armed robbers, cultists and internet fraudsters in the State.

Gov Soludo’s public outrage, demonization and criminalization of traditional worship, herbal institutions and their worshippers or practitioners were also done using public speeches, State broadcasts, radio and televisions jingles and smear media campaigns; copied and replicated by his local government chairpersons and presidents-general of town unions through town criers and social media circles. Since then, traditional religion and traditional medicine and their worshippers and practitioners across the State and beyond have been gravely ridiculed, spat at, defamed, humiliated, scorned, assaulted and degraded by members of the public,especially rival religious bodies and preachers.

The crudest of it all was indiscriminate deployment of false labeling, stigmatization and class criminalization, trump-up charges, hearsay conclusions and unconventional and unconstitutional “Holden Charge” or “Remand Orders” by Government of Prof Charles Soludo to clamp the arrested traditional worshippers and traditional medicine practitioners into indefinite detention particularly in illegal custodies or detention facilities unknown to the 1999 Constitution, the Criminal Code Act of 2004, the Administration of Criminal Justice Act of 2015 and the Nigeria Police Act of 2020 as “lawful detention facilities in Nigeria or any part thereof”.

The above is further illustrated by the fact that the over 40 arrested and detained traditional worshippers and practitioners since January 29, 2025, are presently languishing in an illegal detention facility, known as “Lion House” or “Anambra Homeland Security (AVG) Lion House”, located in Awka, where they have been held illegally and unconstitutionally on orders of Gov Charles Soludo since January 29, 2025, or for more than 60 days.

Anambra’s Gov Soludo Acted Unconstitutionally, Unlawfully And Ultra Vires: It is not only that Gov Charles Soludo acted ultra vires or beyond his powers as Anambra Gov, but he also acted unconstitutionally and unlawfully by manifestly usurping and manifesting absolutist powers not given or granted by any law in Nigeria. It must be stated in black and white that the Anambra Gov lacks power under the Laws of Nigeria to place citizens under detention, specifically by ordering them to be detained indefinitely in facilities manned by his militias (AVG) since end of January 2025 till date or beginning of April 2025. This is nothing short of a clear manifestation of the dictatorial and tyrannical State Detention of Persons Decree 2 of 1984 of Nigerian military’s inglorious epoch. The action of Gov Charles Soludo is also a fragrant and brazen violation of the provisions of “his own Law”: “the Anambra Homeland Security Law 2025”, which forbids “Anambra Vigilante Services” from detaining citizens, other than arresting and handing them over to the Police for proper custody, interrogation and investigation. Very important to point out is the fact that by the existing criminal laws of Nigeria, sub-state actor vigilantes including operatives and leaders of the “Anambra Vigilante Services” are not empowered or trained to exercise “detention, investigation and prosecution duties and control over members of the public accused of offending or breaching criminal law in Nigeria or any part thereof.

As a matter of fact, going by the Order of Operational and Enforcement Seniority of Civil and Criminal Laws governing Nigeria’s three tiers of Government (Federal, State and Local Governments) in the 1999 Constitution, the Country’s Treaty Laws, Acts of the National Assembly and Laws of 36 States; no law passed by a State House of Assembly can impeach or override any provision of the Constitution or any of the country’s Treaty Laws or any Act of the National Assembly inherited or enacted (see Section 315 of the 1999 Constitution). These are respectively specified in Section 1 (3) of the 1999 Constitution (supremacy of the 1999 Constitution and inconsistency of an Act of the National Assembly and a Law of a State House of Assembly with provisions or any provision of the 1999 Constitution) and Section 4(5) of the 1999 Constitution (inconsistency of a Law of a State House of Assembly with an Act of the National Assembly in the event of conflict).

It is the further discovery of the InterSociety that the over 40 detained traditional worshippers and practitioners, detained illegally for over 60 days since end of January 2025, have not been subjected to lawful police investigations till date. Apart from Gov Charles Soludo refusing police to transfer them to their statutory or proper custody for proper and lawful investigation, they are also being held outside the law and on “Trial by Ordeal”, particularly on the grounds of false labeling, class criminalization, class stigmatization, ethno-religious profiling, hearsay conclusions and prosecutorial vindictiveness using questionably secured remand orders and public and rival religious sentiments. Apart from Section 35 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution, under citizens’ right to personal liberty, setting limit or period under which the arrested citizens under investigation can be held before trial, its subsection 35 prescribes a day or two days detention depending on proximity of a court of competent jurisdiction. Such short period of detention (24-48hrs) is for the purpose of criminal investigation and gathering indictable evidence for prosecution which is further dependent upon lower gravity of offense alleged, such as simple and misdemeanor offenses or other offenses that are easily bailable by police or detaining authority or court; other than those carrying capital punishments upon judicial conviction and sentencing.

It must be clearly pointed out that under Section 35, subsection 4 of the 1999 Constitution (Right to Personal Liberty), a longer period of detention such as two-three months without police bail is prescribed for the continuation and conclusion of criminal investigation in criminal matters involving offenses carrying capital punishments on judicial conviction (. i.e. kidnapping, armed robbery, murder, treason, insurrection, terrorism, etc.). In the case of the over 40 detained traditional worshippers in Anambra State under Gov Soludo’s outside-the-law order, it is our advocacy discovery that no police led criminal investigations, and lawful charges have been preferred or brought against them till date, a period of over 60 days; and an impeachable violation of their “Fundamental Right to Fair Hearing and Presumption of Innocence”, justiciably guaranteed under Section 36 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution (Right to Fair Hearing and Fair Trial).

Native Doctor Chigozie Nwangwu, Over 40 Others Being Held For 60 Days Without Police Investigation: Strongly condemned was the unlawful arrest and indefinite detention of Chigozie Nwangwu, a dramatized native doctor, popularly called “AKWA-OKUKO TIWARA-AKI), who was arrested and unlawfully held at Gov Charles Soludo’s militias facility (Awka Lion House) since February 8, 2025. Further reported is that a team of State CID operatives visited him at “Gov Soludo’s custodial Lion House”, Awka on Wednesday and Thursday, 5th and 6th March 2025; nearly 30 days after he was tricked by the State’s Deputy Governor and clamped into the illegal detention facility. According to information obtained by the InterSociety, he was interrogated by the Awka SCID operatives for the first time and asked questions bordering on non-capital offenses such as “how many private buildings do you have and their worth? What do you do for a living? what are the sources of your wealth? How many private cars do you have and their sources and worth? How many hotels do you have and their locations and worth? Does your deity demand human blood and sacrifices to be active? Why did you record and post that video advertising and dramatizing your “Okeite prowess” even after Gov Soludo has placed embargo on such practices? The SCID police team thereafter left the “Lion House” and returned to State SCID headquarters at Awka without taking Chigozie Nwangwu into their custody for continuation of their investigation.

