Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Nigerian religious conflict discussed at Baylor U. lecture
By Belinda Colunga
The Lariat (Baylor U.)
02/22/2008

(U-WIRE) WACO, Texas — She found the brutalized bodies of her two children, Dr. Christian van Gorder said.

This was the tragic ending of a woman and her family who attempted to escape the bullets flying passed her.

The reason? Their religion.

"You're fighting for your faith. You fight for the most important thing in your world," he said.

Van Gorder, an associate professor of world religions at Baylor University, revealed the situation in Nigeria to a group of students Thursday in Draper Academic Building. He spoke in reference to the Muslim and Christian riots that have plagued the poor communities in Nigeria for more than 20 years.

"It's important because this situation in Nigeria is difficult ... and the factors that created the deaths are still in place," van Gorder said.

According to statistical analysis he presented, more than 100,000 Christians and Muslims have been killed because of religious conflict. Although each group, if asked, will say it's the dominant group, the truth is 50 percent of the people are Muslim and 40 percent are Christian, he said.

The other 10 percent are adherents to tribal religions, but the internal war is between the Christians and Muslims, van Gorder said.

"Nigeria is an amazing place in terms of religious fervor," van Gorder said. "It's the most religious country in the world."

The causes for religious persecution among Christians and Muslims may include historical animosity and political, economic, and social power struggle, van Gorder said.

To get a sense of how intense the battles are, van Gorder showed pictures of people fighting with machetes, while another picture illustrated the result of it.

A young boy's arm was chopped in half.

"As we've seen from developing conflict in the Middle East, poverty and religious conflict isn't stagnant," San Antonio senior Alex Moorman said. "The people that are dying in Nigeria are human just like you and I, that want to live their lives."

Many have already fled the region, van Gorder said.

Van Gorder explained the tragic events that took place in the five regions of Nigeria: Kafanchan, Kano, Kaduna, Jos and Yelwa.

War among the Nigerian people is prevalent in each of these places. Churches are burned down, people are decapitated or hacked to death with machetes, and then dragged through the streets, he said.

In March 1996, Muslims attacked Christians simply for reciting a poem because they believe it's promoting their religion. People are also killed on the spot if they can't recite the Lord's Prayer, he said.

While in America beauty contests are seen as a way of honoring young girls and women for their talents and minds, in Jos they're viewed as promoting "nakedness" and the spreading of AIDS.

"It's important for people, like myself, that live such safe, secure lives to be concerned about people less fortunate than ourselves," Moorman said. "He's bringing light to an issue that needs to be addressed by the international community."

But the international community has yet to provide some form solution to this situation.

"The Nigerian government is trying to keep it internal," van Gorder said. Therefore, religious conflict continues as long as no one does anything about it, not even the Nigerian government, van Gorder said.

Many events are kept hidden from the media and many are never reported, he said.

"I didn't know very much about Nigeria or how long it had been going on," Dr. George Gawrych, associate professor of history, said.

While Nigerians continue fighting for their faith, their life expectancy decreases to 47 years of age, van Gorder said.

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