Pursuing peace and addressing extremism in Nigeria: An interview with Fr. Atta Barkindo

Fr. Atta Barkindo, Ph.D., Executive Director of the Kukah Centre, has been appointed to a high-level expert team tasked by Nigeria’s Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) with developing a comprehensive National Peace Framework.

Founded by Most Rev. Matthew Hassan Kukah, Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Sokoto, the Kukah Centre is a policy research institute dedicated to building a humane, democratic society free from ethnic, religious, and economic exclusion.

The National Peace Framework has a daunting mandate: to evaluate and address both entrenched and emerging threats in a nation plagued by insurgency, banditry, and deepening sectarian divides.

In a wide-ranging Zoom interview with CWR, Fr. Barkindo warns that Nigerians have retreated into the fault lines of tribe and religion, creating a fractured society where citizens “die as Christians and Muslims, not as Nigerians.” He critiques a compromised security apparatus and warns of the existential dangers posed by the highly polarized 2027 presidential elections. Ultimately, he argues, Nigeria’s salvation lies not in the barracks, but in forging a true national identity.

Central to this diagnosis is the belief that a peace framework cannot succeed without an honest accounting of the roots of violence. While the physical terrorism gripping the northern part of the country is part of the crisis, Fr. Barkindo contends it is only half the story. The other half, he says, is a subtle but devastating structural persecution of Christians—a systemic marginalization baked into the Nigerian state since the British colonial era.

Tracing a direct line from the colonial imposition of indirect rule to today’s parallel legal systems, he explains how a lack of equal citizenship fuels the conflict. He offers a searing critique of state-sponsored religious favoritism and points to the millions of out-of-school children—the Almajiris—as the true cannon fodder for extremist groups.

Above all, Fr. Barkindo cautions that military might will never be enough to secure Nigeria. True peace, he argues, requires dismantling the structural inequalities that drive its citizens apart.

Following are excerpts of that conversation.

CWR: You were recently appointed to the Expert Team tasked with reviewing and developing Nigeria’s national peace framework. What is your assessment of the current security landscape in Nigeria? Has it reached a tipping point, or is this the new normal?

Fr. Markindo: Over the years, the government has designed all kinds of operations and budgets for war and defense, while leaving peace initiatives to individual organizations and local communities.

The government has suddenly realized that, first, they don’t even have a peace policy. There has been no dedicated budget for peace, nor is there a coordinating institution. The existing institution is primarily for research—the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution. Its mandate is simply to carry out research and training.

That institute was established under President Olusegun Obasanjo around 2000, after the military dictatorship. Initially, it was intended to advise the Nigerian government on foreign policy and interventions during conflicts in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, and elsewhere. Later, as Nigeria began facing its own internal crises and violence, it became necessary to redirect the institute’s focus inward. So, it now combines external foreign policy and internal conflict prevention, but it remains fundamentally a research, data collection, and policy design body for federal government interventions.

What we lack is a coordinating institution, backed by a budget and the necessary resources, to coordinate peace initiatives across the country, down to the community level. I think the government has suddenly realized it has been dealing exclusively with kinetic issues: hard military interventions, forming various military operations, and budgets for purchasing arms. There has never been a serious, national focus on the issue of peace.

That is why our team was selected to review existing peace frameworks developed by various organizations and synthesize them into a single national peace framework. This framework will serve as a guide so that any organization, community, or sub-national region wanting to undertake peace interventions has a national blueprint to draw inspiration from. It also establishes a coordinating institution to provide oversight, ensuring that government agencies with a peace mandate—and the budgets to fulfill it—are actually doing their jobs.

That is our task, and we have from now until October, with the potential for an extension to oversee implementation.

CWR: Nigeria is noted for insurgency and banditry, but the Kukah Centre has indicated that there are emerging threats. What are these emerging threats?

Fr. Markindo: First, Nigeria has lived through various conflicts—political violence, a civil war, and other outbreaks of violence. We have not fully addressed the grievances people have lived with from generation to generation. That is why we say unaddressed grievances are emerging threats. The question is: how far back can Nigeria go to address these issues? In Rwanda, they call it institutional memory. How do you address the memory of historical grievances?

Of course, in terms of physical emerging threats, we have banditry, kidnapping, and the expanding specter of terrorism in the Sahel. But for me, beyond the physical violence, the much bigger problem is the lack of social cohesion. The increasing level of ethnic, religious, regional, and political division is, in my opinion, one of the greatest threats facing Nigeria.