None of the remaining detainees have also been detained by police and placed under their investigation since end of January 2025. It is recalled that the Gov Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State had on February 18, 2025, admitted “arresting and holding over 30 native doctors in connection with kidnapping, armed robbery, killings and cultism in the State”. The State Government also declined to give their names and details of their arrest, detention and investigation (if any). The Government of Anambra State had earlier issued a firm directive that “all native doctors and Ndi Eze-Nwanyi must come and register with the Government”, a height of religious persecution and desecration and criminalization of traditional religion and traditional medicine practice. The InterSociety has severally made it clear that our organization will always lend advocacy supports towards making the State and the citizenry and their properties safe and secured provided that such measures are in line with due process of law; devoid of barbaric methods and “trial by ordeal”, which is repugnant to natural justice, due process, human rights and good conscience.

Hundreds Arrested Since Late Jan 2025 And Illegally Held Without Investigation And Court Trial There have also been indiscriminate and unchecked arrest, illegal and indefinite detention of hundreds of citizens of the State by the Government of Charles Soludo since late January 2025 involving members of the public accused of involvement in “victimless crimes” such as dangerous use of hard drugs or drug abuse, wandering, waywardness, prostitution, use of charms; larceny or theft or stealing and other offenses including suspected cultism, internet frauds, ritualism, kidnapping, armed robbery, etc. The victims were unconventionally arrested across the State by Gov Soludo’s State militias (Agu n’ Eche Mba Vigilante Service or Anambra Vigilante Services) in the past two months or more than 60 days.

The most shocking of it all is that those arrested since then have been held illegally in illegal detention facilities manned by Gov Charles Soludo’s State militias or “Anambra Vigilante Services”, but also there are no records anywhere showing that they have been handed over to Nigeria Police Force or its SCID for proper custody, investigation and prosecution or their discharge and acquittal as provided in criminal laws of Nigeria such as the Administration of Criminal Justice Act of 2015, Nigeria’s centralized criminal procedure law; the Criminal Code Act of 2004 and the Police Act of 2020.

All the above is to the extent that the Gov Charles Soludo’s newly amended “Anambra Homeland Security Law 2025”, which empowers the Anambra Vigilante Services to “arrest and immediately handover or transfer to the Police”, has been observed in gross breach. Eyewitnesses’ accounts including those who visited Gov Charles Soludo’s “Awka Lion House” or Headquarters of the State’s Militias in search of their missing loved ones have described “the Awka Lion House” and its offshoot, “Onitsha Main Market White House” and their likes located in secret places across the State as another “Guantanamo Bay in Nigeria’s South-East where arrested citizens are secretly held and tortured without investigation and open court trial, during which dozens are likely to have been tortured or starved to death and their corpses taken away and dumped inside the River Niger or the Ezu and the Omambla Rivers or criminally interred in unknown secret graves or locations across the State in the hours of the blue law without traces by their families.

There have also been reported cases of “missing persons” particularly by lawyers hired by their families and local rights activists. It must be clearly stated again that the InterSocietyis not against efforts of the Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State in controlling high rate of violent crimes across the State, however it is our insistence that such measures or efforts must at all times be handled with caution and due process and rule of law in accordance with relevant provisions of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution particularly the Fundamental Human Rights provisions and the country’s Human Rights Treaty Laws and substantive criminal laws and their procedural laws. It is also our insistence that the criminal justice administrators, providers and operators including Gov Charles Soludo led Government of Anambra State must put an end to reckless and indiscriminate use or resort to false labeling, hearsay conclusions, class criminalization, class stigmatization, ethnoreligious profiling, discriminatory and selective law enforcements and their operations, transfer of criminal liability or responsibility (breach of Section 7 of the ACJA of 2015), false alarms, cultural violence, distortion and concoction of intelligence and crime statistics and evidence; jungle justice or trial-by-ordeal and prosecutorial vindictiveness.

Enugu: The Dr Peter Mabah led Government of Enugu State is widely fingered to have been conspiring with the Nigerian Government and external others in threatening and undermining present and future territorial, citizen and property security and safety of the State and its citizens following “silence of the graveyard” or conspiracy of silenceand inaction maintained by the State Government over increasing secret and unchecked jihadist Fulani Herdsmenattacks in various communities across the State.

Such attacks have been going on over the years particularly since 2016; to the extent that today, the State is saturated by jihadist activities of Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in many of its 17 Local Government Areas widely believed to be facing threats of attack or undergoing secret attacks targeted at defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of the State’s hinterland. Jihadist influences of Fulani Herdsmen and allied others have particularly become regular and uncontrollable in several communities cutting across Oji Local Government Area (LGA), Awgu LGA, Aninri LGA, Enugu West LGA, Enugu East and Nsukka LGAs (Ugwuogo-Nike/Opi-Nsukka axis), Uzo-Uwani LGA, Isi-Uzo LGA, Ezeagu LGA, Nkanu East and Nkanu West LGAs and Igbo-Eze North and Igbo-Eze South LGAs of the State.

The totality of the above has endangered lives and properties and threatened their fundamental human rights to ethnic and religious identities including rights to be born, develop and live in secured and protected environment; in addition to marking the present Government of the State out as one of those promoting religious violence and attacks on international freedom of religion or worship or belief, contrary to Sections 38 and 10 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and globalized international human rights on freedom of religion or worship. It must also be pointed out that many jihadist activities of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in Igbo Land States of Anambra, Enugu, Imo and Ebonyi are either rarely reported or covered and suppressed or censored under the watch of the four indicted Govs including the Dr Peter Mbah led Government of Enugu State. Several reports also abound exposing indiscriminate third-party land purchases for the Jihadists across the South-East by delegated persons or State/Federal Government-linked middle persons including top Government officials or appointees.

