THE SOCIO-RELIGIOUS DYNAMICS OF INTERNAL MIGRATION IN NIGERIA: THE FULANI PASTORALISTS AND MIDDLE BELT INDIGENES

Résumé

Internal migration is the internal movement of people and goods from one place to the other. In Nigeria, the Fulani pastoralists have in recent times been migrating from the north to other parts of Nigeria, especially the north-central preferably called middle belt by the indigenes. These migrants have a distinctive feature of violence, killing inhabitants of the middle belt in their large numbers, women and children largely displaced. It was discovered that these militant Fulani pastoralists continuously molest their host community due to Religious differences, grazing law, boundary disputes and expansionist tendencies, among others. It is on this base, with the usage of the descriptive phenomenological research, this paper examines the social and religious implications of domestic migration on Nigeria’s development. It assesses methods and strategies in which these violent domestic movements could not hamper the achievement of the sustainable development goals.