Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra recently brought up the inability of successive governments to invest in post-civil war reconstruction, at a forum of southeast governors.
The Federal Government, he said, has failed to live up to its promise of rebuilding the region nearly 60 years after the break out of the civil war.
Suggesting a “Marshal Plan”, for the South East Development Commission, Soludo sees an opportunity to finally put the past to rest.
Soludo, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria has been keeping count of the cost of sit-at-home imposed by the Indigenous People Of Biafra (IPOB) in the billions of Naira, in capital flight and brain drain.
But if conversations taking place in the United States of America, are anything to go by, that cost is about to get significantly higher for Anambra, the southeast and Nigeria.
From all appearances, Emeka Umeagbalasi, the screwdriver salesman in Onitsha, Anambra is making progress where the Nigerian government’s $9 million cannot gain access.
What Soludo, the other four southeast governors, the SEDC and even the Bola Tinubu presidency, which created the commission have not put into consideration, is the willingness of foreign actors, think tanks and lobby groups to reenact the Nigerian civil war and forge a different destiny for all of its people.
But that has always been the misfortune of Africa; it’s maps are drawn and continue to be drawn by foreign hands.
Unlike the colonial era, today, the invisible hands are in what was once known as the New World, discovered centuries ago by Christopher Columbus.
Just when Nigerians were celebrating the recognition of First Lady Remi Tinubu by President Donald Trump at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, a bombshell was dropped from a now familiar quarter; Congressman Riley Moore.
The prayer breakfast is an annual event in the United States that brings together Christian and political leaders in the country.
Trump described Mrs Tinubu as a very respected woman, while emphasising and letting his audience know that the Nigerian First Lady is a pastor in one of the country’s biggest churches.
It was a rare moment that saw Trump say something good about Nigeria.
He had previously described it as a disgraced country, a failed country, designated it as a Country of Particular Concern, where Christians are being persecuted and has gone as far as bombing it to protect Christians from terrorists and herdsmen.
But the wider message that Donald Trump, his Republican Party and the Evangelical Christians who make up the bulk of his base and supporters, have been sending, is that there is a genocide against Christians in Nigeria.
Right from his first term in office, Trump became president because of Evangelical Christians rallying around him.
Their influence in politics had slowly been eroding, with the country becoming more multicultural, religiously diverse, less white and filled with immigrants.
What Soludo, the other four southeast governors, the SEDC and even the Bola Tinubu presidency, which created the commission have not put into consideration, is the willingness of foreign actors, think tanks and lobby groups to reenact the Nigerian civil war and forge a different destiny for all of its people
And in recent days, Trump has been talking about his success in reviving Christianity.
But like every ideology born in the West, whether it is democracy, capitalism or even socialism, Trump and his right-wing support base have chosen to export and revive their beliefs globally.
It is however important to understand where all this is coming from and why the persecution of Christians anywhere in the world touches a nerve with Trump’s base.
It is well known that the United States is a country of immigrants, European immigrants to be precise.
What is less talked about is that virtually all of the early immigrants were Protestants fleeing persecution in Europe; which in the 16th, 17th and early 18th centuries was devastated by religious wars.
Driven mostly by resistance to change from the Catholic Church, the bloodiest of the wars lasted as long as 30 years and cost Germany nearly a third of its population in the 16th century.
For more than two centuries, Protestants were fleeing Europe and seeking safety in the New World.
It wasn’t until the 19th century that Irish Catholics also started to migrate in search freedom to practice their religion.
But just about the time Trump was first elected president, white European Protestants were no longer the majority in the United States.
It wasn’t a symbolic shift.
It showed in the politics, in policies, in the laws of the country and the economy.
Rural white farmers were just as poor as other minorities.
The most telling change however, was how Barrack Obama, the son an African student had been elected president.
It was enough to reawaken a predominantly white, European and Evangelical political movement.
And how Remi Tinubu came to be present at the breakfast event says a lot about the extent at which the Christian genocide narrative has taken hold in right-wing circles, and about the backstage dealings and coordination on what to do about it.