The present Government of Enugu State was in 2024 found by the Intersociety to be one of those States in the South-East and the South-South being coerced by Federal Government of Nigeria into ceding vast expanse of their Trado-Judeo-Christian lands (forests and farm settlements) for “Nomadic Jihadism” disguised by Government using different deceitful names such as “National Cattle Ranching Project” of the Federal Ministry of National Livestock Development which unbelievably claimed that the Project is aimed at ending “Farmers-Herders clashes”. It was further found that for fear of communal backlash and unrest, the Government of Enugu and those of Anambra, Imo, Ebonyi and Abia resorted to different deceitful tactics and excuses to coerce the affected communities and their leaders into ceding such lands and later have them allegedly handed over to Federal Government for disguised “Muslim Fulani Settlements”. Such was the case in Elugwu-Akwu in old Achi Land and Nimbo in Uzo-Uwanipart of Enugu State where top officials of the Government of Enugu State were caught and exposed in Dec 2023 and Jan 2024, forcing them to temporarily retreat.

“Nomadic Jihadism” has been defined by some ethnographicscholars and freedom of religion advocates as “disguised jihadist policy of the Government of Nigeria using “RUGA” (a Fulani word for “human settlement in host or rival communities using outdated rural cattle grazing methods”), “National Waterway Control (NWC)”, “National Livestock Transformation Plan(NLTP)”, “Nigerian Army CattleRanching (NACR)”, “FADAMA”, “National Cattle/Livestock Ranching (NCLR)”, “Federal Grazing Route and Reserve Mapping and Digitization (FGRRMD)” and other disguisesintroduced by Federal Ministries of Agriculture, Water Resources and Livestock Development (created in 2023).“Nomadic Jihadism” disguised under “National Livestock Development Plan” is specifically placed under the Federal Ministry of Livestock Development headed by Alhaji Idi Maiha, a Fulani, as a Minister. The two other Federal Ministries are also headed by Fulanis: Alhaji Mohammed Mahmood Abubakar (Agriculture) and Alhaji Bello Muhammad Goronyo (Minister of State).

The above has been widely criticized as a decoy for “State Jihadism Project” using radical elements within the Muslim Fulani Ethnic Nationality and their proprietor entities such as MACABAN or “Miyatti Allah Cattle Breeders Association and FUNAM or Fulani Nationality Movement. It is further alleged that “the National Cattle Ranching Project” is aimed at forcefully securing Jihadist Settlements across Christian communities and non-Muslim others in the country, to be followed by secret and permanent appointment by the Sultanate of Sokoto of an Emirate or Sarkin Hausa-Fulani for each of the established Muslim Fulani Settlements in Southern and Middle-Belt parts of Nigeria.

The InterSociety had in her March 11, 2024, Report discovered moves by the Government of Enugu State to coerce various communities including the Elugwu-Akwu-Achi Community in Oji River and Nimbo Community in Uzo-Uwani into ceding their large communal lands for strongly suspected “Nomadic Jihadism”. Top officials of the Government of the State were caught on camera disguising and defending the project. The present Government of Enugu State has also been keeping sealed lips over incessant invasion and attacks on various communities by Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen in the State. Such unchallenged and untamed attacks have resulted in the killing of hundreds of defenseless rural Christians on yearly basis; to the extent that since the April 2016 Ukpabi-Nimbo Jihadist Fulani massacre of no fewer than 48 defenseless Christians, the State has lost at least 1,800 persons and burning down or destruction of hundreds of their dwelling houses and seizure and uprooting of thousands of hectares of farmlands, bushes and forests. The unchecked activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen in Enugu State have been so untamed that they have risen to an apogee.

On March 4 and 6, 2025, Reports had it that aggrieved Enugu women in their hundreds, if not thousands on Tuesday, March 4, 2025, protested the incessant attacks by Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen. The protesting women were from Eha-Ohala, comprising Mgbuji, Umujove, and Abor autonomous communities in the Isi-Uzo Local Government Area of Enugu State.

The protesting women were further drawn from Eha-Amufu, comprising Mgbuji, Umujove, Agu-amede, Abor, Isu, Orokoro, Ikpakpara, Umuhu, Amede, and Ihenyi. According to Punch Newspaper and Saharareporters, the protesters blocked the Nkalagu-Eha-Amufu-Ikem-Obollo-Afor Federal Highway, carrying green leaves and singing lamentation songs to draw attention to their plight. They accused security agencies of failing to protect them while the Fulani attackers continued their attacking spree and continued to destroy their farms and settlements.

They shared harrowing accounts of women being raped, beaten, and mutilated by Fulani herdsmen. They women lamented that their women were being raped, their husbands and sons for fear of being brutalized or killed, cannot go to farm anymore. One of the protesters, Mrs. Roseline Odoh, stated that the community can no longer access their farms due to the constant attacks. Odoh said as farmers whose only means to survive was farming has found it tough fending for themselves. According to her, every year, during harvest, Fulani herdsmen come to occupy their farms, destroying their livelihood. Odoh was quoted to have said, “The worst is that they have sacked us from our farm settlements. So many of us don’t have anywhere to go. “Our houses have been burnt down, and the invaders occupy it. “So many of our people – children, youths and our husbands have been killed.

“In each of these cases, the government and security agencies will deny that our people were not attacked and killed. We don’t know the reason for doing so. “If they send soldiers and police here, they will only patrol the town. They don’t go to where these criminals are occupying,” she lamented, adding, “It is high time the Fulani herdsmen attacks stopped.” She added that their people don’t have boundaries with Fulani herdsmen. Therefore, it did not make sense to them how the government is dealing with the issue with kid gloves. According to the protesters, over 150 people from the affected communities have been killed between 2020 and 2025, while more than 28 farm settlements have been sacked and occupied by the attackers.

As if the above was not enough, the SaharaReporters also on March 20, 2025, reported how the once-thriving NdiaguAmofia in Umuhu autonomous community, Eha-Amufu, Isi-Uzo local government area of Enugu State, now lies desolate and abandoned following armed Fulani herdsmen attack and taking over of the land, displacing hundreds of residents who fled in terror after a brutal attack on Friday, February 28, 2025. The SaharaReporters learnt that the marauding herdsmen set two houses ablaze, looted several others, and brutally killed the only child of a widow and a final year university student. The child's uncle was also shot, leaving the community in a state of shock and grief. The attack has madethe residents homeless, and their hopes of returning to their ancestral homes hang in the balance. The village, once a thriving agricultural community, now lies idle, its farm settlements abandoned and with dry leaves covered everywhere.

