Middle Belt in the context of "Southern Kaduna"

The North Central (often hyphenated to the North-Central) is one of the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria representing the majority of the country's Middle Belt. It comprises six states – Benue, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, and Plateau — in addition to the Federal Capital Territory.

The North Central stretches across the whole width of the country, from the border with Cameroon to that with Benin. In terms of the environment, the zone is dominated by the Guinean forest–savanna mosaic, with the western portion falling into the West Sudanian savanna ecoregion. Plateau State is also named for the Jos Plateau, which lies in the east-central portion of the zone.

Tyap is a regionally important dialect cluster of Plateau languages in Nigeria's Middle Belt, named after its prestige dialect. It is also known by its Hausa exonym as Katab or Kataf. It is also known by the names of its dialectical varieties including Sholyio, Fantswam, Gworok, Takad, "Mabatado" (Tyap 'proper'), Tyeca̱rak and Tyuku (Tuku). In spite of being listed separately from the Tyap cluster, Jju's separation, according to Blench R.M. (2018), seems to be increasingly ethnic rather than a linguistic reality.