By Abubakar Adam Ibrahim
Just as the Nigerian National Assembly was debating how to unravel the electoral reforms to reintroduce many transmissions of results during elections, two US Congressmen introduced a bill in the US Congress seeking to address what it described as the systematic persecution of Christians in Nigeria.
Both bills are packaged as one thing. In reality, they are something else. The NASS reforms are concerned with dumbing down the electoral system instead of improving it; the bill sought to regress to the pre-2023 electoral period that allowed greater flexibility for manipulating election results.
For valid reasons, Nigerians were concerned about the proposed changes, and in the end, the Senate adopted a dual system that retains electronic transmission of the results alongside manual transmission when there are technical hitches. It seemed like a compromise, but it is a victory for those who favoured manual transmission. The likelihood of electronic transmission of results suffering inexplicable technical hitches, disappearances, and other unfortunate accidents on election days has just increased.
In essence, the reform is not meant to protect the votes of Nigerians but to protect certain politicians’ access to rigging elections. The focus on the bill demonstrates that the attention of our leaders is focused on retaining power ahead of the general elections next year, not on securing the lives of Nigerians, of which another 170 were massacred just last week in Kwara.
Yes, the Senate held an emergency session following the massacre and made three key resolutions that included calling on the federal government to intensify rescue operations, reform the security architecture in the country, and provide humanitarian support. However, the performative urgency has already given way to the desire to preserve power. The narrative and focus have already shifted, and the victims of the massacre are all but forgotten.
We have seen this cycle repeat itself over and over again. And it is this attitude to leadership, to the insecurity in the country that has allowed a situation where Congressman Chris Smith and Riley Moore, both Republicans, would push the “Nigeria Religious Freedom and Accountability Act of 2026” in the US Congress.
The facts are simple. Nigeria is facing enormous security problems. Hundreds of people are being killed, and millions are being displaced by a variety of actors, including terrorist organisations, ethnic militias, secessionist agitators, and criminal elements with no loyalty to any ideology other than their self-serving interests. The most glaring fact, though, remains that the Nigerian government is floundering, completely unable to stem the tide of this violent wave that is sweeping away its population irrespective of their faith or ethnicity.
In a desperate situation such as we find ourselves, prioritising human life takes precedence over national pride—considering ours has been shot to pieces by the irreverent sons of the winds our country has ceded our peace of mind to. Yet this bill is as controversial as the whole narrative that has framed it. This bill is clearly afflicted by malnourished, dodgy data collection methods from nebulous characters with dubious intents.
I support naming, shaming, and prosecuting the sponsors or beneficiaries of this violence. I completely endorse sanctions against these parties and organisations. I would love to see the day that these individuals are made to suffer the consequences of what they have done to our beloved country and its people. That is why we cannot afford to get this wrong by targeting the wrong people and driving a questionable narrative for very dubious motives.
The bill has a good point. S(10), for instance, suggests offering “technical support to the Government of Nigeria to reduce and then
Nigerians, Muslims and Christians are dying. If the Nigerian government had lived up to its responsibilities, all this debate, bloodletting, and massacres of both its Muslim and Christian populations would not have been happening.
eliminate violence from armed Fulani militias, including disarmament programmes and comprehensive counter-terrorism cooperation to rid the region of Foreign Terrorist Organisations that pose a direct threat to the American homeland.” While questions about how this poses a direct threat to the US homeland remain, the reality is that it has threatened, directly, the Nigerian homeland, and getting rid of it by all means necessary at this point looks like a viable option.
So, the deployment of US troops in Nigeria, for an undisclosed mission, and another 200 to help train Nigerian troops, the optics aside, seem like necessary steps and offers of much-needed assistance. But it is crucial that we go beyond the optics, which this bill tends to dwell on.
The key demand of the bill is the invocation of the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, which is a key US law that allows the executive branch to impose targeted sanctions on foreign individuals and entities responsible for serious human rights abuses or even significant corruption anywhere in the world. Senators Smith and Moore recommended sanctions on the following: (A) Fulani-ethnic nomad militias in Nigeria; (B) Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, former Kano State Governor; (C) Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN); and (D) Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore.
The inclusion of Rabiu Kwankwaso as the only individual named and recommended for the Magnitsky hammer is a head-scratcher.
Kwankwaso has been a distinguished politician in Nigeria and a great champion of education. His government and Kwankwasiyya movement have prided themselves on providing scholarships to thousands of Kano indigenes to study all over the world. Kwankwaso seems like the least likely person one could pin an extremist tag on. Yes, his government, like 11 others in Nigeria in the early 2000s, proclaimed sharia law as the law of their states due to popular demands from the people of those states; it is hard to justify his inclusion on the list.
Unless the US, or rather Senators Smith and Moore, have some intelligence we are unaware of regarding his involvement. If that is the case, the senators would do well to share reports that indict him and warrant his naming. Otherwise, Kwankwaso should seek legal redress. Considering where the Senators have been getting their data from, it is hard to rule out a political motivation for naming Kwankwaso on this list.
When subjected to scrutiny, this bill can be faulted as a violation of the US Constitution. The establishment clause of the First Amendment of the US Constitution is very clear when it proclaims that Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion. By all interpretations, this clause prevents the US government from favouring one religion over another. The US Supreme Court’s non-discrimination framework categorically establishes that the government must remain neutral and cannot treat people or organisations differently solely because of their religion.
So, when you have a bill that is framed, through its deliberate diction, as protecting members of one religion at the expense of another who incidentally are suffering similar atrocities, and expressly calls, as this one does, for “prioritising persecuted Christian communities,” it goes against the very tenet of the First Amendment of the US Constitution. As does the $5.1 billion MOU the US government signed in December with Nigeria that explicitly prioritises support for Christian healthcare facilities and Christian populations in Nigeria.
These are narratives that the US government cannot push in the US because Americans are well aware that the US is not a Christian state—as the US Constitution expressly forbids it to be— regardless of how much Sen. Smith and Moore want to present it as. Any such attempts in the country will face enormous backlash.
If the US is truly desirous of helping Nigeria, for the sake of its “national security and foreign policy interests,” as the bill suggests, it should do so without trying to permanently rip the fabric of Nigerian society by advancing a poorly constructed, poorly researched narrative. If the 170 people massacred in Kwara, and the 30 massacred in Niger State recently, had been Christians, not Muslims, it would have fed into this narrative. But because they are Muslims, it is being glossed over.
Nigerians, Muslims and Christians are dying. If the Nigerian government had lived up to its responsibilities, all this debate, bloodletting, and massacres of both its Muslim and Christian populations would not have been happening. Neither would some foreign congressman use the country to present themselves as religious champions while ignoring the mental health emergency in the White House, the racism, and Gestapo-styled ICE raids in their country. So maybe this time, Nigeria needs to prioritise its national security, not just the next elections.
Abubakar Adam Ibrahim, a columnist with Daily Trust, can be reached through abubakaradam@dailytrust.com
Twitter: @Abbakar_himself
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