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Oct. 28, 2025 - The David Knight Show
23:03
Nigeria’s Christian Genocide
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All right, welcome back.
And joining us now is filmmaker and evangelist Judd Saul.
And his organization is Equipping the Persecuted.
You can find the website at equippingthepersecuted.org.
And that is the main site.
And from that, they have set up another site that's focused strictly on what is happening in Nigeria because there's so much that is happening there.
It's called Truth in TruthNigeria.com.
And so you can find out what is happening there.
We wanted to get it straight from Judd.
Judd, tell us a little bit about this.
I see that you went in 2011 and you first saw what was happening there.
That's 14 years this has been going on now.
But tell us what you saw that got you activated.
Well, what I saw that got me activated.
So I went first to Nigeria with my grandfather, who's an evangelist and wanted to heard stories about Nigeria, wanted to go help serve on the mission.
And when I got there, people were telling us about these attacks that have been going on against them in their communities.
And I personally saw the aftermath of some of these attacks when I was there.
And it always just like it just struck me to my core.
I was like, and I kept on asking questions.
I was like, what are people doing about this?
What are other missionaries?
Are there any other organizations doing something about this?
What can be done?
So over the years, I kept on serving with this other mission I was working with.
But then in 2019, I started equipping the persecuted because, frankly, I'd had enough.
I've talked to pastors and other missionaries and other people there.
I said, what if we created an organization that actually wants to stop the persecution?
What if we had an organization that trained village security teams?
What if we had an organization that responds to these attacks within 48 hours?
And they said, we need this yesterday.
When can we start?
So that's what started equipping the persecuted.
Because I looked around and I saw that very few people were actually trying to do something about the situation.
A lot of people talking, but no action on the ground.
That's right.
Because the government doesn't want to stop this.
I mean, the government is kind of a silent partner in all this, from what I've been able to see.
Is that correct?
Would you say the government there?
Well, in particular, well, there was President Goodluck Jonathan, who is Christian, that was trying to use Nigerian resources to fight Boko Haram and fight the Fulani terrorists.
But then what happened was when Obama came into office, he then started sending Democrat operatives to Nigeria to get Muslim presidents elected over Christian presidents.
And when you saw the Muslim presidents take over, you saw the killing increase exponentially.
Wow.
Yeah.
Yeah, I guess it was appropriately named Good Luck, Jonathan.
I'm going to stop the Muslims killing Christians.
Good luck, Jonathan.
Yes.
Well, so, you know, so what's been going on is before it would be like you'd have a Christian president, Muslim vice president, Muslim president, Christian vice president.
But in the last three presidential terms, what you've had is a Muslim-Muslim ticket.
And the government has been laying cover for the terrorists and turning a blind eye to the killing and pretending it doesn't exist.
Wow.
And so that was Obama's influence.
And so you could have a positive influence as well from the U.S., but that's not there.
I want to focus more on what you actually do in terms of equipping the persecuted.
I heard you talk about emergency response teams, talking about village security.
Tell us a little bit about those things.
So currently, the Nigerian government, you have the police, you have the military, which are all nationalized.
They're all run by the Nigeria government.
But what the Nigerian government did do is recognize village security teams.
They're called vigilante.
Now, vigilante in the U.S. has a negative connotation, but the word vigilante has a positive connotation in Nigeria.
And so these are people that are from their local villages that get together to defend their villages or the first line of defense.
But they get no arms.
They get no training.
They get no funding.
And we've taken it upon our ministry to come alongside them and say, you know what?
We'll give you some training.
How about we give you some radios, some locally sourced bulletproof vests, things that you can do to try to help defend your village.
We can't get in the arms business, but what we can do is come alongside them and give them training and some basic materials to help save lives.
That's good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What we call that here in the U.S. instead of vigilantes, we would call it a posse.
But of course, they would be armed in order to be able to do something about it.
And that is not allowed there, I understand.
And certainly your organization could not provide that.
What about a quick response team after something like this has happened?
Of course, that's going to be medical care and other things.
Yeah, so what happens is, you know, the Fulani come in.
Let's say it's a town of 1,000, 1,500.
They'll come in, start shooting, start funneling.
people in and kill as many as they can, but then you have a lot of survivors that are no longer allowed to return to their homes because the Fulani have decimated everything.
They've burned the houses down.
They chopped down all the crops.
They raise everything.