SaharaReporters were told that the settlement until the attack was last remaining community settlement otherwise known as 'Ndiagu' in Eha-Amufu. Asked why Fulani attacked them, Odoh said "I don't know. On why the sudden attack and sacking the village settlement, he said "I don't know."

"Since the attack, some government officials have come but have never heard anything from them thereafter. I don't know whether they came to know whether it is true or not.But you have seen houses they burned. My own house was burned. They actually came for me but I saw them from afar with AK 47 rifles, I followed backyard and ran inside the bush and hid". On January 13, 2025, in Enugu State, not less than 35 travelers passing through Enugu from Kogi and Benue States including four serving soldiers of the Nigerian Army were abducted by Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen in Enugu-Ezike part of the Igbo Eze Local Government Area of the State and forcefully taken into forests where some managed to escape and whereabouts of others remained unaccounted for till date.

Again, in its latest report of Monday, March 31, 2025, the SaharaReporters ran another feature exposing how Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen overran and took over not less than 44 Farm Settlements (“Ndiagu Farm Settlements”) belonging to defenseless people of Eha-Amufu in Isi-Uzo Local Government of Enugu State. The report was titled: “Herdsmen Overrun Farm Settlements, Occupy Homes, Schools InEnugu’s Eha-Amufu Amid Government Silence”. The SaharaReporters’ report further stated as follows: ““No fewer than 44 farm settlements, known as 'Ndiagu', have been overrun, with residents forced to flee their homes and seek shelter in neighboring communities. A devastating trail of destruction and displacement has been left in the wake of relentless attacks by assailants or herdsmen on farm settlements in Eha-Amufu, Isi-Uzo Local Government Area of Enugu State, for years. The affected communities include Abor Ishala, Mgbuji, Agu-Amede, Eha-Agu, and Umuhu.”

“The latest and most populated farm settlement to come under attack by marauding herdsmen was Ndiagu Amofia village in Umuhu Eha-Amufu autonomous community on February 28. Residents were forced to flee their homes and seek shelter in neighboring communities. In Abor, no fewer than nine farm settlements were overrun by the militias, who sacked the residents and took over their homes with their families. The affected settlements in Abor are Ogomungo, Ngele-Akpankpa, Okwum, Agerie, Ezegwu-Abor, Ashinu, Ovokpo, Mgbede-Abor, and Ngele-Acho. In Umujoovu village, four farm settlements were sacked: Mgbede, Edu, Nditsion, and Onuashinu. In Agu-Amede autonomous community, nine farm settlements were overrun and taken over by the assailants. The settlements are Okpokwu, Uzamuado, Oduba-uzame, Onuchukwu, Efuakpa, Ogeriaba, Okpurugwu, Iyiasa, and Ikpakpara. In the Eha-Agu autonomous community, three farm settlements were sacked, with residents completely displaced and denied access to their homes and palm plantations. The settlements are Odenigbo, Ashinu, and Isu. In the Mgbuji autonomous community, 18 farm settlements were sacked, with residents seeking shelter in the Enugu metropolis and with family relations in other safe communities. The community settlements are completely occupied by marauding herdsmen”.

“The community settlements completely occupied by marauding herdsmen are - "Okpokwu, Okpurugwu, Obodomba, Uloumuorgirie, Ugwuoka, Ngele-Aguiyi, Ogbete-Obibi, Ogbete-Umulo, Agerie, Unuanu, Obodo-Ede, Ukwuakwa, Unomgbede, Iyiasa, Onu-Ashinu, Ubi, Ezegwu, Omulo." In Umuhu Eha-Amufu autonomous community, the last farm settlement sacked is "Ndiagu Amofia". According to SaharaReporters' investigation, the vicious attacks and land-grabbing in the area intensified in 2020 during President Muhammadu Buhari's administration. Chief Obeagu Odoh, a kinsman of Chairman of Isi-Uzu LGA, told SaharaReportersthat the residents were sacked from their homes and have not been resettled. "Some are living in Enugu, some hired houses in the camp, while some are squatting with relations”. “All the farm settlements in our community, nobody goes there. If you dare, it is either you are killed or kidnapped for ransom or you escape with injuries," another resident, Chigbo Okibe, told SaharaReporters. He observed that December 2024 marked the first time Christmas was celebrated in Eha-Ohala since 2021."Getting to a year now, three people from Abor who went to harvest their crops at the farm settlements have not been found," he revealed, adding that the matter was promptly reported to the Enugu State Police Command.

"Yet as we speak, nobody has been held accountable. The herdsmen are currently occupying abandoned homes, and the security agencies are not doing anything to return the people to their homes." “Regarding government intervention, he said, "There's none." For our own side of Abor and Umujoovu, I have not seen any government intervention. The interventions we have received so far were primarily during the Mgbuji crisis when it was at its peak. At the end of the day, the government came and started building roads leading to some of their settlements.” "There was a time the government sited Army barracks in the same Mgbuji when they deployed soldiers to Ogbete Mgbuji, but unfortunately, the soldiers have been withdrawn. Again, from that location to Abor is very far away," Okibe narrated. According to him, there's no presence of government in the Eha-Ohalaautonomous community, which comprises - Abor and Umujoovu. If you follow that vast portion of land, you will arrive in Benue State. So, we only have a boundary with Benue State. I don't know the reason why the Fulani people have refused to go.

Instead of leaving that area, they invite more people to come," he said. Lamenting the development, a woman leader, Mrs. Chinyere Odoebe, said that none of the affected communities knew what to do again. She said, “These are the challenges we have been facing all this while because none of our communities know what to do again. We are not equipped with the weapons they’re (Fulani Jihadists) carrying, so how can we combat people with AK-47 rifles? It is only the hunters and local vigilantes that are securing the community. What they have are Dane guns. And when the security agencies see you with Dane guns, you are accused of carrying weapons, but when Fulani herdsmen attack, you will not see them."

