Nigeria: Armed Violence (Rural Communities)

Kevin Foster Excerpts

Tuesday 27th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. It is also a pleasure to be in Westminster Hall again for a debate on protecting people’s ability to express their religious faith freely, which was initiated by my good friend, the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). I know it is rare that we get the chance to hear the hon. Gentleman—[Laughter]—at 9.30 on a Tuesday morning, but it was a particular pleasure today. I make that comment in jest, but the laughter is probably a sign of how often he has managed to secure a debate on oppressed communities around the world. Such communities are often oppressed purely because they have made a choice about their faith, or to have no faith—I am always clear that this issue is not just about the faith that we share.

The problem is, sadly, not a new one. We only have to look at the Open Doors website to see articles from the past few years about Fulani attacks on those from a Christian background. The hon. Gentleman was right to highlight the huge impact not only on people’s freedom to express their religious faith but on the economy in an area to which poverty is sadly not a stranger for many people. Conflict is continuing and feeds into wider concern about the stability of Nigeria.

Some colleagues and Members in the Chamber are old enough to remember the appalling Biafran war, when Nigeria suffered horrendous loss of life. We have seen the impact of Boko Haram and how it has used its extremist ideology to cow people and try to make them bend their knee, rather than make free choices. Boko Haram has also, famously, sought to deter girls from seeking an education. We reflect regularly on the fact that this debate is about groups seeking both to take away religious rights, to force people to agree with their particular faith or belief, and to remove every other right—not only to religious faith but to supporting oneself, freedom of expression, choice of person to lead one’s country and, generally, to living life as one chooses.

People might wonder why this is an issue for us here in the United Kingdom, but some of us believe that it is important to protect the right to express faith and political views anywhere. Most of us rightly take the view that if people cannot do that somewhere else, the threat is always that such an ideology might spread to this country. For me, it is also about the migrant flows towards the Mediterranean. The fundamental reason for much of that is conflict and war in sub-Saharan Africa, which makes people feel that they have absolutely no hope of making a better life for themselves if they remain in their own country, that they might not be able to progress economically, or that their life will be in genuine danger. It is therefore right to focus on this subject.

It will be interesting to hear from the Minister about the Government’s work with the Nigerian authorities to tackle the problem. The obvious question is about what support our military in particular might supply, which is not so much boots on the ground as capacity building. Support to Nigerian forces could include provision of capabilities to do with surveillance and reconnaissance that might not be available to them but are to us. Furthermore, how are we working with the Nigerian authorities to build their capability to strengthen enforcement of law and order? Ultimately, without the ability to enforce the law in parts of Nigeria, problems will remain. How can confidence in the state authorities, which the information we have read shows is clearly damaged, be built up? How can we as the UK work with the authorities to do that?

We can help not only to achieve short-term security but to support long-term development, particularly through our international development programme. It is all very well stopping the conflict today—perhaps with a better security operation, dealing with specific armed individuals, or tracking down where weapons come from and blocking a particular supply—but if the underlying economic issues that drive people towards conflict remain, that conflict will re-emerge in the future. As the UK looks towards a future as more of a global trader, how can we use aid to stimulate trade and, in turn, economic development, which can be as vital to ending conflict as merely carrying out an operation to prevent attacks in the short term?

It has been a pleasure to make a contribution to this debate and, as always, to be in the Chamber with some familiar faces to talk about defending the rights of others to express their religious beliefs freely. This debate shows that the issue extends beyond states such as North Korea, where people face formal persecution by the state they live under; in so many other cases, in particular in parts of Nigeria and the middle east, non-state actors are the source of persecution. How can we work with the Government of Nigeria to ensure that we are not still debating this subject in 10 years’ time?

[Several hon. Members rose—]