Insecurity: Northern Groups Accuse Foreign, Local Actors

The Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) has raised the alarm over what it described as a coordinated and escalating onslaught against Northern Nigeria, alleging that foreign interests and domestic saboteurs are collaborating to destabilise the region and plunge the country into more profound insecurity.

CNG expressed concern that the United States, despite its advanced intelligence capabilities, has fallen for a “dangerous propaganda narrative” portraying the violence in Plateau and Benue as genocide, while overlooking the far heavier casualties recorded in Katsina, Zamfara, Kaduna, Kebbi, Borno, and other northern states.

In a statement signed by its National Coordinator, Comrade Jamilu Aliyu Charanchi, the group said the recent surge in violent attacks across the North bears the hallmarks of a deliberate and well-funded agenda, orchestrated both within and outside the country.

Charanchi said it was “alarming” that U.S. President Donald Trump appears influenced by “misinformation not supported by the CIA, FBI, or even the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria.”

He noted that Trump’s special envoy for Arab and African Affairs, Massad Boulos, had publicly dismissed the genocide claims as baseless.

He said: “CNG is seriously disturbed that the recent escalation of attacks appears timed to validate these fictitious genocide claims and to prepare the international stage for hostile actions against Nigeria. These attacks are not random; they are deliberate attempts to give false narratives the appearance of truth.

“We therefore urge the Federal Government to recognise that Nigeria is confronting a premeditated internal and external conspiracy to destabilise the nation. The government must act decisively by identifying, exposing, and prosecuting all those, both local and foreign, who manufacture and spread such toxic falsehoods, so that they serve as a clear deterrent to others who may wish to weaponise misinformation against Nigeria.”

CNG noted that the sudden surge in attacks on churches and Christian communities appears designed to reinforce the externally crafted propaganda narrative.

The group said this pattern raises serious questions about whether the timing and targets are coincidental or deliberately manipulated. It vowed that Northern Nigeria would not allow its security challenges to be weaponised for foreign, local, or separatist political agendas.

According to the group, these incidents are clearly beyond ordinary banditry. They bear the hallmarks of political orchestration intended to destabilise communities and plunge the region into deeper chaos.

CNG insisted that Northern Nigeria must never become a theatre for international manoeuvres or separatist propaganda, stressing that the blood of its citizens cannot serve as currency for anyone’s agenda.

The CNG noted that it is disturbed by the resurgence of attacks, which have set the north back with the closure of 47 Federal Government Unity schools and many others across Katsina, Niger, and Kwara, among others.

The CNG regrets that this failure is so glaring that authorities have now resorted to closing schools across a region that is already educationally disadvantaged and bears the highest number of out-of-school children in the country. Such measures, the group warns, further compound long-standing developmental setbacks in the North.

CNG warned that ongoing attacks across the North, including recent kidnappings in Kwara, Kebbi, Niger, and Zamfara, are not random acts of banditry but “politically orchestrated assaults” designed to reinforce foreign-backed propaganda.

The abduction of worshippers in Kwara, schoolgirls in Kebbi, and 315 students and teachers in Niger State, alongside the murder of a Brigadier General, it said, point to an escalating threat that mirrors past mass abductions such as the Kuriga incident of March 2024.

CNG further highlighted the kidnapping of 64 residents in Tsafe, Zamfara, occurring on the very day the Minister of State for Defence, Bello Matawalle, visited the state, describing it as a stark reminder of the deepening insecurity and the continuing vulnerability of citizens.

The group noted that several villages across the North have been ravaged in recent days, leaving families traumatised and livelihoods destroyed.

“The killing of a Brigadier General,” it added, underscores the gravity of the threat and mirrors past mass abductions such as the Kuriga attack of 7 March 2024, proving that the menace previously claimed to have been subdued has resurfaced with renewed aggression.

CNG also condemned the spread of dangerous misinformation, including a recent viral video in which IPOB terrorists disguised themselves as Hausa/Fulani attackers to incite ethnic hatred.

The group stated that such propaganda forms part of a broader strategy to distort public understanding and deepen national divisions.

It also decried the ongoing closure of 47 Unity Schools and several others across the North due to worsening insecurity, saying the shutdown of educational institutions in an already disadvantaged region is a major developmental setback.