Imo: The Hope Uzodinma led Government of Imo State is widely fingered to have been conspiring with the Nigerian Government and external others in threatening and undermining the present and future territorial, citizen and property security and safety of the State and its citizens following “silence of the graveyard” or conspiracy of silence and growing inaction maintained by the State Government over increasing secret and unchecked jihadist Fulani Herdsmen attacks in various communities across the State over the years particularly since 2021; leading to death of not less than 2100 defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of the Imo hinterland. The above is to the extent that today, the State is saturated by jihadist activities of the Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in more than half of its 27 Local Government Areas widely believed to be under threats of attack or undergoing secret jihadist attacks targeted at defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of the State’s hinterland.

Jihadist attacks and influences of the Fulani Herdsmen and allied others have become regular and uncontrollable in several communities cutting across Onuimo, Owerri West, Owerri North, Okigwe, Ehime Mbano, Ohaji/Egbema, Oguta, Ideato South, Ideato North, Ngor-Okpala, Njaba, Orlu, Ezinifite-Mbaise, Nkwere, Nwangele, Isiala-Mbano and Mbaitoli Local Government Areas of the State. The totality of the above has endangered lives and properties and threatened their fundamental human rights to ethnic and religious identities including rights to be born, develop, free worshipand live in secured and protected environment; in addition to marking the present Government of the State out as one of those promoting religious violence and attacks on international freedom of religion or worship or belief, contrary to Sections 38 and 10 of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and globally proclaimed international human rights on freedom of religion .

It must also be pointed out that many jihadist activities of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in Igbo Land States of Anambra, Enugu, Imo and Ebonyi are either rarely reported or covered and suppressed or censored under the watch of the four indicted Govs including the Hope Uzodinma led Government of Imo State. There have several reports in recent times raising grievous concerns over the unchecked and untamed activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in different parts of Imo State, fueled by conspiracy of silence and growing inaction by the Hope Uzodinma Government of the State and deployed federal security agents and their commanders as well as sub-state actor vigilantes and their leaders operating in the State. A clear case in point was a Special Report published by the 247ureports of March 12, 2025, and captioned: “How Northerners (led by Muslim Jihadist Herdsmen) Took Over Imo Forests, kidnap, Rape Women”.

According to the Report, “Apart from those in federal security service such as police, army, immigration and their like, other northerners who reside in Imo State and other parts of the South-East do menial jobs like sale of petty groceries, itinerant shoe mending, cattle-rearing and scavenging for scrap metals. They also do commuter motorcycle operations. You also have the Malams who trade in currencies at Ama Hausa (Hausa settlements) in the region. Their population is larger in the menial job category.

Another enterprise they have now taken to is kidnapping-for-ransom and kidnapping-for-Islamic conversion. The kidnappers among the northerners have taken over forests in Imo State. Forests in Owerri West, Owerri North and Ngor/Okpala Local Government Areas, among others scattered across the State are now both homes and hideouts of many Northerners resident in Imo State. They also reside in forests in Ihube in Okigwe Local Government Area of the Sate. Daily, they kidnap indigenes and residents of Ihiagwa, Obinze, Avu, Oforola, Obibiezena and Eziobodo communities and many others, and demand and seize ransoms ranging from N1million to N5million or more paid to them by relations and friends of their unfortunate captives before they free them. Some however manage to escape from the kidnappers’ hideouts alive to narrate sordid experiences they passed through. Some do not live to relate their stories as we hear they are slaughtered and their parts sometimes made merchandise of or dumped in the forests to decay and return to dust.

“Hardly does any day pass by without cases of kidnappingbeing reported in the communities mentioned above. Severally, indigenes of the affected communities and concerned citizens have cried out and called on the security agents to rescue them. Activist and broadcaster, Theodore Chinonso Ubah popularly known as Nonsonkwa has severally cried out in his repeated calls on security operatives to come to the aid of the State and its defenseless citizens. Nonsonkwacannot fathom why Jihadist Herdsmen kidnapping should be thriving in places like Ihiagwa, Avu, Okolochi, Obibiezena, etc., when the Barrack of the 34 Field Artillery Brigade FABof Nigerian Army is domiciled at Obinze, a shouting distance to the affected communities. Also, police stations equally dot the area’s landscape.”

“On Monday, January 29, 2024, operatives of the Imo State Police Command raided the hideout of Jihadist Herdsmen kidnappers in a forest in Avu and Ihiagwa communities in Owerri West Local Government Area of Imo State andarrested five suspected kidnappers who are of the Hausa/Fulani stock. They were Muazu Awuta, 30 years; Abdullahi Abubakar, 32 years; Ozeru Sabo, 25 years; Saddam Suleiman, 27 years; and Bashir Yahaya, 28 years. All five suspects hailed from Jau Local Government Area of Jigawa State. The spokesman of the police in the state DSP Henry Okoye disclosed that the police discovered two decomposing corpses suspected to be kidnap victims while combing the forest. Okoye added that the police intend to conduct DNA tests to establish the identities of the decomposing corpses. The kidnappers of northern hue operating in Imo State seem to have acquired a certain audacity that is difficult to comprehend. On March 2, 2025, the Imo State Police Command again raided a forest in Irete Community in Owerri West Local Government Area of the State and rounded up three kidnap suspects who are northerners including Suleiman Ahmed, 26 years; Mohammed Salisu, 31 years and Gambo Jefta, 26 years; all from Jigawa State”.

“These persons of underworld deploy weapons of mass destruction in carrying out their dastardly enterprise includingassault rifles to fabricated shotguns and machetes. On Friday, March 7, 2025, kidnappers of Fulani stock (Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen) invaded communities in Ngor/Okpala Local Government Area located along the Owerri -Aba Expressway, taking captive passengers being conveyed in a commuter bus. Some of the passengers managed to escape while others were not lucky, and nobody knows the fate of the kidnapped passengers till date. In 2020 at the height of COVID-19 scare, reports had it that some 100 young Fulani boys were nabbed at Makurdi, capital of Benue State with motorcycles”.

“Upon interrogation, they reportedly confessed travelling to Imo State to undertake commuter motorcycle business (a decoy for engaging in jihadist conducts). Earlier, these northerners carried out raping of women and mothers in farmlands in Imo State. At a point, female farmers stopped going to farms for fear of sexual molestation. An X user recently alleged of a grand plan by northerners to overrun Enugu State, dislodge the traditional institution there and install Emir of Enugu. He further alleged that the plan once achieved would pave way for more incursions into Imo and Anambra States. With stories emanating from kidnap victimsin the hands of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in Anambra and Imo States, this plan is at the verge of being accomplished”.

