A six-year study by the Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa (ORFA) has revealed that 79,323 people were killed in terrorism-related attacks across Nigeria between 2020 and 2025, while 34,773 civilians were abducted during the same period.
The report, unveiled in Jos on Tuesday, June 30, is titled “Four Times Boko Haram? How the World Misreads Nigeria’s Violence.” Its findings were confirmed in a statement signed by ORFA’s Senior Research Analyst, Frans Vierhout.
According to the report, the violence averaged seven attacks and 36 deaths every day throughout the six-year period.
“A total of 79,323 people were killed in Nigeria between 2020 and 2025 — an average of seven attacks per day. More than 42,000 of those killed were innocent civilians,” the report stated.
ORFA, an organisation that monitors religious freedom and documents human rights violations, said its researchers spent years analysing attack patterns, with the findings challenging widely held assumptions about the country’s security crisis.
The study found that 42,033 civilians lost their lives, while the remaining 37,290 deaths involved members of security agencies and terrorist groups.
Contrary to the widespread belief that Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) account for most of Nigeria’s violence, the report said the two groups were responsible for only 12 per cent of civilian deaths.
According to the findings, Boko Haram accounted for eight per cent of civilian killings and ISWAP four per cent, while armed groups identified as “Fulani Terror Groups” were linked to 44 per cent of civilian deaths, amounting to 18,577 killings.
ORFA stressed that its classification refers only to armed groups and not the wider Fulani ethnic population.
“ORFA is careful to distinguish between armed Fulani terror groups and the Fulani people as a whole, the vast majority of whom are not involved in violence,” the report stated.
Commenting on the findings, Vierhout said the evidence pointed to a consistent pattern.
“The data makes this very difficult to ignore. We examined how killings occur, who the victims are, where attacks take place and the seasonal patterns of violence. The evidence points strongly in one direction,” he said.
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He added, “Violence linked to Fulani militias is the dominant force behind Nigeria’s death toll. The Western preoccupation with Boko Haram is, at best, misleading.
“Nigeria is incubating a terror network which the outside world has yet to acknowledge.”
The report also documented 34,773 civilian abductions between 2020 and 2025, attributing 43 per cent to “Fulani Terror Groups” and 49 per cent to “Unidentified Terror Groups.”
ORFA further highlighted what it described as a religious dimension to the violence.
According to the report, 28,551 Christians and 13,224 Muslims were killed during the review period. It added that, after adjusting for state population figures, Christians in affected states were killed at 4.4 times the rate of Muslims.
The organisation also cited findings from its research titled “Captivity by Creed,” which examined the treatment of abducted victims.
Senior Research Analyst Steven Kefas said the evidence revealed a recurring pattern.
“The field research reveals that a lesser value is assigned to a Christian life. From the moment of capture, Muslim and Christian hostages enter different realities.
“It is not about individual captors. It is a system that is consistent across multiple states, armed groups and years of survivor testimony,” he said.
The report found that 75 per cent of civilian deaths occurred during attacks on communities, many involving raids on farming settlements, abductions, sexual violence and destruction of property.
ORFA urged policymakers to recognise the religious dimensions of the conflict, warning that efforts to tackle insecurity would remain incomplete without a broader understanding of the crisis.
The report adds to ongoing debates over the nature of insecurity in Nigeria, where terrorism, banditry, communal violence and kidnappings continue to threaten lives across several regions despite sustained military operations.