• Intersociety tells President to “secularly appoint and ethno-religiously balance new members of the Federal Executive Council and their portfolios”

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been advised to immediately dissolve the Federal Executive Council and also sack National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, as part of efforts to solve the country’s insecurity challenge.

Frontline rights group, the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety), gave the advice in a statement signed by Intersociety’s Head, Emeka Umeagbalasi; Head, Dept. of Campaign and Publicity, Chidinma Evangeline Udegbunam, Esquire; Head, Civil Liberties and Rule of Law Program, Obiajunu Joy Igboeli, Esquire; and Head, Field Data Collection and Documentation Department, Comrade Samuel Kamanyaoku.

According to the group in the statement issued in Enugu on Wednesday, December 24, 2025, “The unfolding events in the country have therefore made it very compelling for Nigerian Government of Senator Ahmed Bola, a South-West Muslim and his Vice, Senator Kashim Shettima, also a Muslim of North-East extraction, to immediate dissolve the Nigeria’s Federal Executive Council or Council of Ministers and reconstitute it bearing in mind the country’s secular Constitution and multi ethno-religious composition clearly grounded in Sections 10, 38, 14 (2) (b), 14 (3), 217 (3) and 147 (3) of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution. That is to say that not only that all the present members of the Federal Executive Council including the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, the National Security Adviser and the Minister of State for Defence should be relieved of their duties but also fresh and non-radical ethno-religionists from Muslim-Christian divides should be appointed as their replacements-with their portfolios secularly and ethno-religiously balanced.

“Going by unfolding events in the US-Nigeria diplomatic arrangements especially against the backdrop of efforts to end attacks by Islamic radicals and their state actor enablers, continuing in office by the NSA and the Minister of State for Defence is tantamount efforts in futility or smokescreen approaches to the issues on the ground. By clear provisions of the Firearms Act of 2004, the NSA is not empowered to bear a “prohibited firearm” in the range of AK-47 rifle, not to talk of arming members of the Fulani population (. i.e. Miyetti Allah Vigilante Group of Nigeria or foreign Fulanis) who have no traces of being conscripted members of the Nigerian Armed Forces, the Police, the DSS, the NIA and arms-bearing members of the Paramilitaries. The Minister of State for Defence, on his part, is still having a long running battle with integrity over widespread accusations of romancing with Jihadist Fulani Bandits and allied others.”

Intersociety in the statement also called on the Federal Government “to direct the country’s security forces especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army to go after Jihadist Fulani Militants (Terror Fulani Herdsmen and Terror Fulani Bandits) and stop targeting victims of their Jihadist attacks by extra-judicially arresting, detaining, killing, maiming and brutalizing them while turning blind eyes on attacking jihadists and amplifying their jihadist attacks.”

Continuing, the rights group said: “The Nigerian Government is also strongly called upon to completely abandon the ongoing ‘Gunpowder Keg’ Policy of Nomadic Jihadism or enforced Pastoralist Fulani Livestock Ranching Settlements targeted at rural indigenous Christian communities and their indigenous and ancestral lands, places of worship, living and learning especially in South-East, South-South, South-West, North-Central, North-East and North-West. The proximity of such artificial Fulani pastoralist settlements to indigenous Christian communities is a clear case of jihadist time-bombs.

“We at Intersociety boldly challenge the Nigerian Government to get rid of all the assembled, armed and protected Jihadist Fulani Bandits and allied others presently flooding and wreaking havocs from the thick forests of Niger State and transform the State or eight of its 25 Local Government Areas in Muslim-held areas into “largest cow and cow milk producing headquarters in Nigeria and West Africa”. That is to say that this the Government of Nigeria must do to justify or authenticate its several claims of “embarking on industrial transformation of Pastoralist (Fulani) Livestock Industry in Nigeria” if such claims are truly devoid of radical religious or Islamic Jihadism undertones. Apart from Niger State having the largest landmass in Nigeria with 76,363km2, the State is also a Middle-Belt State-suitable for advanced natural and scientific animal husbandry and its industrialization.

