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One of the deadliest conflicts in Africa is that between nomadic pastoralists and sedentary farmers over land and water resources. Although these clashes are often attributed to the adverse effects of climate change, such as drought and rising temperatures, do they also have a religious dimension? Nigeria, the country with the highest incidence of such conflicts, forms an insightful case study.
The West African country sees both the greatest incidence of conflicts between nomadic pastoralists and sedentary farmers and the highest number of related fatalities anywhere in Africa.
Perceptions of such conflict differ by faith: Christians are significantly more likely to attribute the violence to religious causes, whereas Muslims tend to view these armed clashes as a direct consequence of climate change.
Bouts of conflict are, on average, less frequent in areas with a predominantly Muslim population compared to those that are predominantly Christian. This is because shared religious identity between nomadic pastoralists and Muslim farmers fosters a baseline of trust, which serves to mitigate tensions and reduce the risk of violence breaking out.
To mitigate these conflicts, the Nigerian government should strengthen the capacity of security agencies, such as the police and military, to ensure they can respond promptly. In the longer term, greater efforts must be directed towards fostering interreligious dialogue; this is crucial for building mutual trust and preventing resource-based disputes from escalating into sectarian violence.
It is impossible to adequately understand contemporary challenges in Nigeria, such as insecurity and socio-economic inequality, without a solid grasp of the country’s history. Any serious engagement with Nigeria’s trajectory over time must take religion into account, as it has profoundly shaped the country from the precolonial period, through colonial rule, and into the postcolonial era. Nigeria is made up of two broad geographic regions: the North and the South. The population of northern Nigeria is predominantly Muslim, owing to its history as an Islamic caliphate for nearly a century before it was conquered by the British in 1903. Following the latter event, northern elites were largely resistant to Western influence and explicitly requested that the British refrain from interfering with their religious way of life. In contrast, the people of southern Nigeria, today predominantly Christian, were more receptive to Western influence. Missionary activity was heavily concentrated in the south, leading much of the local population to replace indigenous religious practices with Christianity accordingly. This regional divergence laid the foundations for enduring religious and cultural cleavages within the country (Tuki 2025a; Kirk-Greene 1965).
Although there are areas of overlap between Nigeria’s two regions, the differences between them are stark. Notably, the North and South existed as separate British protectorates until 1914, when the colonial administration amalgamated them for reasons of bureaucratic convenience, disregarding the cultural and religious differences between the respective populations being brought together in the process. Most formal schools in Nigeria were established by missionaries, and because their activities were – largely due to northern resistance to Christian proselytisation – concentrated in the South, the latter’s populace gained significantly greater exposure to Western education than their northern counterparts. Education, however, was largely instrumental: teaching local populations to read and write in English enabled them to better understand missionary teachings, thereby facilitating their conversion to Christianity (Tuki 2025b).
Today, when asked who they are, the average Nigerian is likely to first identify with a religious denomination, then followed by with an ethnic group; national identity – being Nigerian – tends to come last. This pattern is evident in data from the World Values Survey: some 93 per cent of Nigerians consider religion to be “very important” in their lives. Similarly, 88 per cent report having either “quite a lot” or “a great deal” of confidence in religious institutions such as churches and mosques. In contrast, confidence in formal state institutions is markedly lower, including the police (27 per cent), the courts (43 per cent), the federal government (40 per cent), and parliament (34 per cent).
Further evidence of how Nigerians think about such matters comes from the 2021 Transnational Perspectives on Migration and Integration (TRANSMIT) survey, conducted in Kaduna and Edo states – located in Nigeria’s northern and southern regions, respectively. The survey found that 70 per cent of those spoken with identified religion as the most important component of their identity, 8 per cent prioritised ethnicity, and only 6 per cent selected nationality as their answer here. The remaining 16 per cent reported that all three identities were equally important to them (DeZIM 2025).
Given this historical and contemporary context, it is unsurprising that Nigeria has experienced recurrent episodes of violent ethnoreligious conflict. One prominent example is the crisis that erupted in Kaduna state in the year 2000 after its governor adopted sharia law despite the local populace being nearly evenly divided between Christians and Muslims, with the latter holding only a slight numerical majority. The resulting violence left more than 2,000 dead (Human Rights Watch 2003). Another grim example is the widespread clashes that followed the election of Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, to the presidency in April 2011, a turn of events that included the destruction of churches by Muslim groups and mosques by Christian counterparts (Human Rights Watch 2011). Ongoing clashes between Christians and Muslims in Jos, which have resulted in numerous deaths and residential segregation along religious lines, further demonstrate how faith-based faultlines undermine not only material well-being but also social cohesion (Eke 2022).