According to another Report, dated March 5, 2025, courtesy of Akelicious Online News, “despite the presence of heavy security personnel around the Egbema Production Centre guarding some oil companies at Obiakpu autonomous community in Ohaji/Egbema Local Government Area of Imo State, (Fulani) bandits are said to have taken over the Ukwugba area of the community. The indigenes Ukwugba are said to be presently homeless as many have packed their belongings and fled to neighboring communities where they are seeking refuge. The incident is said to have been ongoing for about two weeks. The indigenes have therefore called on Gov Hope Uzodinma to urgently intervene.

The eze-elect of the community, Chief Ndubueze Nwokomasaid, “Around the Centre, the Nigeria Army has its duty post, the Nigeria Police Force has a station which is some meters away from this post, and the Nigeria Civil Defense and Security Corps are always on patrol in the localities, including the DSS and the vigilantes, yet there are alleged incessant killings in Ukwugba for the past two weeks.” He said that there were emerging indications to suggest that the bandits operate close to the area where these heavy security outfits are stationed. The eze-elect therefore opined that there was a need for Governor Uzodimma to beef up security in the Obiakpuautonomous community, especially the Ukwugba area, a more crack team of security personnel should be drafted to the area”.

Ebonyi: The Francis Nwifuru led Government of EbonyiState is widely fingered to have been conspiring with the Nigerian Government and external others in threatening and undermining the present and future territorial, citizen and property security and safety of the State and its citizens following “silence of the graveyard” or conspiracy of silence and inaction maintained by the State Government over increasing secret and unchecked jihadist Fulani Herdsmen attacks in various communities across the State over the yearsor since 2015; leading to death of not less than 1000 defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of the Ebonyi hinterland including not less than 100 since June 2023 immediately after the emergence of Francis Nwaifuru as Gov of the State.

This is to the extent that today, the State is saturated by jihadist activities of Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in at least five of the State’s 13 Local Government Areas widely believed to be under threats of attack or undergoing secret attacks targeted at defenseless Trado-Judeo-Christians of the State’s hinterland. The affected five Local Government Areas included Ishielu, Ohaukwu, Ishiagu (Ivo LGA), Izzi and Ikwo. It must also be pointed out that many jihadist activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others in South-East States of Anambra, Enugu, Imo and Ebonyi are either rarely reported or covered, suppressed or censored under the watch of the four indicted Govs including the Francis Nwaifuru led Government of Ebonyi State.

Several reports across Ebonyi State have continued to expose the unchecked and untamed jihadist activities of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and allied others, with most of the attacks coming from Ebonyi State boundary with Benue State including Izzi, Ishiagu (Ivo LGA), Ohaukwu, Ishielu and Ikwo Local Government Areas. Such attacks are divided into “secret abductions and killings” and “open invasions and killings”; out of which higher death tolls are recorded in the former which usually go unreported or subjected to state actor suppression when noticed. The above situations are also applicable in Enugu, Anambra and Imo States.

The deployed security forces in the South-East, drawn from police crack squads and officers and personnel of the military are further found to be working hand in hand with the Governments of the indicted four South-East Govs in shifting blames during such Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen invasions and attacks including covering them up and cowardly blaming them on “IPOB/ESN” or “Unknown Gunmen”. Where such attacks are courageously reported by independent media organizations or human rights bodies or whistle blowers, the Governments of the indicted four South-East Govs and deployed security agencies will stop at nothing to mangle or suppress their casualty figures or death tolls as well as figures of the properties lost or destroyed. They also hardly go after the real attackers and in some, if not in many cases, members of the victim-communities or population are targeted for arrest and false labeled; arrested, paraded and indefinitely detained and routinely tortured as “hoodlums responsible for the attacks”; during which too outcries or “disproportionate reprisals” from aggrieved members of the public or victim-communities are met with maximum force including mass arrests and razing down of communal homes and other properties.

A typical case in point was the February 1, 2025, Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen attack in Amegu-Nkalaha Community in Ishielu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State, leading to death of as much as 20 defenseless citizens including members and pastors of the Lord’s Chosen Ministry Int’l. Till date, none of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen responsible for the dastardly act or jihadist attack on the defenseless rural Christian and animist Community of Nkalaha-IshieluCommunity has been apprehended. Instead, the Francis Nwaifuru led Government of the State sent a team of Anti-Kidnapping Unit of the Ebonyi State SCID to go after Comrade Igboayaka O. Igboayaka and caused him to be abducted in Owerri on Saturday, February 8, 2025 and taken to Abakiliki, the Ebonyi State Capital where he was clamped into detention in the past 53 days or Feb 8-March 31, 2025; for “defaming and injuring the person of Gov Francis Nwaifuru and lying against him”.

It was further reported that Comrade Igboayaka’s lawyers later filed Fundamental Human Rights application before the Abakiliki Federal High Court which granted him bail with stringent conditions on March 12, 2025, which were later fulfilled, leading to his release on March 19, 2025; with his matter adjourned to May 8, 2025. Comrade Igboayaka O. Igboayaka is the president of the Ohanaeze Youth Council and was abducted by Gov Francis Nwaifuru’s men on the night ofSaturday, Feb 8, 2025, at Ochez Suites, Works Layout, Owerri, Imo State capital at the venue of their National Convention during which he was reelected as president of OYC. Comrade Igboayaka had after the Nkalaha-IshieluJihadist Fulani Herdsmen attack issued a statement on February 4, 2025, titled: “We Alerted Ebonyi Governor Four Days Before Deadly 'Herdsmen Attack'”, calling on the Gov to sit up and secure the State from the hands of the Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen.

Soldiers Refused To Act As Ebonyi Deputy Gov Accused Of Cracking Down On The Victims: According to the SaharaReporters of February 4, 2025, “residents of AmeguNkalaha Community have accused the Nigerian military and the police of complicity in the February 2, 2025 Fulani herdsmen attack, alleging that they were warned not to leave the community on Saturday (February 1, 2025), only for the attackers to strike the next day without any intervention from security forces. They also noted that the soldiers after the attack returned and seized their phones; preventing thevillagers from documenting the carnage and alerting the world.” SaharaReporters on Monday reported that at least 16(death toll has since risen to 20) residents were gruesomely slaughtered in the attack which took place on Sunday morning, with at least 25 houses being razed completely.Eyewitnesses described how the attackers struck on Sunday while residents were in church, burning houses and yam barns, and slitting the throats of some victims. Others were shot dead”.

