SHARIAH: We are not the only tribe living with Muslims in Nigeria and in the world, let us, Yoruba, take caution {OPINION}

By ORIMOLAGUN OBEGO (Khabarovsk, Russia)

Introduction:

My attention has just been drawn to some anti-Islam and anti-North campaign activities going on via the social media platforms mainly on Facebook credited to some bloggers of Yoruba Land extractions back home in Nigeria. These campaigns followed a statement issued by the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) and signed by its Igbo Deputy National Legal Adviser, Imam Haroun Muhammad Eze Esq, as read in The DEFENDER from my base here in Khabarovsk, Russia.

Before continuing, let me make myself clear that I am a Yoruba man from Nigeria but good friend of Russia where the ruling class and government do not judge you by your religion, race or colour but care more about your humanity. In Russia, unlike in Nigeria where a section of the people pretend to be the best in religious tolerance and peaceful co-existence,which is a fake claim to suppress certain section of the people, authorities and peoples of the Vladimir Putin-led country treat Muslims and Christians with equal rights without interfering or meddling in the respective religious affairs of one another so long it has evidence in the scripture. So, here in Khabarovsk, I live with my other fellow Nigerians in peace with our host communities of the Soviet Union and I have a duty to caution my Yoruba people back home in Nigeria that it is not a good behaviour to live a life full of hate for others.

The genesis:

The Islamic Council, which is under the leadership of Sultan of Sokoto as its President General, is by implications saying “Enough of disregards for rights of Muslims, particularly in South West Nigeria”, citing the roars that went on air over the decision of Muslims in the Southern part to use their religious law of Shariah as an arbitration in their within-Ummah affairs, which is in line with the Constitution. Moreso, issuer of the statement is not just Igbo of the South East extractions, he is also a constitutional lawyer that knows the law as regards individual rights of his fellow citizens. No single noise was heard either from South East or South South but South West region that is Yoruba part is the only problem area. It is sad and shameful because Yoruba Land is not the only tribe living with Muslims in Nigeria and in the world.

Feeling uncomfortable that these anti-Islam hate and intolerance continue to occur in a country that is regulated by law and administered by constituted authorities, the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) said ‘Enough of all of that’.

It said, “The most recent development emanated from Ekiti state where the efforts of the Muslim community to set up an Independent Shariah (Arbitration) Panel was met with unwarranted resistance and objections from both political and traditional quarters.

“This is coming barely a few weeks after the announcement on the inauguration of a Shariah panel in Oyo State generated unnecessary anxiety thereby leading to its indefinite postponement.

“The Independent Arbitration Panel, which is a voluntary platform designed solely for the resolution of civil and marital disputes among consenting Muslims, was to fill the inexplicable vacuum created by the failure of the political elite in South-Western Nigeria to establish Shariah Courts, as allowed by the Nigerian Constitution, in South-Western states, despite the huge population of Muslims in the region,” said the NSCIA in the Eze’s statement strengthening its position with evidence of the Constitution on which threshold all Nigerians across ethnic and religious backgrounds stand and lawfully lay their claims to benefits.

The message:

To our greatest surprise, our fellow Yoruba people outside of the Muslim community in the South West region still believe that the media control is still a monopoly that is within their enclave alone, forgetting that with the advent of social media, which they also employ in raining all of these hypocrisies, are now at the disposal of everyone and so they have been making unguarded utterances with which they insult the leadership of the Nigerian Muslim Ummah especially the personality of its arrowhead, the Sultan of Sokoto, His respected Eminence Alhaji (Ambassador, Dr. General) Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, CFR, mni.

The Sultan, apparently the best friend that any Nigerian, African and global person has had in the last 19 years, is deserving this hate from these Yoruba people for the “offence” of being the leader of the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) that issued the Sharia-support statement signed by the Igbo personality that is its deputy national legal adviser. How sensible could that be? We Yoruba people, who lay claim to the Source of Creation and claim to be the most educated tribe in the world that has the West (Americas and Europe), the East (Russia/China/Saudi Arabia/UAE/Israel) among others within it, why are we behaving like Alpha and Omega of the Universe without any of us, mostly the educated, who know the law, science and are well exposed, being able to call us to order?

As the highest Islamic council in Africa’s most populous country, according to the report by The DEFENDER, Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) only exercised its lawful duty within the ambit of the law as it ventilated its concerns about the incessant religious intolerance and flagrant disregard for the rights of Muslims going on in the Southern part of the country, especially in the South West. And that it did in the statement it titled ‘Live and Let Live’, calling on Governors and traditional leaders, especially in the South West, to ensure that the constitutional rights of Muslims in their respective domains are preserved and protected.

