Alleged Genocide: Nigerian minister urges unedited broadcast of interview with Piers Morgan

Nigeria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yusuf Tuggar, has urged British broadcaster Piers Morgan to air his interview on Nigeria’s religious situation in full, without edits or selective omissions.

Mr Tuggar said on Wednesday that he appeared on Piers Morgan Uncensored to present what he described as a factual and contextual account of the “misleading narratives” about religious persecution in Nigeria.

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“My explanations, supported by verifiable data, may not have conformed to certain preconceived views,” the minister wrote on X.

“However, for the sake of integrity and transparency, it is essential that the full interview be aired exactly as recorded, without edits or selective omissions. Nigeria’s truth must not be distorted to fit external biases.”

The interview has yet to be aired, but Mr Tuggar’s position aligns with the Nigerian government’s consistent stance that there is no genocide against Christians in the country.

The government has said it welcomes international cooperation in tackling insecurity, provided Nigeria’s territorial integrity is respected.

This followed comments by former US President Donald Trump, who accused Nigeria of persecuting Christians and threatened possible military action.

For months, campaigners and politicians in Washington have alleged that Islamist militants in Nigeria are systematically targeting Christians. But credible reports have found that much of the data supporting these claims cannot be verified.

Officials and experts in Nigeria have also dismissed Mr Trump’s claims, saying that Boko Haram and al-Qaeda-linked groups target people of all faiths.

“We are not proud of the security situation that we are passing through,” Kimiebi Ebienfa, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told Al Jazeera. “But to go with the narrative that only Christians are targeted — no, it is not true. There is no Christian genocide in Nigeria.”

He added that “killings in Nigeria are not restricted to Christians alone. Muslims are being killed. Traditional worshippers are being killed. The majority is not the Christian population.”

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Nigeria, a country of more than 200 million people, is roughly split between a largely Muslim north and a mostly Christian south. The conflict driven by armed groups has persisted for more than 15 years, mostly in the northeast and northwest.

In September, US television host Bill Maher described the situation as a “genocide,” claiming that Boko Haram had killed over 100,000 people and burned 18,000 churches since 2009. Similar figures have circulated widely on social media.

The Nigerian government has repeatedly pushed back against such assertions, describing them as “a gross misrepresentation of reality.” Officials maintain that terrorists attack “all who reject their murderous ideology — Muslims, Christians, and those of no faith alike.”

Security analysts and experts have also said that while Christians have been targeted in some attacks, there is no evidence of a coordinated campaign to exterminate them.

Many of the conflicts often portrayed abroad as religious, they add, are actually disputes over land, water, and grazing routes, worsened by climate change and weak governance.