A Report By The 21st Century Wilberforce Initiative And The Stefanus Foundation, Based In The United States And Nigeria Respectively, Has Revealed That The Boko Haram Terrorist Group In The Northeast, Ranks Highest On The List Of The Most Deadly Terrorist Groups In The World.

They are followed closely by the “Fulani Militants” who are placed fourth, behind ISIS and Al-Qaeda.

“Global Terrorism index shows that Boko Haram is the world’s most lethal terrorist group, followed by ISIS, while Al-Qaeda ranks third and the Fulani militants mostly in the middle belt rank 4th,” said Mark Lipdo, Executive Director of the Stefanus Foundation.

Lipdo, made this known while addressing newsmen in Abuja, adding that a research conducted by the groups revealed that over 14 million Nigerians have been directly affected by humanitarian crises in the North-east region of the country.

“14.8 million Nigerians from Northeast are directly impacted by the crisis. Officially, there are 2.2 million Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs. Unofficially, there are five to seven million IDPs,” he said.

He noted that the terrorism in the Northeast has had devastating impacts on education in the region as hundreds of teachers were killed, thousands were displaced, about 1500 schools closed down, and almost 1 million children denied the opportunity of accessing education.

He added that research showed that 13,000 churches were abandoned, closed down or destroyed, 2000 children abducted and 10,000 boys forced to join Boko Haram.

Elijah Brown, Vice President of the 21st Wilberforce Initiative, stated that the number of IDPs in the country were more than 2 million as at December 2015, “the third highest figure in Africa and the seventh in the world.”

Brown called for immediate action to check the menace of herdsmen/farmers clashed in the country as the ugly development was having a terrible effect on the middle belt and the country at large.

“Without intervention, the crisis in the Middle Belt will continue to escalate; this could affect other countries in West African region like the Republic of Benin, Chad, Cameroon, Mali, and Niger,” he said.

Leaders of the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, who were present during the report presentation called on world leaders to come to Nigeria’s assistance to tackle the humanitarian challenges caused by terrorist activities across the nation.

Samson Ayokunle, president of CAN, said that “The situation (in the northeast) is looked upon by international bodies as the biggest humanitarian disaster all over the world.

“A disturbing fact about the problem is that it has not received substantial humanitarian response from the world’s most powerful nations as other disasters of relatively smaller degrees in other parts of the world.

Ayokunle made a passionate appeal to the international community “to come to the aid of Nigeria in seeing to the end of insurgency.”