{"id":97626,"date":"2026-02-11T09:36:23","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T09:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=97626"},"modified":"2026-02-11T09:36:23","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T09:36:23","slug":"if-there-was-no-christian-genocide-there-was-never-sheik-abubakar-abdullahi-we-cannot-mourn-a-hero-while-denying-the-crime-that-made-him-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=97626","title":{"rendered":"If There Was No Christian Genocide, There Was Never Sheik Abubakar Abdullahi; We Cannot Mourn a Hero While Denying the Crime That Made Him One"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jonathan Ishaku<\/strong><\/p>\n

When the Nigerian government publicly mourned the death of Imam Abubakar Abdullahi in January 2026, it did so with language that was humane, dignified, and deserved. The Chief Imam of Nghar village in Plateau State had died at the age of 92, and he was remembered for an act of rare courage: in 2018, during violent attacks in Barkin Ladi Local Government Area, he sheltered more than 200 Christians\u2014some accounts place the number at over 260\u2014inside his mosque, saving them from armed assailants.<\/p>\n

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu described the late cleric as a man who chose conscience over division and humanity over hatred. International tributes echoed the sentiment. Imam Abdullahi had earlier received the International Religious Freedom Award from the United States Department of State, Nigeria\u2019s national honour of Member of the Order of the Niger, and multiple media accolades.<\/p>\n

Yet beneath this solemn commemoration lies a contradiction Nigeria has yet to confront. In the same week that the Federal Government was commiserating over the death of the Imam honoured for averting a Christian genocide eight years earlier, it transpired that it had expended a humongous $9m to counter the Christian genocide story behind US designation as a Country of Particular Concern!<\/p>\n

The federal government cannot simultaneously honour Imam Abdullahi and deny the reality that made his heroism necessary.<\/p>\n

A Hero Whose Meaning Depends on Context<\/strong><\/p>\n

Imam Abdullahi did not become globally known for theological scholarship or political leadership. His prominence arose from a single, stark fact: a specific civilian population\u2014Christians\u2014was under lethal attack, and he, as a Muslim cleric, was not part of the target group.<\/p>\n

This distinction is central.<\/p>\n

If the violence that swept Plateau State in 2018 was indiscriminate, random, or merely communal unrest, there would have been no reason for Christians to flee into a mosque for sanctuary. There would have been no reason for attackers to spare the mosque while churches were destroyed. And there would have been no reason for a Muslim imam to become a shield for people marked for death precisely because they did not share the attackers\u2019 religious identity.<\/p>\n

Strip away the reality of targeted violence, and Imam Abdullahi\u2019s act loses its meaning. His courage only makes sense because there was something\u2014and someone\u2014to be protected from.<\/p>\n

In that sense, attempts to deny the targeted nature of anti-Christian violence in parts of Nigeria do not merely erase victims; they also hollow out the moral legacy of one of the country\u2019s most celebrated figures of interfaith solidarity.<\/p>\n

What International Law Actually Recognizes<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nigeria\u2019s official counter-narrative often rests on conflation: equating organized campaigns of violence with spontaneous riots, reprisals, or breakdowns of law and order. International law does not make this mistake.<\/p>\n

International humanitarian law and counter-terrorism frameworks focus on organized non-state armed groups\u2014actors that display structure, continuity, and sustained hostility toward civilian populations. Nigeria unfortunately hosts several such groups, including Boko Haram, ISWAP, Ansaru, and armed formations often described collectively as Fulani herdsmen terrorists.<\/p>\n

These groups operate across time, territory, and command chains. They meet the threshold that international law and diplomacy take seriously.<\/p>\n

Random violence committed during periods of unrest, regardless of who commits it, remains a domestic criminal matter. It is not equivalent to organized terror campaigns driven by identity and sustained capacity.<\/p>\n

This distinction is not semantic. It is foundational.<\/p>\n

The $9 Million Problem<\/strong><\/p>\n

The contradiction becomes sharper in light of reports that the Nigerian government spent approximately $9 million engaging a U.S.-based public relations firm to counter claims\u2014advanced by the U.S. government\u2014that Christians face systematic targeting in Nigeria, a designation that contributed to Nigeria\u2019s inclusion as a Country of Particular Concern on religious freedom grounds.<\/p>\n

At the same time the state was funding a campaign to deny the existence of such targeting, it was also celebrating a Muslim cleric whose international recognition stemmed entirely from saving Christians from extermination.<\/p>\n

This is not merely a public relations misstep. It is a moral incoherence.<\/p>\n

You cannot credibly deny a crime while building national prestige around a man whose fame rests on resisting that very crime.<\/p>\n

If Nigeria wished to demonstrate seriousness\u2014to its citizens and to the international community\u2014the millions spent on denial would have been better invested in rehabilitation: rebuilding destroyed communities, supporting survivors, compensating widows and orphans, and restoring livelihoods shattered by violence.<\/p>\n

Denial does not heal trauma. Rehabilitation does.<\/p>\n

Truth does not weaken a nation\u2019s sovereignty. It strengthens its legitimacy.<\/p>\n

Imam Abubakar Abdullahi\u2019s life remains a powerful testament to moral courage across religious divides. But his death has also exposed the fragility of an official narrative that insists targeted religious violence does not exist while drawing moral capital from those who stood against it.<\/p>\n

A state cannot mourn a hero born of atrocity while paying to deny the atrocity itself.<\/p>\n

History\u2014and the victims\u2014will not accept that contradiction, no matter how sophisticated the lobbying.<\/p>\n

\u25cf Mr. Ishaku is journalist, essayist and writer. He can be reached on bishilee2017@gmail.com”*<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jonathan Ishaku When the Nigerian government publicly mourned the death of Imam Abubakar Abdullahi in January 2026, it did so with language that was humane, dignified, and deserved. The Chief Imam of Nghar village in Plateau State had died at the age of 92, and he was remembered for an act of rare courage: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":97625,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5807,5782],"tags":[4584,6491,129,676,7984,781],"class_list":["post-97626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-crime-and-violence","category-opinion","tag-9m","tag-abdulahi","tag-award","tag-fg","tag-hero","tag-imam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=97626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/97625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=97626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=97626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=97626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}