Over the years, politicians have focused on building a state, fixating on constructing roads, hospitals, and schools—initiatives that are often steeped in corruption. But there has been no deliberate government policy aimed at creating social cohesion. There is no effort to forge a nation of people with a common vision, understanding, and set of values. Consequently, the concept of citizenship is deeply flawed. In Nigeria, we do not see ourselves primarily as citizens of this country. We view ourselves through a tribal, political, or religious lens.

As the saying goes, we die in Nigeria as Christians and Muslims, not as Nigerians.

To me, this is the absolute biggest challenge. You can build all the infrastructure you want, but without peaceful coexistence, it can all be destroyed. This identity-based fragmentation is a root cause of these emerging conflicts. Identity has become so polarized that people have withdrawn into the shelter of their tribes and religions. To the extent that if you receive a government appointment, you feel obligated to help only your tribe and your religion. If you are elected to office, you first serve your constituents, your religion, and your tribe before you serve the larger Nigeria. This is one of the biggest threats to Nigeria’s corporate existence.

The government must address this quickly. We need to build a nation—a community of people with a common vision and values who love their country and are willing to work for it. Figuring out how to transcend these ethnic and religious boundaries to develop a firm, national citizenship identity will be absolutely critical.

CWR: Speaking of these social divisions and ethnic rivalries, Nigeria is heading toward a presidential election in 2027. Are you already seeing these fissures and fractures emerging as the campaigns kick off?

Fr. Markindo: Absolutely. If you look at the three leading presidential candidates, they all represent specific tribes and regions. You have Peter Obi, a Christian from the Southeast—predominantly Catholic—representing the Igbo people, and sentiments are running very high. Then you have Tinubu, a Muslim from the Southwest, representing the Yorubas. Finally, you have Atiku Abubakar from Adamawa State, representing the Muslim North. The campaigns just started last week, and we are already seeing these divisions and cracks emerge.

Among the candidates, there is no figure of national unity who has the capacity to unite the entire country. Therefore, we expect the campaigns to be heavily driven by ethnic, religious, and regional fault lines.

That is why, at the Kukah Centre—which serves as the secretariat for the National Peace Committee—we are stepping in. The National Peace Committee is not a government initiative; it is a coalition of individuals who have worked at the highest levels of government and recognize the need for mediation and intervention. The committee is headed by former Head of State General Abdulsalami Abubakar, with the Kukah Centre acting as the secretariat, which I head.

Last week, we organized the signing of a peace accord by all the presidential candidates. We asked them to ensure that, as campaigns begin, they avoid personal attacks, insults, and negative rhetoric that would further divide the country. When the elections are eventually conducted in January 2027, and results are announced, we don’t want people to have been primed by negative narratives to reject the outcome or resort to violence.

The goal of the accord is to totally commit the candidates to issue-based campaigns and peaceful rallies—focusing on debating policies, programs, and manifestos that are critical to national unity and development. They signed the accord, though not all of them attended. The second signing will take place in January, two days before the election, to commit them to accepting the outcome of the vote.

CWR: What were the reasons some did not sign?

Fr. Markindo: I think one of their biggest concerns is the lack of enforcement. In the past, people signed the accord, violated it, and nothing happened. But honestly, I think they are being somewhat disingenuous. At the national level, Nigeria has a fundamental problem with law compliance—whether in the judicial system, electoral guidelines, or laws in general. Even within security agencies, people struggle to comply with the law.

To address this, the Peace Committee annotated the content of the peace accord. This means every provision in the accord is drawn directly from the Nigerian Constitution and the 2026 Electoral Act. If you violate any provision of the accord, you are automatically violating the Constitution or the Electoral Act. Furthermore, when the candidates and party chairmen sign the accord, there are two chief witnesses: the INEC Chairman, who is legally empowered to conduct the elections, and the Inspector General of Police, who is legally empowered to prosecute those who violate the Constitution or the Electoral Act.

They sign as our chief witnesses. We monitor for violations, and at the end of the day, we hand over the evidence to them. If they fail to make arrests, that is no longer the Peace Committee’s problem; it is the failure of the institutions legally empowered to do so. However, because the public distrusts government institutions, they would prefer the Peace Committee to go a step further and carry out the arrests and prosecutions ourselves. But that is not our mandate. Ours is a moral intervention—a moral mediation. We are here to support the process and hold people accountable to their duties.

