A Call on UN Security Council to Constitute an International Criminal Court on Nigerian Genocide under Chapter VII, Articles 39-51 of UN Charter
Nwankwo T. Nwaezeigwe, PhD October 26, 2025
I wish to make the following statement in respect to Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah’s Spineless Denial of Genocide against Christians in Nigeria and, his purported plea that the United States should not designate Nigeria as a country of Special Concern on Religious Persecution, as conveyed in his 14-paragraph, although numbered 13, of what I refer to as the “Epistle of Lies to Sokoto Caliphate”, titled: “A Plea & Testimony from Nigeria” delivered in Vatican City on October 21st, 2025.
My people often say, “Bele no dey fear, na him make am dey for front” (the stomach is not afraid hence it stands out in the front). I believe I have written enough on Rt. Rev Matthew Hassan Kukah, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese and, it’s right time I speak to him in the language he best understands. John Chapter 8: 32, tells us: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” This is the time for us to speak and stand for the truth as Christians.
For those of us who having been following Bishop Kukah’s anti-Christian malevolent activities over time, we are not surprised by his utterances. Of course there are incontrovertible facts why Rt. Rev Matthew Kukah will neither stand by the same Christians he was ordained to guide and guard nor speak truth to the throne of God in respect of the matter of genocide against them, but rather will by all means stand by the Federal Government and Sokoto Caliphate.
First, Bishop Kukah is currently an employee of the Federal Government, having been appointed Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council of the Federal University of Applied Sciences, Kachia, Kaduna State by President Bola Tinubu.
So Nigerian Christians do not expect Bishop Kukah to accept the fact of Genocide against Christians in Nigeria; for doing so will be both biting the finger that feeds him and engaging in self-condemnation since he is equally an accomplice.
Second, Bishop Kukah has never hidden the mouth-watering largesse he receives from Sokoto Caliphate right from the point of his ordination as Bishop of Sokoto Diocese to present. In paragraph 4 of his epistle we could see how he detailed his personal benefits from Sokoto Caliphate, starting from free accommodation for his guests, to Toyota Prado gift, during his ordination as Bishop.
Bishop Kukah went further in paragraph 5 to say: “We are therefore not dealing with cases of people who are going around wielding machetes and looking for me to kill because I am a Christian. I travel in my official regalia as Bishop in and out of Sokoto. We carry out our religious services with no molestations.”
What indeed Bishop Kukah was telling Nigerian Christians is that his personal comfort and safety should be used as the yard-stick to judge the veracity of the evidence of genocide against Christians in Nigeria.
Let me remind Bishop Kukah what the Bible says in Galatians Chapter 6, verses 7 and 8: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.”
Let me remind Bishop Kukah that my struggles for the people of Middle Belt, particular his own people of Southern Kaduna began in 1999/2000 during the OPC-Hausa/Fulani Ketu/Mile 12 Lagos conflict when OPC militants mistakenly killed an Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA)) Pastor from Atyep in Mile 12 after they mistook him as a Hausa-Fulani Muslim from his dressing.
My friend from Atyep Dr. Alex Mana then a lecturer with Nigerian Institute of Sports, Lagos, who was a neighbor to my cousin Mr. Dinma Monyei, now in United States, whose house I was staying at Alaka, Surulere, came one early morning panting, and said, “Tony those OPC boys had just killed a Pastor of ECWA Church, my brother at Mile 12.”
I was speechless for a while, but after I recovered, I told him I was leaving immediately to meet Dr. Frederick Faseun, the OPC leader over the matter. Dr. Alex Mana is retired now but currently lives in Kaduna. He can attest to this fact. This was long before the current state of insecurity orchestrated by Fulani jihadists extended to southern part of Nigeria.
When I met Dr. Faseun, the first question he asked me was if they had leaders in Lagos State and I said yes. He then instructed me to link them up with him. Dr. Mana eventually took me to Mr. Isuwa Dogo, the then President of Sokapo (Sokapu) in his office located in Palm Groove suburb of Lagos. I eventually linked them up with Dr. Faseun and the Middle Belt Christians became recognized as a separate entity from the broader Muslim Hausa and Fulani of the North.
It is instructive to note that the first paid newspaper advertorial against the killings Christians in Southern Kaduna I made, SOKAPO was unable to fund it. I personally raised the money from elsewhere. I have since published numerous paid newspaper advertorials and essays, and spoken in many online broadcast media over the on-going genocide against Christians in the Middle Belt in particular and, Nigeria in general without collecting a dime from anybody from the Middle Belt.
So Bishop Kukah should not see me as somebody fighting this cause for the reason of personal interest or self-aggrandizement. I have a pedigree of selfless sacrifice for public interests attestable from both University of Nigeria Nsukka and my hometown Ibusa.
I was virtually the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Southern foot-soldier for persecuted Middle Belt Christians throughout the period of Papa Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor’s term as CAN President. The current President of Northern Zone of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Sunday Oibe is a source of my testimony. Brother Sunday Oibe knew my special assignment from the then CAN General Secretary Dr. Musa Asake, who was diabolically murdered in 2018 by CAN leadership for his unwavering stance on genocide against his people, shortly before I fled into my current exile.