Land and water remain crucial inputs for both African farmers and herders. While farmers depend on arable land to cultivate crops and on water for irrigation, particularly during the dry season when rainfall is scarce, nomadic pastoralists likewise require grazing land for their livestock and reliable access to water for sustenance. It is frequently posited that the adverse effects of climate change, such as droughts and rising temperatures, have depleted land and water resources, thereby intensifying competition over them and, in turn, increasing the likelihood of violent conflict (e.g. McGuirk and Nunn 2025).
Resource-driven conflicts are widespread across Africa. ACLED data (Raleigh et al. 2010) indicate that between 1997 and 2024, the continent recorded 11,416 conflict incidents in which at least one actor was a pastoralist. Despite manifesting in approximately 40 countries in total, such occurrences are heavily clustered in the Sahel region (see Figure 1). Nigeria stands out amid this broader pattern to events, accounting for a disproportionate share of these incidents. Of all pastoralist-related conflicts recorded in Africa during this period, 25 per cent were witnessed in Nigeria alone. Moreover, the West African country accounted for some 41 per cent of the 34,029 fatalities associated with these conflicts continent-wide. Even within Nigeria the violence is unevenly distributed, with certain areas disproportionately bearing the brunt hereof.
While climate change-based explanations have considerable merit, they are also limited in certain key ways. Most notably, they pay insufficient attention to the cultural identities of the conflict actors and fail to explain why resource competition turns violent in some contexts but not others. Indeed, existing research shows that resource scarcity can, under certain conditions, foster cooperation rather than conflict. When competing groups recognise that violence may trigger cycles of retaliation that ultimately leave all parties worse off, they may instead coordinate during periods of scarcity, developing innovative and equitable mechanisms for sharing limited resources and thereby reducing the likelihood of armed clashes ensuing (Adano, Dietz, and Witsenberg 2012).
Nomadic pastoralists in Nigeria are predominantly Muslim and largely belong to the Fulani ethnic group. Sedentary farmers, by contrast, may be either Muslim or Christian. Although conflicts involving nomadic pastoralists occur across all Nigerian states, they are, on average, more likely to manifest in municipalities with predominantly Christian populations. Moreover, Christians are more likely than Muslims to report having experienced such an incident within a 30-kilometre radius of their place of residence.
Questions of trust and identity are the key mechanisms at work here. When Muslim herders come into conflict with Muslim farmers, for example when livestock stray into farmland and destroy crops, the likelihood of the dispute escalating is relatively low. Shared religious affiliation creates a baseline level of trust, thereby reducing the probability that matters turn violent. In addition, both parties can readily refer the situation to a religious authority whom they jointly recognise and respect, such as an imam. As noted earlier, Nigerians generally express greater confidence in religious institutions than in formal state ones like the government, police, and courts.
When Muslim herders come into contact with Christian farmers, however, the likelihood of violence ensuing is higher. Differences in religious affiliation make it more difficult to establish trust, while forms of othering are rendered more salient. In such cases, actors are more likely to perceive one another through in-/-outgroup distinctions. This stands in contrast to interactions between Muslim herders and Muslim farmers, where religious homogeneity facilitates perceptions of shared group membership (Tuki 2025b, 2025c). This interpretation is consistent with the observations of the sociologist James Coleman, who, writing two years before the country gained its independence from British colonial rule, argued that religion in Nigeria creates bonds that unite individuals across ethnic lines. At the same time, he warned that the Muslim–Christian divide had the potential to generate interreligious conflict (Coleman 1958).
The religious dimension to these clashes is further underscored by TRANSMIT (DeZIM 2025) survey data from Kaduna state, which records the third-highest incidence of ones involving nomadic pastoralists among Nigeria’s 36 federal states. While 31 per cent of respondents in the state believe that such occurrences are driven by religion, 26 per cent attribute them to the adverse effects of climate change. Important differences emerge, however, when responses are disaggregated by religious affiliation. Christians (52 per cent, or approximately one in two) are more likely than Muslims (17 per cent, or roughly one in six) to deem these conflicts a question of creed, whereas Muslims (31 per cent, around one in three) are more likely than Christians (18 per cent, or one in five) to emphasise the importance here of a changing natural environment. Furthermore, qualitative research in the Benue region shows that Christian farmers interpret these events as attacks against Christians by Muslims, as well as a systematic attempt to seize land and convert communities to Islam (Nwankwo 2024).
Notably, farmer–pastoralist conflicts are distinct from the insurgency perpetrated by the radical Islamist group Boko Haram. While the former is resource-driven and geographically dispersed across Nigeria’s 36 federal states, the latter is ideological – namely, as spurred by a desire to establish a polity that rejects Western influence in favour of a strict interpretation of sharia law. Moreover, whereas pastoralist conflicts are a nationwide phenomenon, the Boko Haram insurgency remains primarily concentrated in northeastern states such as Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe.