Moving forward, we are suggesting that the peace accord be codified into the Electoral Act to compel compliance. You might ask: Why do you have to force someone to pursue peace? Shouldn’t that be a natural desire? The problem is that political interests often overshadow the desire for peace. For some politicians, peace is only valuable if it guarantees their electoral victory. If it doesn’t, they discard it. That is the mentality we are fighting.

On one hand, the Peace Committee is doing its best with limited resources. We are not government-funded; we rely on the individual resources of people who pool their money together to help the country. Perhaps we need to do better in terms of public sensitization and awareness. But we also need to ensure the peace accord is integrated into the Electoral Act and that political engagement is handled more firmly. With the government now developing a national peace framework, perhaps some of these coordination mandates can be absorbed by a government agency. The only risk is that most government agencies are already politicized—if the director is a political appointee, they simply do the bidding of the government. That is exactly why the Peace Committee must remain independent, impartial, and neutral.

CWR: The Kukah Centre has been heavily involved in grassroots peacebuilding initiatives. What do you think the mainstream Nigerian security apparatus has been getting wrong, and what can the Kukah Centre bring to the national peace framework to fix it?

Fr. Markindo: I see several things. First, the lack of social cohesion permeates every agency, and the security agencies are not exempt. Tribalism, ethnicity, and religious discrimination affect recruitment, promotions, and who gets access to power, resources, and privileges. That is a massive problem.

Second is corruption. As in many African countries, corruption is deeply entrenched. Allowances and housing entitlements meant for the police, for instance, often never actually reach them. That is a huge issue. Third is a failure to comply with their own laws and basic guidelines. Finally, over the years, they have taken their eyes off the ball regarding training and continuous capacity building, especially in the age of technology and AI.

Consequently, this has led to terrible human rights abuses within the security administration. If you visit the prisons or the front lines, the way Nigerian citizens are treated by security personnel is appalling. The situation is worst for the military. They are on the front lines, dying as if their sole purpose is to be slaughtered by bandits and terrorists. A massive overhaul is needed.

CWR: There have been reports suggesting that the military has been complicit in the killing of Christians in Nigeria. Is that what you are seeing on the ground?

Fr. Markindo: Regarding this issue of Christian persecution, trust me, in my opinion, it is deeply historical. It has everything to do with the formation of the Nigerian state—how Nigeria came to be.

Before Nigeria existed as a nation, there were two flourishing Islamic empires: the Sokoto Caliphate and the Kanem-Bornu Empire. These empires had diplomatic relations with the Ottomans, Egypt, Morocco, and Libya. They even sent diplomats to Andalusia in southern Spain when it was under Islamic rule. At a time when Nigeria didn’t even exist, they were conducting trans-Saharan trade, mining, and exporting salt from the Komadugu Yobe River Basin in what is now Yobe State.

Meanwhile, the southern part of the region was predominantly Christian, already interacting with the Portuguese and engaged in trade. Then the British colonial masters arrived. They fought and dismantled these two Islamic empires and stitched together a country they called Nigeria. In the south, they practiced direct rule, superimposing themselves directly over the Christian population. But in the north, it was indirect rule.

They allowed the Islamic institutions to remain and their leaders to take charge, while the colonial masters took a secondary role. That is indirect rule.

Up until Nigeria became independent in 1960, those Islamic institutions were preserved. Throughout all the constitutional conferences leading up to independence, the delegates rejected the idea of dismantling those institutions, whether it was Sharia courts or administrative structures. They were left completely untouched. The emirate system, the Islamic legal system, and Islamic education were all left as they were.

So, when Nigeria became a country, you had two sets of laws: Sharia and the Nigerian Constitution. Nigeria is the only country in the world where these two sets of laws exist side by side.

When you talk about Christian persecution, it happens on two levels. First, there is the physical violence and killing administered by terrorists who interpret an extreme form of Sunni Islam. This is an ideology they learned from figures like Sayyid Qutb and Hassan al-Banna, the founders of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, as well as Osama bin Laden and the Islamic State. It is an extreme interpretation where non-Muslims are not meant to exist, where democracy is considered a sin, and where anyone who practices democracy is condemned to hell.