Wow.
Wow.
And then all these people are put into these camps.
Well, they don't have any food.
They don't have any clothing.
They don't have any shelter.
And so we try to, within 48 hours, is deploy food, aid, and medicine within these attacks.
And many times we come across a lot of wounded victims that haven't been treated.
People that have had bullets in their arms and in their bodies for over 48 hours that need medical care and surgery.
And we come alongside, pay for those medical costs and try to help the wounded.
Wow.
Wow.
That's very important.
You know, we get frustrated because it's like, you know, nobody's talking about this.
And certainly nobody's doing anything about it.
And, you know, it is somewhat difficult.
I'm sure that there's levers that could be pulled if Trump wanted to do anything about it.
But the U.S. government typically doesn't now.
Obama did.
When you look at these people they push, they push the Muslims in there, but is there also a Marxist component to this as well?
It's mostly just Muslims.
I would say there's a hint of that creeping in, a little nationalized things do that.
But I see more of traditional Islam 101 dominance is what's driving this force.
Now, the Nigerian government lately has been very cozy to the Chinese.
While the Biden administration and the U.S. governments turned a blind eye to Nigeria on a lot of things, the Chinese are filling that void, providing a lot of money.
They're sending in some of their politics in, but they're also capitalizing on, I would say, on the crisis, because what we're seeing now is Chinese mines sprouting up on what were once Christian lands.
And they're illegally mining, and the terrorists aren't killing the Chinese because they're probably taking some money on the back end for allowing the Chinese to mine in these areas.
Yeah, that's right.
Wow.
I just say that just recently, this is on Saturday the 25th.
Christians are urged to pray as an American missionary pilot, Kevin Reidout, was abducted in Niger.
This is very dangerous work that you do, isn't it?
Yeah.
Yeah, we're praying for that pilot.
I have some friends that are within that missions organization, and I called them and asked them about that specific situation.
And so far, there's been no ransom asked for.
What we think is happening is that they kidnapped him and they're using the pilot to do things for them.
They don't want to ransom him out.
They want to essentially turn him into a slave for doing what their work is.
That's what I'm hearing on the ground.
Oh, okay.
Wow.
Because there has been no ransom called yet for that gentleman.
And it's very dangerous.
We have to travel with armed security wherever we go in Nigeria.
We have armed security teams, and we know, especially now, I've been speaking out against what's going on in Nigeria publicly.
You know, there's more of a risk there, but just go by God's grace and his mercy and protection.
Well, good for you.
That's fearless, and that's what people of faith should be, should be fearless.
I played the clip before you came on of a pastor there, and we've seen so many videos on social media of the mass funerals that are being held with all the bodies that are there because the killing has been just astounding.
And is it increasing, or how would you characterize it recently?
Oh, no, the killings increased this year.
Before, it would be between 4,000 to 5,000 Christians killed per year.
Wow.
But this year, since January 1, there's been over 7,000 Christians that have been killed.
Wow.
Wow.
The attacks are ramping up, and the Nigerian government turning a blind eye to it, or I would just say they're complicit.
And the mainstream media is laying cover for it as well.
Wow.
Yeah, it absolutely is a case of genocide.
And of course, that's what Bill Mauer said.
And he was right.
We've been talking about it here as well.
But they're very selective about what they're concerned about.
And as we see, you mentioned China coming in there.
See, all the time people would talk about what the Chinese are doing to the Muslim Uyghurs that are there, or they talk about what they're doing to the Falun Gong.
But rarely did they talk about what's being done to the Christians in China.
And so, you know, China, this is par for the course for China coming in, as you point out, in Nigeria, doing a deal with the government and putting mines on the land of the Christian villagers who've been killed and their homes have been destroyed and that type of thing.
It is truly amazing.
Tell us what else you are involved in outside of Nigeria, or is there more that you want to talk about with Nigeria?
Well, primarily my full-time work since 2019 has been focused on Nigeria and trying to raise awareness, but also help the people on the ground.
One of the figures that I haven't pointed out to you is that there's between 3.5 million and 5 million Christians that have been removed from their homes that are living in camps that are suffering from disease, starvation, and just awful, awful conditions.
And they haven't been able to return back to their homes because the Fulani Muslim terrorists have squatted on their land.
And if these Christians go back, they get killed.
Wow.
That is amazing.
Yeah, the Republicans are not interested in this, of course.
