Earlier this month, I recorded a conversation with my friend Patricia Agupusi, assistant professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and an expert on insurgencies, political violence, and state capture, among other topics. She has lived and worked extensively in Nigeria, where her fieldwork included interviewing Nigerians displaced by political, ethnic, and religious violence. When I asked Patricia to come on the show, I was seeking some background on the Trump administration’s statements about anti-Christian violence perpetrated by Boko Haram in the northern part of the country. I suspected that the situation, while undoubtedly dire for Christians, was more complex than the White House’s messaging made it sound.
My suspicions turned out to be correct. In this episode, Patricia offers a nuanced account of terrorism, religious radicalism, interethnic conflict, and government corruption and neglect that has led to the deaths and displacement not only of many Christians in northern Nigeria, but of many Muslims as well. Patricia provides a rich account of the region and its history. It was recorded weeks before the US conducted an aerial strike on Sokoto, a predominately Muslim state that many have described as an unusual choice, if the goal was to inflict damage on major terrorist networks.