Ordinarily, the pronouncements of the American president shouldn’t be of any consequential concern to us. But when he threatens to attack our beloved Nigeria, on whatever pretext, you can expect everyone from seasoned commentators to skit comedians to have an opinion. This has been the reality on social media over the past few days following Donald Trump’s threat to attack Nigeria over what he sees as a continued genocide against Christians in the country.
The past few days have been nothing short of sensational alarmism to lectures on sovereignty to crash courses on the history of American interventionism to conspiracy theories on Trump using claims of Christian genocide as a pretext to set up a military base in Nigeria to claims that Trump wants to attack Nigeria to get access to our minerals. As you would expect of any impassioned hotly debated topic online, insults have been thrown here and there, especially from those who are of the view that Trump wants to set up a military base in Nigeria and/or exploit Nigeria of its resources. Anyone who doesn’t share that view is immediately branded an oaf who has been parasitised by American propaganda.
Of course, the presidency has issued a characteristically terse statement to deny any targeted attack against Christians, citing provisions in the constitution that guarantee religious freedom for every Nigerian. A common retort that I’ve seen from northern Muslims is that, contrary to Trump’s claims of a Christian genocide, Muslims have actually been the biggest casualties of terrorism. Hence, Mr Trump can respectfully mind his business as he clearly does not know what he is talking about.
I’ll say that the past few days have exposed a lot of hypocrisies. And everyone is guilty of this. For starters, Donald Trump’s threat to attack Nigeria contravenes his campaign promise to stop all foreign interventions. His supporters often speak glowingly of his first term because he did not drag America into another senseless war. He has said over and over that he does not want America to be the police of the world – not least when America has got a ton of domestic problems to tackle. He won a sizeable number of independent voters into his MAGA coalition precisely because of his non-interventionism. Nothing then smacks of more hypocrisy than threatening to attack a country that has not constituted any military threat to America. I can imagine how this could be a divisive issue in the MAGA coalition in the coming days and weeks if Trump makes good on his threat.
However, a section of the MAGA base would be glad to see Trump attack enemies of Christianity either in America or halfway across the world. Christian nationalism is ascendant on the Right. And even though Trump is a caricature of a Christian, he panders to the evangelical base, for political reasons, of course. Evangelicals are fully aware of Trump’s moral failings. But they see him as their antidote to the woke extremism of the left. He is the man to fight against abortion, the transing of children, the erosion of Judeo-Christian values, cancel culture, and every other atrocity the left committed while they held sway in the culture.
Nothing also smacks of hypocrisy than the claim that Muslims have been the largest casualties of terrorism in northern Nigeria. Even if statistically more Muslims have indeed died from terrorists than Christians, implicit in that argument is an attempt to downplay the atrocities going on in the north. There couldn’t be a dumber retort. This is the cognitive dissonance one tends to find with northerners every time this issue comes up. The north is often not vocal about the killings in its region, even though they often would pull the more-Muslims-have-been-killed sleight of hand every time Christians decry the attacks against them. If truly northern Muslims believe they’ve been the largest casualties, there isn’t a commensurate response on their part in calling out the government for failing to protect them.
The north is more concerned with protecting its image than it is with addressing real issues like insecurity. In 2013, during the Goodluck Jonathan administration, then opposition candidate Muhammadu Buhari, in a radio interview, labelled Jonathan’s declaration of a state of emergency in Adamawa, Yobe, and Borno as an injustice against the north. Might I add that this was at the time the Boko Haram lunacy was at its peak in the region. But Buhari, a northerner, preferred that Jonathan did nothing about it, and if he did, it would be an attack on the north. In internet lingo, you can’t make this (sic) up!
Until recently, folks like Femi Fani-Kayode and Reno Omokri were vocal about the persecution of Christians in the north. Now, they sing a different tune because they are part of the APC establishment. How convenient. Even Tinubu once tweeted to condemn the persecution of Christians in the north during the Jonathan years. But today, he’s changed his tune. For Tinubu, he is in a dilemma. He has to deny that there is a Christian genocide in the north because he needs the north to get re-elected in 2027. Religion is a lightning rod in the north. He needs the optics of a president who is defending the sovereignty of Nigeria and the north against a kafir like Donald Trump to maintain his good standing with the northern elite. Atiku learned how much of a thorny issue religion is when he hurriedly condemned the murder of Deborah in 2023 over accusations of blasphemy. He was forced to recant. If they did that to Atiku, one of theirs, then Tinubu, a Yoruba man, has no choice but to disagree with Donald Trump, even if it means people will continue to die; Christian or Muslim.
Between Jonathan and Tinubu, we’ve had three presidents. Thousands have been killed under their watch. The problem is worse today. Jonathan’s major problem was Boko Haram. Today, the problem includes militia herders, ISWAP, bandits, kidnappers, and unknown gunmen. Jonathan lost in 2015 largely because of Boko Haram. Chibok girls were kidnapped under his watch. Entire local governments were overrun by flag-hoisting Boko Haram terrorists. But the north got used to it. They got numbed to it. Yet, it took a Donald Trump to make a couple of posts in 2025 to jolt the north back to the seriousness of this problem, even if his reasons are not entirely altruistic. Since 2009/10, it’s clear that we are incapable of ending this crisis without some help. Regardless of which group has suffered more, we can all agree that insecurity is rife in the north.
It’s worth stressing the damage insecurity has done to this country. Billions have been expended on the purchase of arms, the setting up of IDP camps, and the resettling of displaced populations. Insecurity has killed thousands, rendered millions orphans, widows, and widowers. Property and livelihood have been destroyed. The economy of the north-east has been decimated. Insecurity has derailed us from the path of growth and development. We’ve gotten so used to all this bloodshed and humanitarian crisis that it’s almost difficult to imagine what Nigeria was like before Boko Haram. It’s heart-wrenching to think that there is a generation of Nigerians who have no clue what peace feels like. I don’t care who has suffered more. It’s stupid to play fast and loose with statistics when people are evidently dying daily. Whatever Trump’s motivations are, perhaps a sensible approach would be to cooperate with him to exterminate these bastards. Because, as of now, he seems to be more interested in addressing this problem than the Nigerian government.
Guest