ACN Nigeria Project Visit – Day 6

I’m now going to pick up on another highlight of our trip to Malumfashi where the pastoral centre has become such a hub serving the Diocese of Katsina and indeed the whole of the Church in north-west Nigeria. On the other side of the pastoral centre from where we met the bubbly Catholic women we were greeted by another large group of people. The mood there couldn’t have been more different. These were people who have taken shelter here from homes 35 kilometers away. Their entirely Catholic village called St Dominic Gidan Namune in Kamkara local government area has come under repeated attack from militant Fulani herdsmen and it is no longer safe to live there. Fr Samuel Peter, Justice and Peace Director for Katsina Diocese explained that their village was now occupied by militants. Another priest Fr Ibe Cyril Childe, said: “Persecution is very real in our context in southern Kaduna. Our people are forced to change their names to get jobs. If a person applies to the government for help and the person is Christian as is evident from his name, the application will be lost.”

We all prayed together. In the silence you could somehow sense the depth of their desolation and loss. It was an incredibly emotional experience, made all the more so by the way the people carried themselves with such dignity and quiet perseverance. I got talking to one of the IDPs, a young man named Marcus Solomon. He walked with a profound limp and one of his knees seemed very swollen/deformed. A single man aged 28, he described how a few years ago bandits came and kidnapped him. He explained how his torturers used the butt of a gun to torture him. In Solomon’s view, his attackers’ motives were twofold – ransom for money and forced conversion. He said: “They told me to convert but I refused. They said that for them it’s a joy to kill a Christian who won’t convert.” He said that he then tried to run away and that it was then that he was shot in the knee and sustained the injury from which he has never recovered. He went on: “They left me for dead and I began to reach out for my friends for the ransom. After nearly one month, I was released and was taken to a hospital but I have not fully recovered even now.” As he finished, Marcus looked me in the eye before saying: “I thought I would never see a man from your country coming to visit us. Thank you so much. You and your friends at Aid to the Church in Need should continue to pray for us, pray that we may stand strong in our faith.”

As we set off from Malumfashi bound for our next destination, these words of Marcus kept ringing in my ears.