The Democrats were in terms of equipping the Muslims to do this kind of persecution, but the Republicans are just, you know, I guess, looking elsewhere with all this.
Truly, it's amazing.
We are gaining a little headway with Republicans, but we're fighting a war of narratives.
I think there are people, there are some in the Republican Party that are capitalizing off of the, well, they don't want to solve the solution.
They don't want to solve the problem.
I think they're capitalizing on the back end.
And we have other Republicans that are coming up and calling for U.S. intervention on behalf of persecuted Christians in Nigeria.
But there is a battle and a war of words and a war of narratives we're fighting against.
And there is a genocide against Christians in Nigeria.
We have some Republicans and the Democrats obviously repeating Muslim talking points from Nigeria that there is no crisis, there is no genocide.
It's bandits or these unknown gunmen.
Everybody refuses to name who's doing the killing.
And it's Muslims killing Christians.
Yeah.
Well, of course, as my producer says, we're too busy blowing up boats to worry about Christians being genocided.
That's, I guess, what's happening here.
We have our different areas that we're interested in, and we have our areas that we have some financial interest in.
China, of course, is taking an interest in it.
They're looking at getting minerals out of this area.
But my producer also says, what about providing them with 3D printers where they could make their own weapons?
Of course, they'd have to have electricity.
Do they have electricity in these villages?
No, that's the problem.
No, that's the problem.
Like, we have solutions, but they don't have the power.
They don't have the power source to be able to do these things.
Power, especially in these areas, they're lucky.
If there is a line run to their communities, they're lucky it runs 10% of the time.
They're lucky to have power maybe 10% of the time.
The rest is just blackout.
It's awful.
Wow.
Talk to me as an evangelist.
I mean, what is it like talking to somebody in an area where there's this kind of a persecution for becoming a Christian?
I mean, that's like a death sentence.
I would imagine that'd be a pretty big obstacle to overcome when you're talking to somebody about Christ.
Well, actually, it's not as hard as you think because when you have people that are already living in abject poverty and then everything getting totally taken away from them, you come in meeting the needs, presented with the gospel.
People are very willing to hear and they accept it.
And the Christians that are murdered for their faith, that refuse to convert to Islam, have a real sense of Christianity that I wish most Americans, most Americans, couldn't understand.
Yeah, I agree.
I agree.
Yeah, where they get up in the morning thanking God, thank you for letting me, thank you for allowing me another breath today.
Thank you for allowing me to live.
And they get up going, Lord, we're relying on you for sustenance.
They have no choice but to rely on God, but they stay faithful to the end.
And that's what keeps me motivated, keeps me coming back.
And that testimony actually really, it makes it easy to share the gospel with these people.
And even the ones that are nominal, not fully saved, we've even seen Muslims come to know Christ because they've seen our kindness.
They've seen how we treat one another, and we come to care for them.
And we see many Muslims come to know Christ through this mission just because we're shining a light into the darkness.
That's great.
Yeah.
Yeah, we have this life of comfort, which is not conducive to a Christian life, really.
When we're struggling with hardship, that makes Christ so much more precious.
And we see him working in different ways in our life like that.
And that is something that many people in the West, the affluence gets in the way of us being able to see that.
And when you're living hand to mouth like that, you really can see it.
Do they speak English?
Most of them do.
The educated Nigerians speak English.
You have a lot of people in the rural communities that only have their tribal language that they know.
They know some English, but majority of the country does speak English.
So what about Bibles and things like that?
Most of it is done in English, or do you have it in the tribal languages as well?
We have it in English, but then we have Bibles printed in, I say their dominant tribal language.
So a lot of the area we work in is Hausa.
And so we have Bibles printed in Hausa that we give to these people.
And then Fulani converts, Falani Muslim converts that convert to Christianity, we have the Bible printed in their language and given to them.
And so, you know, with technology and the way things are, we're able to get the Bible translated into several different tribal languages and we get them out there.
But if they know English, we give them an English Bible.
If they don't, we give them a Bible in their translation.
Talk to us a little bit about the Fulani tribesmen.
Of course, I see that phrase all the time, but where are these people coming from?
Are they Nigerian or are they coming from another area trying to take over areas of Nigeria?
What's going on with the Fulani?
Another Muslim?
So the Falani are not indigenous to Nigeria.
They're coming from way up North Africa, from the Sahel.