The country of concern designation is apparently not enough.
The bombing too isn’t enough.
If Congressman Riley Moore was to be taken seriously, there are discussions, maybe considerations of supporting separatists movements against the Nigerian State.
In plain language, ignite a second civil war and push for the breakup of Nigeria along religious lines.
In a social media message on February 7, Moore said, “I have traveled to Nigeria and engaged in multiple high-level meetings with Nigerian officials, the Church, aid groups across the country, and IDPs, to get a better understanding of the rampant persecution of Christians in Nigeria. In my discussions, the idea of dividing the country has not come up in any serious way. Efforts to embolden separatists, hurts Christians in Nigeria – especially in the North and Middle Belt. A destabilized Nigeria would embolden terrorists and make Christians less safe in Nigeria and across the continent.”
But who is Riley Moore?
For Nigerians, what matters is that Moore was one of the earliest lawmakers in the United States pushing the genocide narrative and seeking to punish the country for it.
As far back as July 2025, he had introduced a resolution in the US Congress condemning the Nigerian Government for its failure to protect Christians.
In a twist fate, it is Moore that is now warning against supporting separatists in Nigeria as this will only destabilise the country and make Christians less safe.
There is never a peaceful breakup of a country.
Even before nations become self-governing, breakups are costly, messy and often violent.
In the partitioning of Pakistan from India in 1947, anything between 200,000 and two million lives were lost.
Fifteen million people had to move across demarcated borders not to find themselves on the wrong side.
At least two major wars and several other conflicts have since followed the breakup.
The Tinubu presidency has to seriously up its game, send well equipped ambassadors and resources to relevant countries to ward off a global crisis and potentially save millions of lives from civil unrest that could last a decade
For 30 years, Eritrea waged a war of independence against Ethiopia.
It finally succeeded in 1991, at a cost of nearly 200,000 lives.
The breakup was immediately followed by a full-blown war between the years 1998 and 2000, with another 70,000 killed and hundreds of thousands more displaced.
Then, there is Sudan and South Sudan.
It was a second civil war that finally led to the breakup of Sudan.
There were conflicts between the two countries after the breakup.
But the real tragedy was how the split led to internal ruptures with each country sinking into separate civil wars.
The civil war in South Sudan has lasted longer but the conflict in Sudan has been deadlier, costlier and more destabilizing to Africa and the world.
Starting in 2023, there are estimates of up to 150,000 people killed.
Eight million have been internally displaced and another four million have fled the country all together.
Between Sudan, Ethiopia and India, it is Sudan that most resembles Nigeria.
At the same time, Nigeria is like no other country.
Whatever the casualty figures and number of displacements are in Sudan or Ethiopia, you can multiple them several times over for a picture of what could potentially happen in Nigeria.
Moore was in Nigeria late last year, visiting communities in Benue and victims of herdsmen attacks.
It is likely the visit has helped soften his heart.
But from the sound of his tweet, he has lost control of this policy debate.
The impact of Remi Tinubu at the prayer breakfast may also be limited. Sending a 70 year-old ambassador and signing $9 million lobbying firm may be too little, too late.
No president wants to preside over the disintegration of his country.
The Tinubu presidency has to seriously up its game, send well equipped ambassadors and resources to relevant countries to ward off a global crisis and potentially save millions of lives from civil unrest that could last a decade.
Those driving the separatist discussion in Washington are very likely activists and lobbyists who cannot point out Nigeria on a map of the world.
Yet, they are about to decide the fate of 230 million people.
Some young impressionable Nigerians with sizable followers on social media platforms and even on television have gleefully cheered at the labeling of the country’s insecurity as Christian genocide.
Most don’t know what it’s like for entire families, communities to have to carry all the possess on the heads in search of safety.
Displaced Nigerian and refugees won’t be able to look to America for safety.
For centuries, the New Colossus, a poem by Emma Lazarus defined the Statue of Liberty.
The statue defined America. Under Donald Trump’s America, both the poem and the statue have lost their original meaning.