My Heart grieves

Massacre of Christians in the Middle-Belt of Nigeria by Bruce Cerew

Today my heart grieves for Christians in the Middle-Belt of Nigeria. It’s becoming unbearable to sit and watch the continuing and seemingly endless killing, abuse, torture and beheading of innocent children, women, young and old.

I have been waiting in vain for an intervention from international organizations such as the U.N., Amnesty, EU, and ICC. They need to do something to stop this madness, but they are not doing anything. In fact, they have remained silent.

It is hard to sit back watching and waiting for Bishop Tutu and Pope Francis to go to Nigeria to tell President Buhari to stop the killings. These are killings that have targeted one group of people. In the past, religious leaders went to Myanmar to stop similar atrocities, but here they have remained silent. How hypocritical.

My heart grieves for the men and women, babies and children who have been brutally murdered in their homes with their heads chopped off like cows, while the military personnel who were supposed to help them watched in amusement.

My heart grieves for young children whose parents have been brutally murdered by well-armed herdsmen and will now become casualties left to hopelessness and despair for the rest of their lives.

Oh, my heart grieves at the injustices against a targeted group of people in Buhari’s Nigeria. Although the genocide is against a group, there are very real individuals behind this chapter in history.

My heart grieves for Liya Sharibu, a teenage Christain girl adopted from among one-hundred-ten Dapchi school girls in February 19, 2018 in Nigeria. This girl remains the only one in the hands of Boko Haram because she was reluctant to convert to Islam. The world media are not talking about her. No Western politician has called for her freedom, not even the U.N, Amnesty International or any human rights group. There have been no protests calling for her release. Why?

In 2016, over one-million immigrants were welcomed as kings and queens in countries throughout Western Europe. After the photo of a young Syrian boy swept the headlines, I saw countless demonstrations with banners proclaiming “Welcome, We Are One.” All of the human rights organizations rallied for free passage of over one million Syrian refugees to Europe. I watched as German Chancellor Merkel and many other Western European politicians opened their borders to welcome the Syrians, and even used the same slogan, “We are one people.”

But now, the same media, the same politicians, Amnesty, U.N, Merkel, and all the rest of the world have remained silent over the ongoing ethnic cleansing of an entire community in Nigeria’s Middle-Belt. The Western media are not reporting on the brutal killings of children, men and women in Nigeria.

My heart grieves for the hundreds of unarmed young IPOB members brutally murdered, tortured, drawn out and shot in the head for agitating for restructuring and self-governance in South-East Nigeria.

My heart grieves. To date, no Dutch politician, television channel, newspaper or radio station has dared to even carry the news. Why? Is it because this is happening against Christians and in Africa?

Why has the rest of the world remained silent while this atrocity continues? How can we say that we are one world, one people, when there is a clear favoritism of one race and faith against the other.

Mr. Buhari, Merkel, Mark Rutte, Bishop Tutu, Pope Francis, and the rest, how can you go to sleep tonight when these killings continue?

As for me, I’m not going to wait any longer. I’m not going to remain silent. I cannot go to sleep tonight knowing that by morning another village in the Middle-Belt of Nigeria will be wiped-out.

I do not want to be a part of the injustice and hypocrisy that is taking over our world today.

It’s time to stop these barbaric killings in Nigeria and to bring the perpetrators to justice. I’m saying enough is enough. Help me spread this message until all the world knows about it.

I will announce a date for peaceful demonstrations around the world.

Bruce Cerew, author and activist is a Dutch African writer of the books Long Road, or in Dutch (De Lange Weg), War Child and European Spring,( Europese lente)

Kindness is the ability to love people more than they really deserve, and love is the wisdom of the fool and the folly of the wise.