Horizontal inequalities and ethno-religious conflicts in Jos metropolis, North-Central Nigeria

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ABSTRACTProlonged political struggles and perceived horizontal inequalities between Christian Afizere, Anaguta and Berom against Muslim Hausa and Fulani in Jos metropolis, North-Central Nigeria have boosted feelings of difference between the two groups and ignited convulsive bloody conflicts. This article analyses the discourses of horizontal inequalities and how they stimulated the protracted ethno-religious conflict in Jos metropolis and beyond. It discusses how socio-historical forces and conditions, in this case colonial and post-colonial policies and politics, spurred horizontal inequalities and how such inequality fanned the embers of ethno-religious conflicts. Relying on interviews, focus group discussions, archival documents and relevant secondary sources, the paper contends that the conflicts are clear manifestations of historical traditions of unequal access to political offices, economic resources, cultural resources and education in Jos and cities of central Nigeria, and that the government that should mediate in the conflicts has been intermeshed in them.