A
new wave of violence has struck the highlands of central Nigeria in the
past few days. According to the little news from Jos, the capital
of the Plateau State, the fighting between the Taroh Christian majority
and the Fulani Muslims in the city of Yalwa-Shendam have caused the
death of 350 people, and that number may rise in the coming hours.
There are 60 injured, according to a spokesperson for the Nigerian Red
Cross.
The spark that caused
the massacre came last Friday, after weeks of growing tensions between
the two communities. The death of three Christians in the village of
Kabong allegedly caused a violent reaction by the Taroh militias, with
the following bloodshed in the city.
The situation in the Plateau State, an area cut off from the larger
African and international media circuits, is therefore worsening. After
three entire days there is still no definite victim count and the
reasons for the hostilities are still vague and imprecise.
The international press refers to the fighting as merely “racial” or
“religious”, implicitly considering the clashes the inevitable
consequence of ancestral tribal grudges. But the situation seems far
more complex. Though it is undeniable that religious matters do have a
certain importance, in the Plateau State, as elsewhere in the northern
areas of Nigeria, land disputes are at the bottom of the hatred that
has been tearing the highlands apart for years.
The dominant religion in the Plateau State is Christianity and it is
followed mainly by groups such as the Taroh, who are originally from
the area. The Muslim Fulani minority is nomadic in origin and settled
here aver the years. The strong sense of belonging to a clan and to
traditions and to one’s own religion is a part of the mutual enmity
between these two groups, but what truly divides them is the land,
where the first group insists it has always lived and which the second
wishes to use; the same scenario of hatred visible in many other parts
of the world, even if the main characters are different.
The problems of land possession worsened with colonization and later with
independence, when
agriculture and animal husbandry became the basis for the economy and
the sustenance of most of the new states in sub-Saharan Africa. Whoever
had land had more chances of survival, whereas the
existence of nomad populations was threatened by governments who often
did not acknowledge them any rights.
Islam
and Christianity embodied and strengthened the enmity between the two
peoples, in an area – northern Nigeria – where the Muslim groups have
for some time now been demanding the introduction of Sharia, Islamic
law, against the wishes of the Christian community.
The clashes last Sunday are
merely the last link of a long chain of violence in the Plateau State.
The few, rare witnesses say that a group
of Taroh militiamen attacked homes and villages armed with machine
guns, but also with traditional weapons – spears and machetes. With
these, tens of people were fatally injured or hacked to pieces. Among
the victims are an unknown number of women and children.
Though the communities accuse one another, many blame police officers and the
regional army, who are suspected of having turned a blind eye
more than once to the Taroh group’s misdeeds. Among the accused is the
president of Nigeria, Olosegun Obasanjo, a Christian who is not popular
among the Muslims of the North.
According
to the most recent news, Yalwa-Shendam is quiet again. While the
authorities attempt to get a clear picture of the situation, the
ambulances begin bringing dozens of bodies to the morgues and
hospitals. The damage caused by the fighting and by vandalism may
amount to millions of naira, the Nigerian currency.
“This land breathes hatred, ignorance and violence” says Buhari
Bello resignedly, a correspondent for the national daily newspaper
Daily Trust, from Jos. “An ancient land dispute is masquerading behind
an
out-and-out religious clash. Showing one’s faith freely is a great risk
for oneself and one’s family. And it is not the first time that all
Hell has broken loose between the Taroh and the Fulani, but only a few
people are aware of what happens here. The Nigerian authorities, the
government and the international community cannot continue to ignore
us. The world has forgotten us.”
On September 11th, 2001, while New York, the U.S.A., the West and the
entire world watched in horror as the images of the World Trade Center
unfolded, with its almost three thousand dead, another massacre was
taking place, ignored and neglected, in Jos and other villages of the
Plateau State. At least one thousand people died and another hundred
were injured that week in fighting between the Muslim and the Christian
community. Today, almost three years later and who knows for no much
longer, the hatred and the rivalry between the two communities continues to strike
at the desire for democracy in the most populous country on the African
continent.
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