This physical violence is meted out not only against Christians but also against Muslims who refuse to align with this extreme version of Islam. That is the first level—the physical violence.

But for me, the second level—the subtle, structural discrimination—is where the real persecution of Christians lies. All Christian schools in the north have been taken over by the government. There are places where you are not allowed to build a church. In states like Katsina and Sokoto, for example, there are laws stating that purchased land cannot be used to build a church. Christians are systematically denied employment in government administration. There are forced conversions, and there are places where Christians can never become traditional rulers. These things are happening as I speak to you. There is no equality of citizenship; your rights are dictated entirely by your religion.

If a Christian aspires to a traditional leadership role, they usually have to convert to Islam. Even in federally funded universities, you are not allowed to build churches. Look at the universities in Sokoto: they will never allocate land to Christians, and even if land is allocated, they are blocked from building on it. Sometimes, existing churches are simply destroyed.

We are tackling both the physical violence and the discrimination, fighting against this deep level of marginalization and exclusion. In some northern states, a Muslim man can marry a Christian girl, but a Christian man cannot marry a Muslim girl unless he converts. You have Islamic teachers and scholars using social media, radio, and newspapers daily to promote Islam to the absolute exclusion of any other identity, with zero consequences. This is where the real discrimination lies. It is a colonial legacy we have never been able to overcome.

There is no strong leadership or political will to promote a common national identity and citizenship, or to ensure that religion remains a private matter. In northern Nigeria, you see state governments—like the Kano state government just a few weeks ago—sponsoring the mass weddings of 3,000 Muslim couples. This religious ceremony was funded using state resources. You see state governments spending billions of Naira to send citizens on Hajj to Mecca.

These are resources that should be used to build healthcare facilities, roads, hospitals, and schools. Instead, they are used to promote religious activities in a country that, by constitution, is supposed to be secular. This is the crux of the issue, and this is where we need progress.

CWR: If you were to meet someone who believes in this extremist version of Islam, what would you say to them within the context of the national peace framework? What would you tell them about the need for inter-religious tolerance?

Fr. Markindo: I have met them before. This isn’t my first time working with the EU; I was on an EU project where we helped set up a de-radicalization and rehabilitation program for violent extremists. So, I have engaged them directly.

One of the core problems in northern Nigeria is that a lot of their literature comes from Saudi Arabia. Because Saudi Arabia is a theocratic state, its literature does not promote democracy; it promotes theocracy and rule by Sharia law. That is what many young people in the north read. I studied Arabic in Egypt. The highest number of students at one of Egypt’s largest Islamic universities comes from Nigeria, Malaysia, and Indonesia. When these students return to Nigeria, having studied Arabic, Islamic law, and theology, their only prospects are to become teachers, Grand Qadis, or Sharia court judges. Most of the extremists I met in prison completely lack formal, secular education.

Because of this, even if the government creates jobs, these individuals lack the skills to take them. Nigeria is modernizing rapidly; without a formal education, you cannot acquire the skills needed for a decent government job—unless you settle for being a security guard. But that is not the prosperity Islam promised them. They see foreigners doing well in their own communities and ask themselves, “What about us? We embraced the Islam you taught us, but we are getting nothing in return.”

Furthermore, many of these men come from polygamous families with three or four wives and thirty-something children. If you are the second child of the fourth wife, you are already struggling for your father’s attention amid severe poverty, illiteracy, and a lack of education.

If there is one thing I would tell them, if I met them—the extremists—it is to embrace education. They can embrace both religious and modern education. I am a Catholic priest; I embrace theology, but I also went to secular school. My advice for the national peace framework is to roll out widespread access to secular education and make it strictly compulsory across Nigeria. For decades, the generation that rejected education has now become the cannon fodder for terrorism. If you go to places like Kano and Sokoto today, you see millions of Almajiris—out-of-school children roaming the streets with plates in their hands, begging. Tomorrow, these are the ones who will become the extremists and terrorists.

This is happening because society has not paid attention. Even here in Abuja, you see them on the streets with their mothers. The mothers sit by the roadside and send the children to beg. These children should be in school. You never know what is in a child’s mind until they are educated; they could be a future Elon Musk. But because they haven’t gone to school, they will eventually turn on society, realizing that society failed them.

I am from Adamawa. My parents were Muslims who converted to Catholicism specifically so I could have access to school. I have cousins who refused to go to school; today, they have multiple wives and dozens of children, and none of them are educated. If I had not gone to school—all the way to the University of London—I probably could have become a terrorist myself. Who knows?

