If you want to understand why Kaduna burns, you have to understand that the violence is rarely actually about religion. It is about land, political exclusion, economic marginalisation, and historical grievances that political elites have successfully weaponised along religious lines for decades. The solution, therefore, cannot just be interfaith dialogue at the elite level. It has to happen at the community level — mosque by mosque, church by church, street by street.
That is the thinking behind ENPUAI’s Interfaith Peace Partnership Programme, launched in Kaduna in 2023. The programme identifies pairs of mosques and churches in the same neighbourhood or facing each other across a flashpoint divide. It trains their religious leaders together in peacebuilding communication, trauma awareness, and community dialogue facilitation.
The trained leaders then run regular joint community activities: shared Ramadan/Easter celebrations, joint tree planting, inter-faith football tournaments, and most importantly, joint emergency response protocols for when tension rises. When a rumour starts spreading that could trigger violence, these leaders are each other’s first phone call.
By December 2024, ENPUAI had established forty-seven interfaith partnerships across Kaduna State. Partner congregations report a dramatic shift in how their members talk about the ‘other side’.
Pastor James Yakubu of Rigasa Parish and Mallam Ibrahim Sule of Rigasa Central Mosque have been partners since May 2023. They now co-chair the Rigasa Ward Peace Committee, which has twice intervened to prevent rumour-driven violence from escalating. In September 2024, they jointly appeared on Kaduna radio to call for calm during a period of heightened tension — a broadcast credited by the state government with preventing a potential outbreak.
“We were always told our faiths are incompatible. ENPUAI helped us discover that our values are identical.” — Mallam Ibrahim Sule, Rigasa Central Mosque, Kaduna