This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Nigeria, where fear has paralyzed a farming village in northwestern Sokoto state after a series of U.S. military strikes on Christmas Day, which President Trump claimed targeted two ISIS camps in the region. But residents of Jabo, a predominantly Muslim community, say there’s no recorded history of anti-Christian terrorism in the town. Bashar Isa Jabo, a lawmaker representing Tambuwal in the Sokoto state parliament, described Jabo as, quote, “a peaceful community,” saying in an interview with CNN that the town has, quote, “no history of ISIS, Lakurawa or any other terrorist groups operating in the area,” unquote.
The strikes, carried out by the U.S. in collaboration with Nigeria’s government, come as Trump has repeatedly falsely claimed a Christian genocide is taking place in Nigeria. In a post on Truth Social last month, Trump wrote in part, quote, “The U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’” Trump wrote.
Organizations monitoring violence in the region say there’s no evidence to suggest Christians are killed more than Muslims and other religious groups in Nigeria.
President Trump touted the Christmas Day strikes in a call into WABC.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I said, “Hit them on Christmas Day. It’ll be a Christmas present.” We hit ISIS, who have — terrible. They’re butchers.
AMY GOODMAN: Nigeria’s information minister said, quote, “Portraying Nigeria’s security challenges as a targeted campaign against a single religious group is a gross misrepresentation of reality,” unquote.
This all comes as a suicide bomber detonated an explosive inside a mosque in Nigeria’s Borno state Christmas Day, killing five worshipers and injuring 35. Jennifer Kavanagh, a director of military analysis at Defense Priorities, said, quote, “The U.S. action taken in Nigeria while Americans celebrated the Christmas holiday is an unnecessary and unjustified use of U.S. military force that violates Mr. Trump’s promises to his supporters to put American interests first and avoid risky and wasteful military campaigns abroad.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. Africa Command confirmed strikes on Somalia which took place over the course of four days, from December 22nd to Christmas Day.
For more, we’re joined by Yinka Adegoke, Africa editor for Semafor, an independent news platform. He was the founding editor of Quartz Africa.
Thanks so much for being with us, Yinka. If you can talk about what President Trump said? Said this was a Christmas gift. Explain what’s going on in Nigeria, with so many saying, including the foreign minister of Nigeria, that there is not a campaign of genocide against Christians, that as many or more Muslims are dying as Christians.
YINKA ADEGOKE: Right. Yeah, no, you’re very right. This has been — Nigeria has a very serious problem of insecurity that affects a wide range of Nigerians, especially those who live in the more remote parts of the country, which tend to be in the north, and the north of Nigeria is predominantly Muslim. And therefore, when these insecurity problems happen, for a variety of reasons — and we can get into some of those — they tend to impact Muslims more so than Christians. But over the years, of course, Christians have also been attacked. Some churches have been attacked, just as mosques have been attacked, because, obviously, churches and mosques tend to be fairly vulnerable and easy targets.
But, you know, there’s almost a sort of a callousness to the way President Trump referred to a “Christmas present,” when, you know, there are real lives at stake here. People have been killed. People are living really insecure lives. And it’s not just because they are Christians or because they are Muslims. It’s because there’s a general problem of insecurity in this region, often fueled by, frankly, just poverty. Lots of young people without work to do are easily engaged in these kinds of, you know, violent acts in order to survive, frankly.
But, you know, it’s — the thing that is — overall, that is really problematic about what President Trump is doing here is that you have a country that definitely does have a problem, and, in fact, maybe some of these strikes will have a short-term impact, but they don’t really address the sort of underlying problems. And it feels like, you know, the U.S. is almost exporting its own sort of culture wars about the kinds of things that evangelical Christians have pushed for a long time about Christians being persecuted around the world, and sort of projecting this onto Nigeria.
AMY GOODMAN: And to what extent do you think this is to appease them, Christian evangelicals, who have not only been talking about this in Nigeria, but in other places, as well?
YINKA ADEGOKE: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: Nigeria, what, evenly divided between Christians and Muslims, Yinka?
