I’m pitching a powerful segment on Nigeria’s spiraling rural violence, centered on the execution‑style killing of a pastor and his family inside their church residence – with two guests who can speak from direct experience on the ground.

Shortly after midnight on April 27, Rev. Ayuba Choji of ECWA (Evangelical Church Winning All) was gunned down with his wife and two children in their church home in Gako, Riyom LGA, Plateau State, Nigeria. Witnesses say armed Fulani attackers stormed the compound shouting “Allahu Akbar,” forced their way into the family’s three‑bedroom apartment, and opened fire as the family slept, continuing to shoot into the home for over 30 minutes before looting it and fleeing. A military base sits roughly three miles away; soldiers arrived only after the gunmen escaped.

This one incident brings together several themes your viewers care about: religious freedom, terrorism, failing states, and the human cost of insecurity.

Key angles your audience may find important:

• A pastor and entire family wiped out in a single, targeted incident inside a church residence, turning a supposed place of refuge into a killing field.

• Eyewitness accounts of the attack – the “Allahu Akbar” shouts, the sustained gunfire, and the looting – highlighting both the extremist rhetoric and the criminal profiteering that often overlap in these raids.

• The security gap: why a military base so close to Gako did not prevent or interrupt a half‑hour assault, and how this fits into a broader pattern of delayed security response in Plateau and other Middle Belt states.

• The impact on the ECWA congregation and surrounding community, who are now grieving their pastor while questioning whether state forces can or will protect rural Christian communities.

This case offers:

• A concrete, verifiable incident with names, dates, and location, suitable as a stand‑alone news piece or as the opening vignette in a wider feature on church‑area attacks and failures of protection in Plateau State.

• A lens on the intersection of religion, ethnicity, land conflict, and state weakness in Nigeria’s Middle Belt, told through the story of one family rather than abstract statistics.

I’d like to recommend one or both of these guests for interview consideration:

• Judd Saul – American documentary filmmaker and longtime field worker in Nigeria’s conflict zones.

  • Has spent years traveling in Plateau, Benue, Kaduna and neighboring states, documenting village attacks, interviewing survivors, and working closely with local church and community leaders.

  • Can place Rev. Choji’s killing inside the broader pattern of night raids on rural communities, explain who the attackers are, how they operate, and why so many villages near security installations still feel completely unprotected.

  • Speaks in clear, accessible terms for a U.S. audience, connecting this story to wider questions of religious freedom, terrorism, and U.S. foreign policy.

   

• Franc Utoo – Nigerian advocate and community leader (located in U.S.).

  • Brings a Nigerian voice to the story, with first‑hand knowledge of how these attacks affect families, churches, and villages across Plateau and the Middle Belt.

  • Can describe how communities view the state’s response, why trust in the security forces is collapsing, and what everyday life looks like after an entire pastoral family is wiped out.

   

Possible segment angles:

• “Killed in their beds inside the church”: The story of Rev. Choji’s family and what it reveals about Nigeria’s security crisis.

• “Three miles from a military base”: Why Nigerian soldiers so often arrive after the killing, not before.

• “Faith under fire abroad”: How attacks on churches and clergy abroad intersect with global religious freedom and U.S. interests.

Logistics:

• Judd & Franc (currently) U.S.-based and available

• B-Roll available

If this is of interest, I can send brief bios, suggested chyrons, and 4–5 focused questions tailored to your show’s tone.