May be Bishop Kukah might like to read my last interview on this issue of genocide against Christians in Nigeria published in the July 6, 2025 issue of the Catholic World Report online news media titled, “Church Leaders: It’s time for Nigeria’s Christians to defend themselves” as reported by the erudite journalist Ngala Killian Chimtom; for him to understand that we have since passed the stage of denial and, that we are now in the stage of initiating the call for International genocide criminal court for Nigeria.
Let me again remind Bishop Kukah that in January 2017 after the massacre of over two hundred defenseless Southern Kaduna indigenes by the same Muslim Fulani jihadists, I singularly mobilized funds and wrote a full-page newspaper advertorial published on the Daily Sun, Vanguard, and Leadership issues of Friday December 9, 2017, condemning both the heartless massacre and, the criminal indifference of John Cardinal Onaiyekan and the Roman Catholic Church over the killings.
Indeed, at one stage when I met the younger brother to Sam Nda-Isaiah of Leadership Newspaper Abraham Nda-Isaiah in his office in Abuja requesting for rebate for a full-page advertorial in his newspaper on genocide against Christians in Southern Kaduna, his surprising comment was why are you a Southerner so concerned about the killing of our people? I simply told him that if we don’t stop the killing of your people today, it will become our turn tomorrow. What’s happening today?
All Bishop Kukah knows best is sowing the seed of discord between Catholics and Protestants in Nigeria; playing the treacherous politics of Catholic-Protestant rivalry sponsored by Sokoto Caliphate which hosts his Diocese. Throughout the period of his vocation as a Roman Catholic Priest, rising to the exalted position of a Bishop, Bishop Kukah has never shown any concern about the plight of his people as people facing extermination.
Throughout the eight years period of the blood-sucking demon called Nasir el-Rufai as Governor of Kaduna State, Christians of Southern Kaduna and particularly Atyep, were slaughtered with reckless abandon, their homes seized and occupied by Fulani herdsmen and, many of them turned refugees in their homeland. Thanks to their illustrious son General Christopher Musa, the immediate past Chief of Defence Staff who used his good offices to reclaim his people’s land.
Today we cannot talk of genocide against Christians in Nigeria without the mention of his Atyep ethnic group. It is indeed unfortunate that Bishop Kukah, has forgotten the gruesome experience of his people in 1992 under General Ibrahim Babangida?
He has forgotten how a kangaroo tribunal set up by General Ibrahim Babangida sentenced the respected Gen Zamani Lekwot and other prominent Atyep indigenes to death, even after suffering untold carnage from the Muslim Zango immigrants supported by Sokoto Caliphate?
Under Bishop Kukah’s watch we saw a helpless innocent Christian student Miss Deborah Samuel gruesomely murdered in Sokoto by Muslim mobs under the trumped up accusation of insulting Islam. Bishop Kukah has forgotten the gruesome murder of Rev Father Isaac Azekpili Achi by the same Muslim jihadists.
Bishop Kukah has forgotten how the Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in Adamawa State Rev. Lawan Andimi was displayed before every Nigeria on video by the jihadists and subsequently murdered. Do we need to continue reminding Bishop Kukah of the uncountable number of Christians that are no more as a consequence of the Sokoto Caliphate-sponsored jihadists?
Bishop Kukah with all his degrees in theology and philosophy tells that he cannot clearly explain what genocide is all about under the present Nigerian situation. In the last part of paragraph 3 and beginning of paragraph 4, Bishop Kukah attempted to confuse us on why what is happening to Christians in Nigeria should not be called genocide.
For him the mere killing of few Muslims by Muslim insurgents invalidates the fact of genocide against Christians. For this reason, according Bishop Kukah, the floods of blood in Nigeria have no religious boundaries. To him we cannot find the right word for the endless slaughter of Christians in Nigeria.
Let me remind Bishop Kukah what Article II of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide as ratified by UN General Assembly resolution 260 A (III) of 9 December 1948, which entered into force on 12 January 1951:
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed withintent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”
The question to Bishop Kukah is what has the above definition to do with the killing of a small number of Muslims by their fellow Muslims? Does that invalidate the fact that genocide is being committed against Christians by Muslims in Nigeria?
Bishop Kukah should know that we have passed the stage of denial of genocide. We have since moved to the stage of Article III, which defines the punishment for those who committed genocide.
Article III defines the following acts shall be punishable: (a) Genocide; (b) Conspiracy to commit genocide; (c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;(d) Attempt to commit genocide; (e) Complicity in genocide.
Nigerian Christians should therefore begin to gather relevant bodies of evidence in respect of genocide against Christians based on the above conditions, for the expected United Nations International Criminal Court for Nigeria against perpetrators of genocide.
