Nigerian President Buhari accused of running an 'Islamist government' and aiding 'cleansing' of Christians

A civil rights group accused President Muhammadu Buhari of running an Islamist government and aiding the rising sectarian attacks against Nigerian Christians.

The International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law (Intersociety) criticized the Nigerian president for his seeming "unwillingness" and "inability" to protect the Christian population in the country facing increasing incidences of violent attacks from religious extremists.

"As we speak, none of the perpetrators has been fished out and put on trial," said Intersociety Chairman Emeka Umeagbalasi. "That is to say that Government is fully aiding and abetting the sundry ethno-religious cleansing and butcheries. It also partakes circumstantially and vicariously, if not directly."

Umeagbalasi added, "The Buhari administration, from every indication, is also running an Islamist government."

Intersociety urged Christian leaders to force Buhari's government to revert to the rule of law.

According to a report by international religious persecution watchdog Open Doors and its chief executive officer Lisa Pearce, the state's Islamic extremists killed 4,028 Christians and attacked 198 churches in 2015 alone. It also reported 1.3 million internally displaced Nigerian Christians.

Open Doors asserted that the political elite aided these sectarian attacks carried out by Boko Haram and Muslim Fulani herdsmen.

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), the country's umbrella organization of various Christian denominations, also criticized the administration's "lukewarm" response to the spate of non-Muslim killings. CAN urged Nigerian Christians to prepare to defend themselves in the face of the persecutions.

"You will agree with me that with these happenings and the lukewarm attitude by the authorities concerned toward putting an end to it, Nigeria is dancing a macabre dance of death, both for the nation and for its citizens," stated CAN.

Former congressman Frank Wolf, also a distinguished senior fellow of the 21st Century Wilberforce Initiative, reported after visiting the African country in February with Wilberforce's delegate team of religious freedom advocates that the Nigerian Christians feel abandoned and forgotten by the West and the churches in the West.

Wilberforce reported that the country is at the brink of breaking apart. Wolf warned that the U.S. should look back on Nigeria, the largest African country with 180 million in population, because doing otherwise would be catastrophic.