The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has urged the U.S. State Department to redesignate Nigeria as a “country of particular concern” (CPC) for its egregious violations of religious liberty.
“The State Department designated Nigeria as a CPC in 2020 for the first time, an action USCIRF has recommended every year since 2009,” the USCIRF notes in its 2022 report released April 25. “In 2021, the State Department chose not to redesignate Nigeria as a CPC, despite religious freedom conditions in the country not changing significantly from the previous year.
“Furthermore, the State Department completely bypassed downgrading the country to the SWL [Special Watch List], indicating that Nigeria is a country with no severe religious freedom violations as defined by IRFA [International Religious Freedom Act of 1998],” the report adds.
In detailing the reasons for designating Nigeria as a CPC, the report states that religious freedom conditions in Nigeria remained poor in 2021 as “both state and nonstate actors continued to commit widespread and egregious religious freedom violations.”
A kidnapped girl reacts as she prepares to reunite with family members in Jangebe, Zamfara State, on March 3, 2021, after she was kidnapped from a boarding school in northwestern Nigeria last week on February 26, 2021. Hundreds of girls who were kidnapped from a boarding school in northwestern Nigeria last week have been freed, the local governor told AFP on March 2, 2021. (AMINU ABUBAKAR/AFP via Getty Images)
“Despite Nigeria’s constitution protecting religious freedom, Nigerian citizens faced blasphemy charges and convictions, violence, and attacks during religious ceremonies,” it finds.
The report goes on to say that a diverse array of nonstate actors in Nigeria also “continued to conduct attacks on houses of worship, religious leaders, and religious congregations in 2021,” which includes the burning of churches and the slaying of numerous Christian leaders and faithful.
“At least 13 religious leaders were kidnapped for ransom over the course of the year, including eight priests, two pastors, and two imams,” it adds, and “…the Nigerian government has often failed to respond sufficiently to violence against religious leaders and congregations.”
In a statement released in November 2021, USCIRF said it was “appalled” at the decision of the Biden administration to remove Nigeria from the list of CPCs.
USCIRF said it was “unexplainable that the U.S. Department of State did not redesignate Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) and treated it as a country with no severe religious freedom violations.”
“While the State Department took steps forward on some designations, USCIRF is especially displeased with the removal of Nigeria from its CPC designation, where it was rightfully placed last year,” said USCIRF Chair Nadine Maenza.
Moreover, the CEO of Open Doors USA, David Curry, called the State Department’s removal of Nigeria from the CPC list a “baffling error,” which is “likely in direct violation of the International Religious Freedom Act, the law that requires these designations to be made in the first place.”
In its World Watch List 2021, Christian persecution watchdog group Open Doors declared: “More Christians are murdered for their faith in Nigeria than in any other country.”
Clergymen carry coffins containing the bodies of priests and worshippers allegedly killed by Fulani herdsmen in north-central Nigeria on May 22, 2018. (PIUS UTOMI EKPEI/AFP via Getty Images)
The primary driver of anti-Christian violence in Nigeria is Islamic extremism, Open Doors stated, coming from a variety of groups: the Boko Haram terror group, Hausa-Fulani militant Muslim raiders, and the affiliates of the Islamic State ISWAP, which operate in the North and Middle Belts of Nigeria but are becoming more common elsewhere.
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