The topic of religion is contentious in Nigeria, particularly because of its close association with armed conflict. In public discourse, references to religion’s role in shaping the dynamics of violence are often dismissed as the oversimplification of complex social problems. Yet this rebuttal is itself simplistic and problematic. For viable solutions to be developed, problems must be examined from all relevant dimensions – including those that are uncomfortable or politically inconvenient. Indeed, solutions are sometimes found precisely in the areas where there is the greatest reluctance to look.
As noted, religion is deeply woven into the fabric of everyday life in Nigeria. Moreover, both the experience of conflict and the meanings that individuals attach to these experiences are shaped by religious identity. Christians and Muslims do not necessarily interpret these clashes in the same way, with the former being more likely to attribute them to religious causes. Such divergent interpretations can deepen mistrust and heighten the risk of further escalation. Regardless of whether policymakers accept the fact that religion is indeed a contributor to the outbreak of resource-driven conflicts, it is crucial to recognise at the very least that perceptions influence behaviour.
This psychological reality is evident in the cycle of revenge underlying farmer–pastoralist conflict – a phenomenon in which violence escalates from the individual to the communal level, with each attack creating the conditions for reprisal. What begins as a dispute between an individual farmer and herder quickly draws in members of the broader ethnic and religious groups to which the initial actors belong. During these acts of revenge, individuals are targeted not because of direct involvement in the initial set of circumstances but because of their shared identity with the original aggressors. Psychologists refer to this phenomenon as “vicarious retribution.”
Before viable solutions to resource-based conflicts can be formulated, Nigerian policymakers must adopt a holistic understanding of these occurrences – as including the oft-dismissed “simplistic” religious perspective here. Failure to do so risks the adoption of policies that inadvertently exacerbate tensions rather than mitigate them. A notable example is the government’s proposal to establish grazing reserves across Nigeria’s 36 federal states as a means of reducing conflict between nomadic herders and sedentary farmers. The rationale was that herders would reside with their livestock in designated areas, thereby limiting contact with farming communities and, in turn, reducing violence.
Although well-intentioned, the policy encountered strong resistance in southern states, where the population is predominantly Christian, as well as in some northern ones with large Christian populations (such as Benue). Opponents accused the federal government of attempting to seize ancestral lands and transfer them to Muslim nomadic herders. Others interpreted the proposal as part of a broader Islamisation agenda, alleging that the government sought to dispossess Christian communities and empower Muslims. These perceptions were particularly salient given that the president at the time, Muhammadu Buhari, was both Muslim and Fulani. By contrast, the policy faced little opposition in northern states home to overwhelmingly Muslim populations (Tuki 2025d).
In light of the religious dimension to conflicts over land and water in Nigeria, policymakers need to focus on three key priorities going forwards. In the short term, they should strengthen the capacity of security agencies, such as the police and the military, by providing adequate training and equipment so as to be able to respond swiftly and appropriately to such situations. Historical evidence suggests that violence has, at times, persisted for days on end without any intervention, thereby broadening the scale of the devastation (Amnesty International 2018). In addition, greater efforts should be made to ensure the judicial system can and does prosecute the perpetrators. Accountability is crucial for breaking cycles of revenge, with people less likely to take the law into their own hands when they believe that offenders will be brought to justice through formal legal channels.
In the longer term, meanwhile, the government should pursue policies that foster interreligious trust. This is vital because persistent violence in Nigeria has resulted in residential segregation, which limits intergroup contact and, in turn, increases the risk of further clashes. One way to encourage such face-to-face exposure is through sustained conversation among religious leaders. People’s opinions are often shaped by the views taken by their spiritual authorities, such as pastors and imams. When these leaders visibly engage in dialogue, they humanise the out-group and signal to their followers that members of other religious communities are legitimate collaboration partners rather than inherent threats, thereby diminishing perceptions of danger (Eke 2022).
Finally, the Nigerian government needs to take concrete steps to foster a strong sense of national belonging that transcends cultural identities such as those of ethnicity and religion. Nigerians tend to vote along the latter two lines, and politicians frequently exploit these divisions to advance their own ambitions. As a result, politics becomes a zero-sum game in which the victory of a candidate from one ethnic or religious group is perceived as a loss by those not members thereof. This heightens political contestation, raises the stakes around electoral competition, and increases the likelihood of violence. Cementing a shared national identity will be difficult given how deeply entrenched religion and ethnicity are in Nigerian society. Nevertheless, this only underscores the importance of limiting the salience of these cleavages so that candidates for office are evaluated primarily on competence and merit rather than on fealty to identity politics.
