By Sandra Marroquin —
Fulanis in Nigeria are winning the competition to see who can kill the most Christians in Nigeria. According to new study, they murdered more than their two biggest rivals combined.
The jihadist Fulanis in Northern Nigeria killed 79,323 people from 2019 to September 2025, according to the tally conducted by Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa (ORFA).
They are so successful at installing Sharia society and stealing farmland from Christians, they slaughtered 36 people a day — 42,000 of which were civilians.
Islamic Fulanis accounted for 44% of the deaths — far more than the 12% that Boko Haram and ISWAP killed together. While nominal Muslims are often targeted and killed in these attacks as well, the study found that Christians were killed at a rate 4.4 times that of Muslims.
“Violence linked to Fulani militia is the dominant force behind Nigeria’s death toll. The Western preoccupation with Boko Haram is, at best, misleading,” Frans Vierhout, a senior research analyst at ORFA, told TruthNigeria.
Boko Haram became infamous for kidnapping 276 schoolgirls in Chibok in 2014 to sell off as wives to Muslims. At the time, Michelle Obama called for the release of the innocent girls, but Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau mocked international pressure: “I abducted your girls. I will sell them in the market, by Allah. Allah has instructed me to sell them. They are his property and I will carry out his instructions.”
Many of the girls escaped or were rescued, but others remain unaccounted for.
But as deadly as Boko Haram is, it pales in comparison to the Fulanis, the new report shows. The Fulanis armed themselves with military grade weapons after the fall of the Libya in 2011. The Nigerian government is trying to downplay what some call genocide, saying these are territorial disputes between herdsmen and farmers.
But why then do the Fulanis burn churches, target pastors, shout Islamist slogans and spare nearby Muslim communities?
The Fulani are an ethnic group of roughly 40–50 million people spread across West and Central Africa, and the overwhelming majority are not militants.
Related content: Everybody cares for Palestinians not Nigerian Christians? Fulanis want a sharia society, Happy Palm Sunday from Fulanis means death for Christians. Sources: International Christian Concern, Roys Report, others.
