ABUJA: A radical Muslim group has bowed to political pressure and backed off from a ultimatum to the mainly Christian Igbo minority that they quit northern Nigeria or face reprisals.
The Arewa Youths had given all Igbos living in the north until October 1 to leave.
The threat, issued in June, worsened the simmering ethnic and religious tensions across Nigeria, Africa’s most-populous nation, and provoked widespread condemnation.
Late on Thursday, the Arewa Youths issued a statement stepping back from their ultimatum.
“Mindful of the concerns generated by the clause... that advised the Biafran Igbo to relocate... we immediately opened channels for dialogue and interaction,” the group said.
“Admittedly, we came under intense pressure from genuinely concerned national, political, traditional, religious and cultural leaders.
“As a consequence of these vigorous engagements... we are today pleased to announce the immediate suspension of the relocation clause.”
Since the so-called “quit notice” was issued on June 8, the federal government in Abuja had repeatedly called for calm.
Then on Monday, President Muhammadu Buhari addressed the issue in a televised speech following a long absence from the country for health reasons.
“Nigeria’s unity is settled and not negotiable. We shall not allow irresponsible elements to start trouble and when things get bad they run away,” he said.
The Arewa Youths’ ultimatum was itself in response to a bid by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) — a mainly Igbo group in the south — to secede from Nigeria.
“We will not accept a system that is designed to alienate and subdue the people of the north,” the northern Muslim group said in response, calling for a referendum of Igbo people to settle the Biafra issue.
Rising communalism and anti-Igbo sentiment has been blamed on the IPOB’s bid to declare independence.
Their initiative has been stoked by memories of 1967 when their predecessors declared an independent republic of Biafra in the southeast.
That declaration led to a brutal 30-month civil war and more than one million deaths, most of them Igbos, from starvation and disease.
Nigeria is roughly evenly split between the Muslim-majority north and the largely Christian south, but the country is made up of more than 250 ethnic groups.
The biggest is the Hausa-speaking Fulani in the north, the Yoruba in the southwest and the Igbo in the southeast. Many have relocated for economic reasons over the years.
Nigerian Muslim group retracts expulsion threat to Christians
Nigerian Muslim group retracts expulsion threat to Christians
Lawsuit challenges Trump administration’s ending of protections for Somalis
- The lawsuit cites a series of statements Trump has made describing Somalis as “garbage” and “low IQ people” who “contribute nothing.”
BOSTON: Immigrant rights advocates filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to stop US President Donald Trump’s administration from next week ending legal protections that allow nearly 1,100 Somalis to live and work in the United States. The lawsuit, brought by four Somalis and two advocacy groups, challenges the US Department of Homeland Security’s decision to end Temporary Protected Status for Somali immigrants, whom Trump has derided in public remarks. Outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in January announced that TPS for Somalis would end on March 17, arguing that Somalia’s conditions had improved, despite fighting continuing between Somali forces and Al-Shabab militants. The plaintiffs, who include the groups African Communities Together and Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans, in the lawsuit filed in Boston federal court argue the move was procedurally flawed and driven by a discriminatory, predetermined agenda.
The lawsuit cites a series of statements Trump has made describing Somalis as “garbage” and “low IQ people” who “contribute nothing.”
The plaintiffs said the administration is ending TPS for Somalia and other countries due to unconstitutional bias against non-white immigrants, not based on objective assessments of country conditions.
“The termination of TPS for Somalia is racism masking as immigration policy,” Omar Farah, executive director at the legal group Muslim Advocates, said in a statement.
DHS did not respond to a request for comment. It has previously said TPS was “never intended to be a de facto amnesty program.”
TPS is a form of humanitarian immigration protection that shields eligible migrants from deportation and allows them to work. Under Noem, DHS has moved to end TPS for a dozen countries, sparking legal challenges. The administration on Saturday announced plans to pursue an appeal at the US Supreme Court in order to end TPS for over 350,000 Haitians. It also wants the high court to allow it to end TPS for about 6,000 Syrians.
SOMALI COMMUNITY TARGETED
Somalia was first designated for TPS in 1991, with its latest extension in 2024. About 1,082 Somalis currently hold TPS, and 1,383 more have pending applications, according to DHS. Somalis in Minnesota in recent months had become a target of Trump’s immigration crackdown, with officials pointing to a fraud scandal in which many people charged come from the state’s large Somali community. The Trump administration cited those fraud allegations as a basis for a months-long immigration enforcement surge in Democratic-led Minnesota, during which about 3,000 immigration agents were deployed, spurring protests and leading to the killing of two US citizens by federal agents.
In November, Trump announced he would end TPS for Somalis in Minnesota, and a month later said he wanted them sent “back to where they came from.”
The US Department of State advises against traveling to Somalia, citing crime and civil unrest among numerous factors.
