Former Chief Whip and current Senator representing Borno South, Ali Ndume, has blamed the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration and the Senate for the tagging of Nigeria by the United States President, Donald Trump, as ‘Country of Particular Concern.’
Senator Ndume, in a statement on Saturday in Abuja, accused both the executive and legislative arms of complacency, saying their failure to proactively engage the United States (U.S.) government on the alleged persecution of Christians in Nigeria led to the development.
The Senator recalled that he had earlier sponsored a motion in the Senate on “Christian genocide” in the country. The motion, he said, led to resolutions mandating the Nigerian government to engage the U.S. with verified facts and figures.
President Trump had on Friday, announced the designation of Nigeria as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’ over alleged persecution of Christians.
Trump made the announcement via a post on his Truth Social platform, which was also shared on the official White House X handle.
“Thousands of Christians are being killed. Radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter,” President Trump wrote.
But the Nigerian government swiftly rejected the claims, insisting that Trump’s assessment did not reflect the true situation in the country.
However, Senator Ndume accused the Tinubu administration and the Senate of treating the allegation raised by US lawmaker, Riley Moore, with complacency, prior to Trump’s declaration, and urged the federal government to take urgent steps to engage the US government with facts and figures on the activities of terrorists’ organisation which he noted were blind to faith.
“I have alerted the government, I even moved a motion. Nigeria is a sovereign state, it isn’t about what the United States can do to us, but about the misconception and the ripple effects of classifying us as a country of concern.
“We should engage the American government by presenting facts and figures. By engaging the US government, we should demand that they hear the other side of the story from the Nigerian government and the Muslim community. Muslims have been killed too. The genocide isn’t against Christians but Nigerians generally,” he said.
