Nigerian Bishop Raises Alarm Over Christian Killings as New Data Points to Escalating Violence
By Globalvoice
Catholic Bishop of Makurdi, Bishop Wilfred Anagbe, has repeatedly warned U.S. lawmakers that Christians in Nigeria face what he describes as systematic violence and displacement, arguing that the attacks against communities in the Middle Belt represent more than isolated episodes of insecurity.
Anagbe has appeared before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee four times in July 2023, February 2024, March 2025 and November 2025 where he raised concerns about killings, displacement and the destruction of Christian farming communities.
Speaking to Globalvoice, Anagbe said the pattern of violence had become increasingly difficult to dismiss as ordinary communal conflict.
“The total elimination of the Christian population is underway,” Anagbe said.
He alleged that attacks frequently follow a recurring pattern involving civilian killings, destruction of churches and farmland, and the displacement of entire communities.
According to the bishop, the subsequent occupation of abandoned communities points to what he described as a deliberate campaign of displacement and Islamisation.
Those claims remain contested, with Nigerian government officials disputing descriptions of the violence as primarily religious persecution and instead emphasizing the country's broader security challenges.
New Data Fuels Debate Over Scale of Christian Killings
The renewed warning comes amid competing interpretations of the security crisis and its religious dimensions.
Field tracking data attributed to Equipping the Persecuted (ETP) recorded 4,216 Christians killed in Nigeria between January 1 and September 8, 2026. Based on that dataset, the figure represents an average of approximately 16.8 deaths per day, or one death every 86 minutes.
If that pace continued through the remainder of the year, the dataset would imply more than 6,000 deaths by the end of 2026. However, that is a projection rather than a confirmed year end figure, and the methodology and completeness of conflict related datasets should be considered when interpreting the numbers.
In its report, Crisis in the Middle Belt: Religious Persecution and Security Failure in Nigeria, ETP argued that framing attacks exclusively as farmer herder disputes risks overlooking cases involving religious persecution and other forms of organized violence.
The Nigerian government has rejected descriptions suggesting that the crisis can be reduced to a campaign against Christians.
Government officials have instead characterized the insecurity as a complex combination of factors, including farmer herder conflicts, competition over land and resources, terrorism, banditry and broader criminal activity.
Presidential Deputy Spokesperson Philip Agbese has previously described the national crisis as involving multiple, interconnected security and resource related disputes.
Scholars Debate Whether Christians Are Being Systematically Targeted
The question of whether Christians are being systematically targeted remains central to the international debate over Nigeria's security crisis.
Dr. Christopher Wadibia, described as an independent scholar of Nigerian religious movements, told Globalvoice that he believes Christian communities in parts of northern and central Nigeria are being deliberately targeted.
“Do I believe that Christian communities in Nigeria’s Middle Belt and North are being systematically targeted? Yes, I do,” Wadibia said.
He pointed to Nigeria's repeated appearance in international assessments of anti Christian violence as evidence supporting that interpretation.
Other analysts, however, stress that Nigeria's violence has multiple drivers and that religious identity can overlap with ethnic, political, economic and territorial disputes.
The distinction is important because the policy response differs depending on whether attacks are primarily understood as religious persecution, communal conflict, terrorism, criminal violence or a combination of these factors.
Weapons Supply and Communication Gaps Raise Security Concerns
Beyond the debate over motive, security analysts have identified weapons trafficking and inadequate communications infrastructure as major challenges facing rural communities.
Security analyst Dennis Amachree argued that security agencies need to investigate the networks responsible for supplying illegal firearms rather than focusing solely on intercepting individual shipments.
“Interceptions alone are not enough; there should be deeper investigations into those behind shipments of illegal arms, as well as arrests and prosecutions,” Amachree said.
He also pointed to smaller scale weapons smuggling, including firearms allegedly concealed within vehicle imports, while arguing that larger arms shipments warrant closer scrutiny.
Another vulnerability is the limited communications infrastructure available in many rural communities.
According to Amachree, poor mobile-network coverage can prevent residents from quickly alerting security agencies when attacks begin, potentially allowing violence to continue for hours before a response arrives.
Displacement Becomes a Central Security and Humanitarian Issue
The continuing violence has contributed to a major internal displacement crisis in Nigeria.
Data from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) cited in the report puts Nigeria's internally displaced population at more than 3.71 million.
The crisis is particularly severe in the Middle Belt, where communities affected by repeated attacks have been forced to abandon farms and ancestral settlements.
Conflict-monitoring data has also pointed to a significant deterioration in violence. Analysts associated with the ACLED Exploration Portal have identified the second quarter of 2026 as a particularly violent period in Nigeria, with attacks targeting civilians reportedly increasing by 30 percent compared with the previous quarter.
Such figures, however, measure recorded incidents and should not automatically be interpreted as evidence of a single coordinated campaign.
Controversy Over Closing IDP Camps
Government efforts to reduce reliance on internally displaced persons camps have generated another contentious debate.
Officials have promoted resettlement and the restoration of normal community life, but church leaders and human-rights advocates have questioned whether displaced families can safely return to areas where security threats remain.
Critics argue that permanently relocating communities away from their ancestral lands could create a situation in which victims lose access to farmland and property while armed groups effectively retain control of abandoned territory.
Fr. Remigius Ihyula of the Makurdi Diocese told Globalvoice that the ultimate objective should be to enable displaced communities to rebuild their lives on their ancestral lands.
“We must move beyond the ‘camp culture’ and restore the dignity of the people in order to restore the entire social and economic fabric,” Ihyula said.
He argued that displaced families should be supported to become self-reliant on land where their communities have historically lived and farmed.
Ihyula also raised concerns about the impact of prolonged displacement on children, education, healthcare and psychological wellbeing.
International Attention Intensifies
The debate over Nigeria's Christian communities is increasingly attracting international attention from religious-freedom organizations and humanitarian groups.
International comparisons have also been drawn with the experience of Christian communities displaced by ISIS in Iraq, where some communities eventually returned to villages destroyed during the conflict.
Mark von Riedemann, Director of Public Affairs at Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), has argued that international partnerships with local churches could help facilitate the safe return and reconstruction of displaced communities.
The central challenge for Nigeria remains balancing security, humanitarian assistance, religious freedom and the right of displaced citizens to return safely to their ancestral communities.
For Bishop Anagbe and other church leaders, the issue is fundamentally one of protecting vulnerable Christian communities. For federal authorities, the crisis encompasses a much broader security landscape involving terrorism, banditry, communal conflict, resource competition and criminal networks.
What remains undisputed is the scale of human suffering: thousands of Nigerians have been killed, millions displaced and numerous communities disrupted by years of violence.
The critical question now is whether security measures and humanitarian policies can reverse that trend while allowing displaced Nigerians to return home safely.
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