“This is more so when the State’s landmass is roughly three times more than the total landmass of the entire South-East, measured 29,525km2. Also, out of Nigeria’s 923,000km2 landmass, North has largest component of more than 750,000km2 as against the South’s 172,000km2; out of which South-East has the smallest component of 29,525km2; roughly three times lower than that of Niger State. Intersociety was appalled and shocked by a recent statement made by the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Livestock Development that “the Nigerian Government is working with federal ministries, state governments and private sector to ensure the reserves (Fulani Cattle Colonies or Settlements) across the country’s 36 States and FCT (Abuja) have good schools for the (Fulani) pastoralists and their children to attend, access roads, public healthcare, places of worship (Mosques), residences (including Fulani leader or Emir palaces)…, etc.

“The key part of this statement was contained in the Punch Newspaper of Dec 19, 2025; during which the National Secretary of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria-MACABAN, Alhaji Aliyu Gotomo was said to have welcomed the Nigerian Government’s program and insisted that the program must be widespread and extended to “all parts of the country”. For more details, please see the link here: https://punchng.com/fg-urged-to-expand-grazing-reserves-nationwide/#google_vignette

“From several eyewitnesses’ accounts and testimonies from victims of such attacks, there are widespread accusations levelled against the Nigerian security forces especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army in various field of their operations, strongly showing or indicating that members of the Fulani population especially the Jihadist Fulani Militants (terror Herdsmen and Bandits) are being shielded and given “the above the law treatment”; from the South-East, the South-South, the South-West to Old Middle-Belt-during which the Jihadist Fulani Militants are hardly arrested or engaged in operational field gun battles. They are also placed “under the status of highly protected persons” by the country’s operational security forces across the country. These further explain why not a single Jihadist Fulani Herdsman or Jihadist Fulani Bandit has been arrested over the recent abduction of 315 Catholic School Children and their teachers in Niger State, among other torrents of abductions and disappearances on the ground of religion in the past two months.”

Intersociety noted that “it is on record that the Nigerian security forces especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army have massively deployed their State coercive instruments against victims of the Fulani Jihadist attacks and their properties who are also indiscriminately dispossessed of their constitutionally and statutorily protected ‘self-defence instruments’ including hunters, domestic security and safety and gaming guns recognized by the country’s Firearms Act of 2004. The security forces especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army have severally enabled attacks against Christian communities and their properties by launching post Jihadist attacks’ arrests or crackdowns on victims of such attacks and controversially accusing them of “being militias or carrying out or planning reprisal attacks”. It is not only that the Nigerian security forces especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army target more Christians and their properties for indiscriminate operational attacks than Jihadist Fulani Militants (real culprits), but also statistically unarguable is the fact that “out of every ten Christian victims of Jihadist Fulani attacks and property destructions in Nigeria, at least seven also suffer post jihadist Fulani attacks’ military terror and fear-leading to likelihood of such victims suffering from post-traumatic disorder”. On the other hand, “out of every ten Jihadist Fulani Militants involved in anti-Christian butcheries and allied attacks in Nigeria, more than 9.5 are given above the law and remained un-arrested by security forces or soldiers”.

“Recent accounts by Truth-Nigeria, a respected Conflict and anti-Persecuted Christian advocacy online media, dated Dec 19, 2025, are a clear case in point. The Report was titled: “Federal Government (security forces) Accused of Aiding Fulani Terrorists Against Christians”.”

The report in question focused on pieces of evidence generated from the Middle-Belt, especially Benue, Taraba and Plateau “where several religious, community and human rights leaders and survivors or victims of jihadist attacks were interviewed and they separately accused military personnel especially soldiers of the Nigerian Army of gross partisanship and selective law enforcements and operations especially by launching attack against victims and their communities; during which many of the victims and survivors have been arrested, brutalized and hounded into secret detention. The most shocking of it was how they were told by soldiers to “live with Fulanis and condone their excesses or risk being arrested and detained by the military”. See more details here: https://truthnigeria.com/2025/12/federal-government-accused-of-aiding-fulani-terrorists-against-christians/”.