Nigeria’s ongoing security crisis has brought disastrous losses to various communities, crossing religious and ethnic divides. But a prevailing narrative—often touted by some external observers—is that Christians are the victims of such violent attacks.

While it is the case that Christians have indeed been attacked, this claim dismisses the overwhelming majority of Muslims who have also been attacked. It distorts reality on the ground and has the potential to cause even more religious conflict. Rather than focus on whether a victim was Muslim or Christian, the concern should simply be that a human life was unjustly taken.

The violence carried out by Boko Haram, Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP), bandits, Niger Delta militants, and the so-called “unknown gunmen” does not discriminate between Muslims and Christians. The casualties of these assaults are chosen not on religious grounds but on vulnerability grounds. However, some media reports have a tendency to disproportionately report Christian casualties and entirely overlook the gigantic suffering of Muslims.

For instance, the Adamawa State Muslim Council indicated that from 2013 to 2017, Boko Haram killed 5,247 Muslims in just seven local government areas. In addition to that, 5,161 Muslims were injured, and property worth N81.6 billion was lost.

At the national level, the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law estimates that between 2009 and 2022, approximately 30,000 Muslims were murdered by terror groups like Boko Haram and ISWAP.

These statistics establish beyond reasonable doubt that the victims of terrorism in Nigeria are not one particular religious group. If we are to go by numbers, for every Christian killed, at least 10 Muslims have been killed by banditry and terrorism. This fact shreds the false narrative that Christians are being targeted and Muslims are not.

The narrative that Christians only are under persecution has risky consequences for Nigeria’s stability.

First, it entrenches religious divides by creating resentment among Muslims, who have lost just as much—if not more—at the hands of these violent groups. By only highlighting Christian casualties, the pain of thousands of Muslim families is erased from the public imagination. Such selective sympathy generates mistrust and undermines national unity.

Second, it distorts international perception of Nigeria’s crisis. The rest of the world, depending on biased reports, may develop an inaccurate understanding of what is occurring. This can lead to foreign policies and interventions that address only a segment of the problem and allow the larger issue of national insecurity to fester.

Banditry and insurgency have left a trail of catastrophic humanitarian crises in their wake. The United Nations estimates that over 27,000 civilians have been killed since 2009 when Boko Haram started its campaign. The conflict has also displaced over two million people, with Muslims and Christians alike fleeing for their lives. Towns and villages, regardless of religious demography, have been reduced to rubble, with thousands left without livelihood.

This is neither a Muslim crisis nor a Christian crisis—it is a Nigerian crisis. The violence is more routinely driven by criminal motives, political motivations, and economic desperation and not religious persecution. The terrorists and bandits want to intimidate and dominate, not impose a religious agenda.

The majority of these claims of disproportionate targeting of Christians rely on external reports that often lack a nuanced understanding of the dynamics in Nigeria. Just recently, a viral post on X (formerly Twitter) by an Indian-American Catholic claimed systemic Christian persecution in Nigeria. It garnered thousands of likes and retweets and made a substantial impression on global audiences. It selectively ignored the Muslims’ plight, perpetuating an incomplete and biased narrative.

While it is important to draw attention to the insecurity in Nigeria, such polarised reports and distorted portrayals do more harm than good. They provide a skewed report that fans the flames of tension rather than building solidarity. Moreover, they are likely to be exploited for political gain, with some using these claims to draw international sympathy while ignoring the overall insecurity of millions of Nigerians.

There must be a shift in how the crisis in Nigeria is discussed, both domestically and abroad. The pain of a Christian mother who has lost a child is no different from the pain of a Muslim father who has lost an entire family. The bullets that these terrorists fire do not ask the religion of their victim first before they strike. The pain is shared, and the response must reflect that shared reality.

So it is time we end the religious victimhood narrative of this crisis. To acknowledge that Muslims and Christians are being killed randomly is not an attempt to downplay or diminish the Christian ordeal—but rather to present the whole picture. The security challenges are not exclusive to anyone, and so the fight shouldn’t be over who suffers the most but that no one suffers at all.

In the middle of all this is a simple fact: every life lost to violence in Nigeria is a TRAGEDY, full stop, regardless of religion. It is not a “Christian life” or a “Muslim life”—it is a human life. Breaking victims down into categories of religion does a disservice to the shared grief of Nigerian people.

To all who are adamant on viewing and describing Nigeria’s security crisis in the language of religious persecution, let me ask you: when a Muslim village is reduced to ashes, when a masjid is bombed, when an Islamic cleric is murdered, where is your outrage? And if you do not have an answer to that, then perhaps it is time to revisit the narrative you are selling.

For as long as the focus remains on setting one religious group against the other, Nigeria will continue to walk further into division, and the perpetrators of the violence will benefit from the distraction. But if Nigerians—of all religions—stand together and demand real solutions, then the conversation will shift in the direction that it needs to go: holding those in power accountable and demanding the security that is every citizen’s right.

We don’t need all these narratives. What we need is a unified response against insecurity and not a religious game of accusation.