Some of the most reliable data available on displacement statistics can be sourced through Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (internal-displacement.org) providing both aggregation and incident-level statistics. New conflict and violence-caused displacements in 2023 account for 291,000 persons, around a tenth of the overall number of such displaced in the country (3.3 million, half in Borno). While new numbers appear to be on the rise (2022 = 148,000), IDMC explain that “the increase was mostly the result of more comprehensive data collection.” For our purposes of understanding religious freedom impact, we exclude IDMC data pertaining to disaster displacements (e.g. flooding). Religious affiliation in Nigeria is very high, especially to Christianity and Islam, religions both represented at about the 46% mark.
The Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa (ORFA) has assessed violence and conflicts per religious affiliation and have discovered significant bias against Christians who are killed and abducted more frequently than Muslims, especially when factoring in the respective populations for the subnational area in question. Unfortunately, we do not yet have the subnational breakdown of the 291,000, but we can provide the following two breakdowns based on the following hypotheses for Nigeria 2021–2023 displacements estimations based on religious affiliation.
Hypothesis 1: Displacement bias will reflect abduction bias
| Year | Displacements | Muslim/Christian displacements | ORFA Muslim: Christian abduction ratio | Muslims abducted | Christians |
| 2021 | 376000 | 345920 | 4.4 | 64059 | 281861 |
| 2022 | 148000 | 136160 | 5.9 | 19733 | 116427 |
| 2023 | 291000 | 267720 | 3.4 | 60845 | 206875 |
Hypothesis 2: Displacement bias will not reflect abduction bias
| Year | Displacements | Muslim/Christian displacements | ORFA Muslim: Christian abduction ratio | Muslims abducted | Christians |
| 2021 | 376000 | 345920 | n/a | 172960 | 172960 |
| 2022 | 148000 | 136160 | n/a | 68080 | 68080 |
| 2023 | 291000 | 267720 | n/a | 133860 | 133860 |
We are currently limited by the lack of subnational analysis and other precisions. Once this is gathered, a finer appraisal should be made whereby Hypothesis 2 will represent the numbers as per state average. We also can be more confident of the 2023 data over preceding years given the IDMC concession noted above. Finally please note that the Muslim and Christian numbers are based on the 92% national average of the population they jointly represent. More crucially still, research should indeed be conducted as to whether the ORFA bias is applicable to displacement statistics.