So Niger, Chad, they're nomadic herders, and they've worked their way south and going into Nigeria.
And wherever these guys end up, they end up taking territory, killing, and continuing to gain political power.
They're a conquering tribe, but they do it through Islam.
I used to call it, they start with cultural jihad, where they move in, they become neighbors, they do business, kids go to school together.
And when they get the population and the political power, then they start the killing.
And then they keep working their way further south and doing that.
And so they are not indigenous to Nigeria.
They're an invading tribe.
That seems to be an established pattern for Muslim conquest, isn't it?
Coming in and gradually, as you start to accumulate your numbers, you come in peacefully at first.
Talk about Boko Haram.
And of course, we've heard about them for quite some time attacking and kidnapping girls out of schools because they don't want girls reading anything and getting educated.
But give us an idea of where they're coming from and what they're about.
Well, so Boko Haram are also Fulani.
Oh, it's the same thing?
They're Fulani.
You know how radical Islam, they have different groups that sprout up.
So one is not as hardcore as the other one in their Islam, and they have rival groups.
So you have ISIS of West Africa, you have Boko Haram, but they're all Fulani.
And they practice a Sunni Wahhabiist form of Islam, which is a very radical Saudi Arabian form of Islam.
And then they kind of battle it out here and there.
But then the Fulani that aren't necessarily affiliated with ISWAP or Boko Haram still coordinate together to go kill and take over more territory.
Wow.
Wow.
So the Wahhabi.
Sometimes they have their little spats.
One's not as radical as the other, so we've got to fight each other over here.
But they still systematically conquer as they go.
Yeah, wow.
So Wahhabiists, not the Sunnis or the Shias, but they're more like the Saudis.
So I imagine a lot of the Sharia law with beheadings and mutilation over theft and all the rest of the stuff that is there, as well as the putting hoods on women and all the rest of this.
So how can people support you?
They can go to the website and they can get information about what you're doing and how they can support you.
Yeah, you can go to equippingthepersecuted.org, partner with our organization.
We need all the help we can get.
Like I said, our resources are need is great.
Resources are small.
We're doing everything we can to help out our persecuted brothers and sisters.
And then if you want information, up-to-date news on what's going on in Nigeria, go to truthnigeria.com.
Well, I really appreciate what you're doing.
And it really is important.
I mean, there is, other than, you know, talking to politicians and complaining about what politicians are doing or not doing, you are actually getting in there and helping the people who have been attacked, who have been, you know, families that have been physically attacked, the people who have been shot, give them medical care to help to rebuild their houses, I guess, as well as part of that.
And that is really a key thing.
And of course, equipping them with a kind of a warning system since they're not allowed to defend themselves in that country.
But thank you so much for what you're doing.
And again, truthnigeria.com and equippingthepersecuted.org are the places where people can find out about what you're doing there.
Before you leave, though, you're a filmmaker, so do you have a documentary about this that you have done?
So we've put out a few, we're working on putting together a series of mini-documentaries about certain subjects in Nigeria.
We put out one a few months ago called the Father's Day Massacre, which was an attack that took place in June in Benway, Nigeria on Father's Day, where 280 Christians were slaughtered.
Half of them were burned alive.
The other half that weren't burned alive were shot and hacked to death with machetes trying to escape the fires.
Oh, that's horrible.
And that was a very significant moment that we decided we needed to do a cover and show that, show how horrific that attack was to let people know that this persecution is real.
Wow.
And it's not just about banditry and farmer-herger conflict, that this is a real genocide.
And we put that out in June.
It's called the Father's Day Massacre.
And then before that, I've done political.
Where can people find that?
Is that on YouTube or is it?
It's just right on our website, equippingthepersecuted.org.
All right, good.
Yes.
Well, it truly is amazing.
And, you know, before you came in, I played the one guy who was talking about, well, 100 years we won't know anything at all, but Christ knows what they have done.
The Common Man.
They created Common Core to dumb down our children.
They created Common Past to track and control us.
Their Commons project to make sure the commoners own nothing and the communist future.
They see the common man as simple, unsophisticated, ordinary.
But each of us has worth and dignity created in the image of God.
That is what we have in common.
That is what they want to take away.
Their most powerful weapons are isolation, deception, intimidation.
They desire to know everything about us while they hide everything from us.
It's time to turn that around and expose what they want to hide.
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Thank you for sharing.
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