“One resident, Simon Edeze, said that soldiers seized phones from community members who were documenting the aftermath of the attack, threatening to destroy their homes if they saw any videos or pictures of the carnage. “Worse still, when they came the soldiers seized the phone of our people who were making videos and threatened that if they saw videos of the carnage and pictures of the destruction they would come and destroy them,”

Simon Edeze, whose phone was seized, narrated. According to him, “After they carried 10 corpses of our people recovered including a retired policeman namely Mr. James Ogbu, from different locations they were slaughtered, the soldiers returned and handed back the phones seized from the people.” The community also criticized the deputy governor of Ebonyi, Mrs. Patricia Obila, for allegedly ordering mass arrests in the community and accusing residents of killing cows belonging to Fulani herdsmen, without visiting the community to condole with the victims’ families. “Even the deputy governor of Ebonyi, Mrs. Patricia Obila, was the one telling the police that they should go for mass arrest in our community, accusing our people of killing cows belonging to the Fulani herdsmen. Residents expressed frustration that the government only responds when cows are reported killed but remains silent when their farms and crops are destroyed and lives and other properties wantonly destroyed by the same cows and their herders.

On the same February 4, 2025, the SaharaReporters reported that residents of Eboh Community in neighboring Eha-Amufu, Isi-Uzo Local Government of Enugu State were fleeing their homes over Herdsmen Killings in neighboring Ebonyi Villages; to the extent that women and children below age of 18 years had already fled the agrarian community which had witnessed several attacks and abduction by Fulani Herdsmen in collaboration with neighboring Benue State communities since 2021. The carnage they (Fulani Herdsmen) visited in the neighboring Nkalaha Community on Sunday, which left at least 16 persons dead, and 25 houses other valuable assets burned has sent shockwaves to our community. SaharaReporters reported on November 2024, how three farmers from the neighboring Mgbuji community were murdered by same Fulani herdsmen while trying to occupy their farmlands near the boundary with Benue State. Video clips seen had shown one of the victims slaughtered inside his Rice farm lying beside a basket cassava, he reportedly harvested before he was attacked. It would be recalled that suspected Fulani militias under President Muhammadu Buhari, had sacked over 20 farm settlements in Eha-Amufu communities and killed no less than 123 locals between 2019 and 2022, which further rose to over 150 as of March 2025.

Similarly, according to the Vanguard Newspaper of June 1, 2021, Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen on May 30, 2021, attacked seven Igbo villages cutting across Izzi and Ohaukwu Local Government areas of Ebonyi State, displaced over 3000 persons and killed more than 30. The attack, carried out by suspected herdsmen in the boundary area of Ebonyi/Benue affected seven Igbo Christian villages of Ndigwe, Ataloga, Odokem, Ekile, Nduobasi,, Ekpufu and Obakota located in Izzi and Ohaukwu Local Government Areas of Ebonyi State, leading to the death of over 30 indigenes of the State and several survivors taken to the Alex-Ekweme Federal University Teaching Hospital, Abakaliki for treatment. The residents of these villages were completely displaced in the attack and scores of others were never found and have remained missing with further deaths reported.

Sixteen (16) Manifestations Of State Jihadism In Nigeria

1. Alleged Nationalization and ‘Islamization’ of Muslim Fulani Cattle Herding and their outdated cow grazing routes and systems including the 2023 creation of “the Federal Ministry of (Fulani) Livestock Development”

2. Alleged introduction of a flurry of ‘State Jihadism’-friendly plans and projects and their nationalization and ‘Islamization’ using disguised names such as “RUGA” (a Fulani word for “human settlement in host or rival communities using outdated rural cattle grazing methods”), “National Waterway Control (NWC)”, “National Livestock Transformation Plan(NLTP)”, “Nigerian Military Cattle Ranching (NMR)”, “National Cattle/Livestock Ranching (NCR)”, “National Livestock Development Plan (NLDP)”,“FADAMA” (Hausa word for “irrigation in the north for enhancement of agriculture and livestock), “Federal Grazing Route and Reserve Mapping and Digitization (FGRRMD)”, etc.

3. Alleged “Preferential and Above-the-Law” treatments to members of the Hausa-Fulani Muslim civilian population in Nigeria or any part thereof including favorable treatments and protections to them during law enforcements and law enforcement operations.

4. Alleged security forces’ little or zero law enforcement actions against Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and their atrocious conducts including massacre of tens of thousands of members of Trado-Judeo-Christian population and allied atrocities including unchecked abductions, disappearances, kidnapping-for-ransom,kidnapping-for-radical Islamism and widespreaddestruction of properties (churches, other worship centers, farmlands and dwelling homes).

5. Alleged ethno-religious radicalization of the country’s security forces including police, military, secret police and paramilitaries since 2015 and maximum protection to Hausa-Fulani Muslim population and massive deployment of media and publicity and State resources in the protection of their interests as against little or zero media and publicity and State resources for their counterparts in other ethnic and religious groupings.

6. Alleged forceful ceding of acutely scarce communal lands in the South-East and their alleged taking over by the Federal Government for remote purposes of nationalizing ethnic Fulani occupational interests of cattle herding or rearing and their Islamization.

7. Alleged complacency and remote backing by Nigerian Government through inaction and unwillingness, of organized, systematic and egregious attacks by Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen against Trado-Judeo-Christian communities and villages and their natives and properties including churches, other worship centers and dwelling homes.

8. Alleged turning of the country’s National Broadcasting outfits such as the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) into a national instrument for propagation of Islamism and promotion of related Islamic programs, contrary to Nigeria’s secular status as a country of multicultural, multiethnic and multireligious compositions; in defiance of Section 10 of the 1999 Constitution; leading to psychological Islamization of members of other religious faiths.

9. Alleged institutionalization and nationalization of “Muslim-Muslim” presidency or “Muslim Presidency” and “Muslim Vice-Presidency”; the first of its kind in the country’s civil rule since 1960.

10. Alleged introduction of forceful shutdown of all public schools in Northern Nigeria during the month of Muslim Ramadan, the first of its kind in the history of the country and despite over 30m indigenous Christians in the North and estimated over 10m non-indigenous others in the Region.