For me, there is simply no alternative to education, particularly in Northern Nigeria. Boys and girls alike must be educated. There is no other option.

CWR: Burkina Faso’s President, Ibrahim Traoré, recently made headlines by telling Burkinabe students studying Islam in Saudi Arabia not to bother coming back, as they would not be welcome. He argued they are just returning to introduce an extremist form of Islam that fuels terrorism—and Traoré is himself a Muslim. What lesson can Nigeria draw from Traoré’s approach to fighting terrorism from that perspective?

Fr. Markindo: I find his approach a bit extreme, primarily because it raises human rights issues. People have the right to study what they want, and you can only penalize them if there is concrete evidence that they are involved in extremist activities. In Nigeria right now, the very people helping us engage terrorists, moderate their views, and change their minds are Muslim scholars who understand these ideologies. You need people with that exact knowledge to help you. That is the essence of deradicalization: dealing with people who are already radicalized. To remove that extremist ideology, you need qualified scholars.

I believe Nigeria’s approach should be to identify moderate scholars. Traoré is a Muslim, so he should be looking for moderate Muslims like himself—people who love their country, love peace, hate extremism, but deeply understand the theological issues. They have the knowledge, they speak Arabic, they can interpret texts, and they can convincingly deradicalize extremists. If students are receiving training in Saudi Arabia with the intention of coming back to help their country, that should be welcomed. In Nigeria, we have learned to distinguish between moderate Islamic leaders and extremists.

It is just like how not every Catholic priest is a liberation theologian taking up arms. When Peter drew his sword to defend Jesus and cut off the ear of the high priest’s servant, Jesus told him to put his sword away. The point is that not everyone within a faith resorts to violence.

In Nigeria, as we set up these programs, we must partner with moderate Islamic scholars. They know these extremists; some of them were even their former students. Because Islam has so many sects, there is no central controlling body. It is not like the Catholic Church, which has a central authority under the Pope in Rome, cascading down through archdioceses, dioceses, and parishes. Instructions come from Rome, and the Church can discipline, expel, or excommunicate anyone who deviates.

Islam is not structured that way. Every sect—whether Shia, Sunni, or Sufi, and within Sunni, orders like the Qadiriyya and the Tijaniyya—operates independently. Because there is no central coordinating body, you cannot universally discipline them. That is why the government must identify and work with moderate scholars who have influence over their specific sects.

These scholars don’t just help you engage terrorists; they can help you draw up a balanced curriculum. As the writer famously said, religion is often what stops the poor from rising up against the rich. Ultimately, you need these moderate scholars to evaluate and regulate what is being taught in local communities, aligning it with societal needs. But to do that, you need people who possess the knowledge and also genuinely love their country.

I hope Traoré reconsiders his blanket ban and differentiates between those who hold extremist views and pose a threat, and those who have the knowledge to actually help. If African countries adopt that nuanced model, it would be incredibly beneficial.

CWR: Given Nigeria’s current trajectory, do you think the country can overcome this era of insecurity? And what message do you have for ordinary citizens who feel abandoned by the state?

Fr. Markindo: Citizens have the opportunity to vote during elections. If a government abandons you, you come together and vote them out. That is the power we have, and we have to keep testing it. Since 1999, we have successfully transitioned from one government to another.

The problem, however, is that Nigerians are entirely fixated on the elections themselves. We put immense energy and time into preparing for the election, monitoring the voting, and ensuring it is peaceful and credible. But we fail to put that same energy into monitoring governance. My advice to Nigerians is to shift their attention and energy from merely monitoring elections to actively monitoring governance. Once you elect your leaders, what are they actually doing? Are they corrupting the resources that should be coming to you? Did you vote for them just to enjoy life on your behalf, or to do the work they were elected to do? That is my first piece of advice.

Second, we need to look at our security agencies and judicial processes. Those in charge of the courts must help us end the culture of impunity. Currently, there is no accountability; it feels like you can commit any crime and just get away with it. It is a massive problem. When people finally see that criminals are held accountable and pay for their crimes, things will change. I believe we are slowly getting on the right trajectory.

Finally, we must continue to engage local communities to build a true nation, rather than just a state. We must build a common citizenship and a shared identity as Nigerians. That is my advice.