Governor Nasir Ahmed El-Rufai of Kaduna State has lambasted the Archbishop of Catholic Diocese of Kafachan, Bishop Joseph Danlami Bagobiri over the actual figure of Christians killed in Southern Kaduna crises: “The figure is false and Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, didn’t say that. The figure was released by the Catholic Diocese of Kafachan, that 808 Christians were killed. That’s false. An Archbishop caused those figures to be released. He has to come and explain how he came about those figures. I’m going to report that bishop to the Pope. I will personally write to the Pope.”

“The Catholic Church is one of the most organised global institutions and before you become a bishop in the Catholic Church, you must have enough thought and knowledge equivalent to a PhD, you must be deep and philosophical. It is a dent on the Catholic Church, worldwide, for a bishop to issue such a statement without facts, without checking.”

“Instead of them to stop it, when they were challenged about the figures, they issued another one. On January 16, SEMA went to Southern Kaduna and spent three days, to establish how many people were killed and they issued a report which did not just report on what happened now, they went as far back as 2013 and covered local governments even outside Southern Kaduna and came up with 376.”

“This was inclusive of 2013. We have our own official figures but, I don’t even want to give you that until our report comes out. I’m shocked a Catholic bishop would do that. He was on medical treatment outside Nigeria, yet, he issued a statement on what happened in Southern Kaduna. Two days later, the number two man issued another statement of some sorts and he said the 808 includes lives lost from 2011. It’s false! In 2011 alone, more than 808 persons were killed in Southern Kaduna! Not all of them were Christians! In 2011, most of the victims were Muslims.”