Let Nigerians not be deceived by Bishop Kukah’s viperous lying tongues accusing former President Barack Obama of purportedly imposing President Muhammadu Buhari on Nigerians. President Barack Obama did not impose Muhammadu Buhari on Nigerians. Bishop Kukah and his Catholic cliques did.
Who provided the link between Sokoto Caliphate and President Obama that eventually led to his open hostility against President Goodluck Jonathan? It was the same Bishop Kukah who connected the United States Secretary of State, John Kerry, who is a Roman Catholic.
John Kerry eventually connected the Northern Muslim Governors to Joe Biden their fellow Roman Catholic and, then President Barack Obama. Was Bishop Kukah not in attendance when in August 2016 after the defeat of President Goodluck Jonathan, John Kerry visited the Sultan of Sokoto?
Is it not an incontrovertible fact that the Roman Catholic Church employed “Episcopal” Town Hall Meetings through the Roman Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Nigeria led by the then Archbishop of Jos, Bishop Ignatius Kaigama as a tool for mobilizing Catholics for Muhammadu Buhari against Goodluck Jonathan?
Was it not Cardinal John Onaiyekan who pulled the Roman Catholic Church out of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) after his defeat as CAN President by Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor and thereafter pitched camp with the Sultan of Sokoto Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar III to form what he called Interfaith Initiative for Peace? Since the formation of the said Interfaith Initiative for Peace thousands of defenseless Christians have been murdered in cold blood by Muslims.
In August 2014, John Cardinal Onaiyekan held a meeting with the Sultan of Sokoto under the aegis of Onaiyekan-Sultan of Sokoto Joint Conference on 2015 elections; which was a framework to rig President Goodluck Jonathan out of office. The result of the unholy conference was the unholy recruitment of Father Ejike Mbaka as the anti-President Jonathan Prophet of doom, leading to his infamous Baal prophecy against President Goodluck Jonathan.
Bishop Kukah equally convened his own Judas Iscariot group named, “National Peace Committee” before the 2015 Presidential election; which he claimed was aimed at fostering smooth hand-over of power, but which was indeed an anti-Jonathan campaign tool. Otherwise what has a Catholic Bishop to do with hand-over of power between President Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari?
What achievement did his spurious National Peace Committee have in the issue of stopping the slaughter of Christians in Nigeria since its formation in 2015? If I say that Bishop Kukah is a spiritual fraud and a priestly scam, I am not making a mistake and I have no apologies for saying so.
On 5th of August 2015 Cardinal Okogie granted an interview to newsmen at his residence in Lagos extolling the supposed virtues of Muhammadu Buhari. In his words, “I reassure the president-elect of our prayers and spiritual solicitude, we look forward to seeing a President that will be the Nelson Mandela and the Le Kuan Yew of Nigeria.”
Where is Cardinal Anthony Okogie presently? Where is Archbishop Ignatius Kaigama? Where is Father Ejike Mbaka at this moment of our greatest need? What happened to Cardinal Okogie’s Nelson Mandela and the Le Kuan Yew of Nigeria?
Let me again state that it is an insult to Nigerian Christians for Bishop Kukah to say that the present Government of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a known jihadist, whose Vice Presient is a confirmed Boko Haram sponsor, is more tolerant of Christians than President Muhammadu Buhari who even had a Christian Vice President. The same ethno-religious lopsided appointments under President Muhammadu Buhari are still what are obtained today. What we have today is the case of Fulani Muslims replaced by Yoruba Muslims.
Bishop Kukah ridiculously believes that because the wife of a Muslim President is a fake Christian pastor, Christians are at advantage under President Tinubu. Why didn’t Bishop Kukah, if indeed he is a true Bishop of Christ, mention the three topmost security positions occupied by Muslims—National Security Adviser to the President, Minister of Defence and, Minister of State for Defence? Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah, Nigerian Christians are not fools; they are not as unintelligent as you assume them to be.
I want to conclude by saying that my only consolation in this matter of Bishop Kukah’s Judas Iscariot posturing is that His Holiness Pope Leo, X1V cannot be deceived. Before becoming a Pope, he was Head of the Augustinians and, had visited Nigeria, in particular their Jos Headquarters frequently. So he knows the truth about the Genocide against Christians in Nigeria far better than Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah.
What Nigerian Christians urgently need at present is the call for UN Security Council to Set up an International Criminal Court for Nigerian on Genocide in the manner of the November 1994 International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda; under Chapter VII, Articles 39-51 of United Nations Charter.
Dr. Nwankwo T. Nwaezeigwe is the Odogwu (Traditional Generalissimo) of Ibusa, Delta State & President, International Coalition against Christian Genocide in Nigeria (ICAC-GEN). He was formerly Director, Centre for Igbo Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He lives in exile in Manila, Republic of the Philippines. Email: Nwaezeigwe.Genocideafrica@gmail.com Visit our: https://icac-gen.org to understand the core reason of my struggles and exile in Republic of the Philippines. He is the author of: THE AFRICAN THEATER OF THE MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT: Studies in Arab Neo-Colonialism in Black Africa Washington DC: Academica Press Inc., 2019 & Over ten other books.