Nigerian governor orders demolition of memorial to church attack victims (Aid to the Church in Need)

The governor of Nigeria’s Ondo State (map), without explanation, ordered the demolition of a civil memorial to the victims of a 2022 terrorist attack on a Catholic parish.

“The demolition is a violation of our common respect for the dignity of life and the memory we share of our 41 brothers and sisters who were unjustly killed,” Bishop Jude Ayodeji Arogundade of Ondo said in a statement. The “demolition seems to have renewed the pain of everyone who was affected by the attack, and justifiably so.”

The nation of 237 million (map), the most populous in Africa and sixth most populous in the world, is 47% Christian (11% Catholic), 46% Muslim, and 7% ethnic religionist.