NIGERIA: ONE DEAD, TWO INJURED IN ATTACK ON CHRISTIANS
15 February 08
Persecution against the body of Christ is non stop – we need to be praying!
Muslim youths use machetes on students, set aflame police station, over ‘blasphemy’ claim
Last Friday (8 Feb) a policeman was killed and two Christian teenagers were injured in the town of Sumaila, in Kano state when Muslim high school students went on a rampage over claims that a Christian student had written a ‘blasphemous’ article on the prophet of Islam, Muhammad.
Killed at the local police station after the attack on students at Government Secondary School-Sumaila, was Inspector Jibrin Garba, also a Christian.
One of the injured teenagers who suffered knife and machete wounds, Ahmadu Inuwa, said the accused Christian student, Ashiru Danlami, could not possibly have written the alleged English-language article as he could hardly speak in English, much less write in the language.
The Rev. Samaila Kogo of the Evangelical Church of West Africa (ECWA), from Sumaila, said his investigations showed that Muslim students wrote and published the blasphemous article as a pretext for attacking Christian students. This strategy, he said, is used in schools across northern Nigeria to force Christian students out of schools.
Only two of the 57 Christian students who had fled threats dared to return to the school one was Ahamadu Inuwa (pictured above) and Isiaku Dogo – final-year students with only a few months to graduate – both felt they needed to be in class to prepare for finals. Muslim students assaulted them with knives and machetes.
Having injured the two Christian students, Christian sources said, the Muslim students went directly to the town’s police station, where they killed the Christian police officer and burned down the police station.
A Christian leader in Kano state Rev. Dangora believes there’s a state campaign to keep children of Christians out of public schools.
Rev. Dangora said the ploy to keep Christian students out of schools would hurt Christians in the state as many of them are poor and cannot afford to educate their children in private educational institutions. He called on the Nigerian government to save Christian students from becoming endangered and being denied education that is important to their well-being.
source: Compass Direct
- Please pray for the right of Christian children/teenagers in northern Nigeria to have an education.
- Pray for the school in Sumaila, that the love of Jesus will be shown through the lives of Christians – showing forgiveness and kindness to those who persecute them.
- Remember teenagers, like Ahamadu, desperately wanting to finish school.
It’s not too late to get involved in SHOCKWAVE our prayer event for persecuted Christians 29 Feb – 2 March – we’re asking individuals, youth groups, CUs, churches to give some space over the that weekend to unite and pray for our persecuted family. Will you stand with them?