YINKA ADEGOKE: Yes, correct. Correct, correct, evenly divided between Christians and Muslims. And it really does feel like this is more so a — if you use his term of “Christmas present,” it felt more like a Christmas present for the evangelicals, you know, parts of his constituency, his base, as we say — right? — more so than the actual Christians in Nigeria, you know, not something that the people over there — listen, there are real concerns about insecurity there, so I don’t — I really want us to be careful not to make it seem like, you know, Christians are not — have not been attacked. It is of concern. But it’s not like they have been targeted because — simply because they are Christians, which is a, you know, nuance that is important to understand.
AMY GOODMAN: Can I ask you, though — most people would say, “How could this possibly be related?” What impact did USAID cuts have on different parts of Nigeria?
YINKA ADEGOKE: I think that’s such a fantastic question, because I think — I think this is the thing that, you know, everyday Americans do not sort of appreciate. The work that America has done with — had done for decades with USAID had kind of kept a lot of these things under — you know, had prevented them from spinning out of control, you know, because, really, at the core of many of the problems you see around in places like northern Nigeria, but not just northern Nigeria, many other African countries, unfortunately, as well, is a real problem of development and a real lack of support for their development in certain regions of certain countries.
And northern Nigeria is a classic example, where, you know, if you’re in somewhere like Lagos or Abuja, somewhere like that, you would — even as a visitor, you would not expect USAID to be — to have much of a role there. But in these parts, these remote areas, where there’s climate change, where there’s competition for resources as, you know, people look for farmland, which leads to some of these conflicts that end up targeting farmers who happen to be Christians, you know, there are real issues here, which agencies like USAID and many other sorts of NGOs and charities and organizations from — you know, both the local domestic ones and international ones have played a really effective role in helping. You know, everything from humanitarian efforts to health and other sorts of development aid has been really important.
And I think there’s just a feeling these days that has been spread that, you know, the only way to work with these developing countries is to see what we can get out of them — right? — rather than understand that, actually, you know, these development agencies have a really important role beyond just sort of an investment and profit kind of approach.
AMY GOODMAN: So, here you have President Trump saying there’s a Christian genocide in Nigeria, but the Trump administration has denied entry for Nigerian refugees, as well as virtually every other refugee group, with the exception of white South Africans. A total of 19 countries are now banned from all immigrant visas and all tourist, student exchange visitor visas, according — including Nigeria, from the American Immigration Council. So, they are allowing in white South Africans, they say, because white Christian South Africans are targeted, but not allowing in, even though they bomb Nigeria, Black Nigerian Christians.
YINKA ADEGOKE: Yeah, I mean, it goes back to that point, that earlier point — right? — about the sort of — the exporting of the, you know, American culture wars, right? Like, this idea of “They’re killing Christians. Let’s go. There’s a Christian genocide,” or “There’s a white genocide in South Africa,” neither of these things have been — you know, by every sort of expert, anyone who pays attention to the details, no one believes this, has said this is true. Right? But it’s just, let’s say the thing that keeps our base happy, and exploit this sort of concerns. Meanwhile, it creates all sorts of, you know, terrible outcomes in the long term, right? The relationship between the United States and South Africa, you know, the long — the United States, in the end, came around to being one of the great supporters of the early days of democracy in South Africa, and now it sees itself at loggerheads with the ANC.
Then you look at Nigeria, you know, the largest African population, and they’re just a country which has, you know, exported all kinds of important people and great talent to America, as well. And suddenly you’re saying no students, no student visas, no tourist visas. A real kind of change, and it’s not really clear that this is — how this benefits America in the short or even the long term, other than to keep a certain sort of ideology sort of satisfied, if you like.
AMY GOODMAN: Yinka Adegoke, I want to thank you for being with us and also want to note, you know, the U.S. is attacking these Venezuelan boats. Venezuela has the largest oil reserves. And then you have Nigeria, the largest oil producer in Africa. We’ll talk more about those connections in the days to come. Yinka Adegoke, Africa editor of Semafor, an independent news platform, was the founding editor of Quartz Africa. Thanks so much for being with us.
When we come back, U.N. experts are raising grave concern over treatment of Palestine Action-linked hunger strikers in the U.K. We’ll go to the U.K. for an update.