11. Alleged organized and systematic moves with strongly suspected remote backing from federal establishments to forcefully introduce Islamic Shariah or Islamic Criminal Law in Southern part of Nigeria, a predominantly Christian region-with a takeoff target in the South-West.

12. Alleged remote State inaction and sanctioned indiscriminate lynching or open mob-killing of evangelical Christians and moderate Muslims for “blasphemy” and Nigeria’s security forces’ inaction and complacency.

13. Alleged judicial conspiracy and complacency in non-protection of citizens of Nigerians against radical Islamism by handing down pro jihadist judgments in fragrant breach of the citizens’ right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion in Section 38 of the 1999 Constitution (see the recent Supreme Court verdict on Adamawa Farmer, Sunday Jackson v attacking Fulani Herdsmen: SC/CR/1026/2022/2025).

14. Alleged blunt and blatant refusal of the present and successive Federal Governments in Nigeria to declare or designate Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen as a “terrorist group” since 2015 and decriminalization of their jihadist and genocidal activities as “activities of criminal herdsmen resulting from Herders-Farmers’ Clashes”; despite the group being responsible for tens of thousands of deaths on the grounds of religion and ethnicity in the past ten years or since 2015 and destruction or burning down of over 6000 churches and tens of thousands of dwelling homes as well as seizure and confiscation of hundreds of thousands of hectares of indigenous Christians and animists’ lands and sacking of over 2000 of their communities in places like Benue, Nasarawa, Plateau, Taraba, Southern Kaduna, Kogi, Niger, Kebbi, Adamawa and recently in Edo, Delta, Enugu, Ebonyi, Imo, etc.

15. Alleged discriminatory and selective law enforcements and law enforcement operations by Nigeria’s security forces particularly military personnel and members of police crack squads including turning blind eyes or doing little or nothing against the terror activities of Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen and Jihadist Fulani Bandits including dubbing them “repentant bandits” and offering them amnesties in the North and conversely visiting criminal parties and members of the defenseless civilian population and their communities and properties in the South with maximum force, state terror and war-grade attacks.

A clear case in point was the distress report by The Truth-Nigeria, dated February 26, 2025, captioned: “As Many as 200 Nigerian Christian Captives Starved and Tortured by Fulani Terrorists Near Army Base in Kaduna…As Terrorist Hostage Camp Abides in Shadow of Military Bases in Kachia”. The distress report held that “after three harrowing months (Dec 2024-Feb 2025) in captivity, eight abductees emerged on Monday following payment of a ₦40 million ($27,000 USD) ransom to Fulani Ethnic Militia operating a hidden torture camp in Kachia County. The county is home to Table Hill Army Training Area and the Nigerian Army School of Artillery, among other military sites. The heavily armed kidnappers had seized them Dec 2, 2024, from their homes in Kauru County, Kaduna State, Northwest Nigeria. The 26 Pentecostal Christians were marched more than 30 miles over a four-day period until they came to be chained in a compound deep in the forest near the village of Rijana, approximately 28 miles south of Kaduna City”.

“The Rijana Village in Kachia County, a neighborhood on the Kaduna-Abuja Expressway, has been an infamous kidnapping haven for more than eight years. The Truth-Nigeria can exclusively report that as many as 200 tortured Christian hostages remain in a forested compound near Rijana and are in danger of execution any day. The 8 released captives interviewed on Feb 23 by Truth-Nigeria reporters had been whipped and starved by Fulfulde-speaking kidnappers for close to 90 days before their N40 million ransom had been paid”.The fate of the 200 Christian hostages in jihadists’ hands near Army bases remained totally unclear as of March 4, 2025. For more details, see the links here: https://truthnigeria.com/2025/02/christiancaptivesstarvedtorturedbyfulaniterrorists/ , https://apnews.com/press-release/ein-presswire-newsmatics/christian-hostages-judd-saul-nigeria-government-abuja-district-of-columbia-fde6223b0523c0ff81b695eb7bff4a82

16. Alleged forceful yearly conversion of tens of thousands of Christian Minors and adults to Islam and complicity of the authorities of the Northern State Governments. According to The Truth-Nigeria Report of Monday, March 31, 2025, captioned: “The Grooming and Forced Conversion of Christian Girls in Northern Nigeria”, over 20 cases of Christian girls held in government-controlled shelters across Yobe, Adamawa, Gombe, Bauchi, and Kano have been documented. “State Governments are funding organizations like the Dawah Council and Islamic Propagation Centers,” Rev David Ayuba Azzaman said. “These groups target Christian girls from poor backgrounds, seducing them into Islam and forced marriages”, he further told The Truth-Nigeria.

“A Nigeria Police Force source in Yobe corroborated the scale, revealing over 300 cases of Christian girls are “held and groomed for marriage to Muslims.” Local Christian leaders report a systematic tactic: Muslim men groom girls with gifts, pressure them to convert, and use groups like ACC (Adamawa Concerned Citizens) to legitimize underage unions. Adamawa’s ACC is a State Government-funded Muslim-majority group accused of systematically converting underage girls and arranging child marriages. There have been several reports of various State Governments and their Govs in Northern Nigeria funding forceful conversion of tens of thousands of Christian minors to Islam particularly in the camps of the Internally Displaced Persons and centers where Christian minors rescued from Jihadist Kidnappers are kept”. Such reports have been going on and had become widespread since July 2015, a month and few days after Retired Major Gen Muhammad Buhari took over as Nigeria’s fifth civilian president. Culpable Northern State Governments include Borno, Kebbi, Adamawa, Katsina, Yobe, Bauchi, Niger, Kaduna, Zamfara, Kano, Kogi, etc. For more details, see the link here: https://truthnigeria.com/2025/03/the-grooming-and-forced-conversion-of-christian-girls-in-northern-nigeria/

End.
Signed:
For: International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

/s E. Umeagbalasi
• Emeka Umeagbalasi
Criminologist And Conflict and Peace Studies’ Scholar

Lead-Researcher/Head
International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

/s. C. Umeche
• Chinwe Umeche, Esquire
Human Rights Lawyer/Head, Democracy and Good Governance

International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

/s. O.J. Igboeli
• Obianuju Joy Igboeli, Esquire
Human Rights Lawyer/Head, Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

/s. E. B. Umeagu
• Engineer Ekene Bede Umeagu
Head, Religious Freedom and Human Rights
International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law

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