Fourteen members of the U.S. Congress have written to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, urging him to reverse the delisting Nigeria as Country of Particular Concern (CPC) for religious persecution.
Saying that they were “deeply troubled by your recent decision to remove Nigeria from the list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC),” the U.S. lawmakers said that the decision was “highly suspect, as it came just days before your trip to Africa to meet with Nigerian officials.”
The letter to Secretary Blinken reads: “One of our founding ideals as a nation is to allow citizens the freedom to practice religion and to maintain that freedom to do so. As a result of this core value, we as a nation are compelled to promote religious freedom around the world and point it out when other counties are not. We are deeply troubled by your recent decision to remove Nigeria from the list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC).
“This decision is egregious. Your action undermines the United States’ commitment to protecting international religious freedom. Nigeria, being the most populous country in Africa, is home to 80 million professing Christians. Millions of Christians living in Nigeria face some of the worst acts of persecution, causing many to flee as a result of the devastating violence.
“Since June of 2015, there have been 11,000 Nigerian Christians killed by jihadists, radicalized herdsmen from the Fulani tribe and the emerging Islamic terrorist group, Boko Haram. 1,202 of those killings happened in the first six months of 2020. In 2021 alone, an estimated 3,462 Christians have been killed.
“We find this decision highly suspect, as it came just days before your trip to Africa to meet with Nigerian officials. It also goes directly against the 2021 recommendations for Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) and Special Watch List (SWL) by United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).
“This decision is egregious. Your refusal to listen to the recommendations of the USCIRF and blatant disregard to the atrocities in Nigeria lacks necessary condemnation to those currently committing religious persecution abroad. We implore you to reconsider this decision.”
The letter was signed by the following members of Congress – Mary E. Miller, Mark Green, Gus Bilirakis, Tracy Mann, Michael Guest, Louie Gohmert, Bob Good, Ralph Norman, Vicky Hartzler, Mo Brooks, Brian Babin, Lauren Boebert, Dan Bishop and Michael Cloud.
Reacting to the letter, Nigerian-born international human rights lawyer, Emmanuel Ogebe, commended the Congressmen and women for the letter, stating that Secretary Blinken should “reverse” religious persecution delisting as it gives Nigeria “license to kill.”
According to Ogebe, “I thank the dozen congressmen and women of the US Congress who took the bold step of calling out the US Secretary of State for his ill-advised removal of Nigeria from the religious persecution list.
“Probably no policy position of the US government on Nigeria has attracted more universal condemnation than this. Indeed, the bipartisan US Commission on International Religious Freedom took the rare step of condemning a a fellow US government office – the U.S. State Department.
“Even members of the British House of Lords in the U.K. have similarly lampooned Secretary Blinken’s actions as have NGOs all over US, Europe and Nigeria. The action was baseless and amounts to voodoo diplomacy as even my during my latest visit to Nigeria last week, over a dozen Muslim worshippers were reportedly killed and women raped in mosques while dozens of hapless people were burnt alive in cars.
“Similarly, in addition to the failure of most States to complete their own #EndSARs investigations, even Lagos State that was hailed for exposing the truth of the Lekki massacre has now backpedaled and shot itself in the foot by denying that there was indeed a massacre.
“Accordingly, Secretary Blinken is urged to rethink the license to kill given to Nigeria especially as we mark the 5th anniversary of the Shiites massacre in Kaduna State. It is not too late to get it right, and Blinken owes it to humanity and himself not to screw up again this year.”
