MACBAN seeks FG’s diplomatic intervention over US terror tag

The Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) has called on the Federal Government to urgently engage United States authorities over what it described as an “erroneous narrative” associating the association with terrorism in connection with a proposed U.S. Congress Bill.

Five U.S. lawmakers have introduced a bill proposing sanctions — including visa bans and asset freezes — against former Kano State governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN), and Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore. The Bill was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The proposed legislation, titled the Nigeria Religious Freedom and Accountability Act of 2026, was sponsored by Congressmen Chris Smith, Riley Moore (the lead author), Brian Mast, Mario Diaz-Balart, and Bill Huizenga.

The bill calls on the Secretary of State to determine whether certain Fulani ethnic militias in Nigeria should be designated as foreign terrorist organisations.

Addressing a press briefing on the U.S. Bill on Sunday in Abuja, MACBAN President, Baba Othman Ngelzarma, said discussions around the Bill have increasingly sought to link the association to terrorism and mass atrocities.

He described such insinuations as false, unfounded and injurious to the integrity of a legally registered national body established in 1986.

While acknowledging the sovereign right of the United States to deliberate on religious freedom and human rights issues, MACBAN urged Nigeria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Office of the National Security Adviser to initiate urgent diplomatic engagement with relevant U.S. authorities to correct what it termed misleading narratives.

The association appealed to the National Assembly, particularly the Senate Committees on Foreign Affairs and National Security and Intelligence, to adopt a formal resolution clarifying the Senate’s position and activate parliamentary diplomatic channels to engage the U.S. Congress constructively.

“Given the strategic role of the National Security Adviser as head of the Nigeria Section of the U.S.–Nigeria Joint Working Group, we respectfully request that this matter be elevated within bilateral security dialogues to ensure that Nigeria’s counterterrorism cooperation framework is not premised on false equivalences.

“Nigeria’s security architecture must not be undermined by external narratives that disregard domestic judicial processes and lawful institutional status,” he said.

Ngelzarma warned that failure to address the alleged mischaracterisation could prejudice Nigeria’s international image, embolden sanctions-based targeting of Nigerian associations and undermine public confidence in the country’s institutions.

He said no court in Nigeria or abroad has ever convicted or indicted MACBAN as an organisation for criminal or terrorist activity, insisting that conflating isolated criminal acts of individuals with a registered association was legally unjust.

The association maintained that pastoralists have themselves been victims of banditry and violent attacks, revealing that at least eight of its state leaders were killed in 2025 by criminal elements.

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