What, under the firmament of any common sense, can any Yoruba man attacking the Sultan’s personality for standing for the Muslim Ummah he leads point to as wrong with the position of the Council? Why are we, Yoruba people, in the marriage called Nigeria always creating the impression that our tribe, which creation is even beyond our imagination, is the only set of creatures created by God Almighty? This idea of taking ethnicity and culture too far to the detriment of many others is something that the Federal Government of Nigeria must now sit down to address. Yoruba politicians in power, lawyers and activists in the civil society organisations must begin to rise up to speak against and condemn these unholy campaigns being launched by their side of the Nigerian tribes if truly their essence in national politics and administration is for the good of the entire country.

“The Islamic Council cannot place where the natural freedom and rights of Muslims or Christians to live by dictates of their religions, which is global knowledge and practice, continues to be a thing of concern especially in the Yoruba part of Nigerian regions anytime Muslims decide anything based on their religion and which is constitutional,” the media report stated. What is so complicated in this for any sensible tribesperson to understand?

Islamic benefits we should talk about:

The other time, just at the announcement of Islamic banking commencement in Nigeria, not just in South West, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi as Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the unfortunate row that announcement generated, which the media made-believe like nationwide, was initiated and executed by Yoruba people. We have always known that what the Ngbati Press (of Lagos-Ibadan concentrated media of the old) used to make look like conflicts between Muslims and Christians in the country is simply because we, the Yoruba people, are at work with our hate.

That was why the uproars against Islamic banking system at the time was made to seem like Christians hate Islam, no. After all, the Islamic banking system, which is legal, was not even initiated by Sanusi but Professor Charles Chukwuma Soludo, a Christian CBN Governor in his time before Sanusi. The uproars occurred simply because the CBN Governor that announced its implementation is a Fulani man from Kano, Northern Nigeria.

Today, Islamic banks especially JAIZ Bank PLC, TajBank PLC and Lotus Bank are a good reference of banking delivery service that many Nigerian (non-Muslim) customers and investors want to be part of. JAIZ Bank in particular is Islamic bank but it is the most religiously tolerant financial institution in Nigeria today as it allows many Christian staff and investors participants in its daily banking operations and business management, I learnt from the report.

With the same Sultan of Sokoto, being hypocritically vilified by our Yoruba people for saying “We are Muslims and Islam is our religion”, and President of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) now doing well as they jointly and effectively, too, administer affairs of the nation’s scriptures-based religions, the wind has blown to the face of those mischief makers and we have now all seen the rump of the fowl.

Here in Russia, where we have a government that is truly committed to the good of the people, national interest and security, such people who use mischief to destabilize the country through faked religious conflicts are adjudged treason offenders committable to death. Political leaders in our home country should stop being silent over this stupidity and take decisive action against perpetrators, no matter where they hide and fish them out even from under whichever professional cover they claim.

The sad references:

Yoruba at home in South West Nigeria should always think twice before they foment trouble over a matter that does not concern them. Yoruba is just a tribe, out of the over 250 tribes in that country and several uncountable ones globally. The last time these evil minded people – who now eulogise Satanism saying “Esu” (satan) is a righteous person – went on the social media attacking our own revered Timi of Ede for what they claimed was his prostrating for the Emir of Ilorin during a visit to headquarters of the Kwara State Emirate Council. How should Timi of Ede have greeted an aged Emir of Ilorin, whose more convenient posture to receive visitor is done seated for reason of age? The same Yoruba people have tried a lot to want to go to Ilorin and reclaim Geri Alimi from what they called the Fulani Northern Nigeria, albeit returned with failure, but they continuously failed to make such attempt to go to reclaim the Anagos (Yorubas) from the Dahomeans now called Republic of Benin, where they have since become citizens by fate.

We have always read articles by a Nigerian in the Diaspora (UK) and press releases of some Lagos State indigenes. Through these media publications we see that these same Yoruba people now attacking the Sultan for standing for the rights of his Muslims people, who cannot be separated from others across the country, are the same people being pointed at as manufacturers of the 25-year-old injustice that natives of the former Colony of Lagos have suffered. The Lagos State indigenes, who one is aware are blessed eminent but long shortchanged Nigerians, say the marginalization, deprivations, persecution, unlawful land reclamation and usurpation of rights and benefits as well as the blockade from having access to political power of their own indigenous state, which they suffer, are not caused by non-indigenes who are Igbo or Ibibio of South East, South South or Hausa-Fulani people of Northern Nigeria but by the non-indigenous Yoruba from the other five South West states. This is evil that Yoruba of Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, Ondo and Ogun have and continue to do to their fellow Yoruba Eko. I left Nigeria seeing it and still read the news they still continue.

The Canada returnee Oluwo of Iwo Land experience:

They have so much distorted the history of Yoruba Land that they even claim that the royalty in the land is owned by occultism they call Isese and so that no Muslim or Christian can vie for the right of ascension to the throne of his forefathers as an Oba in the land except that he is forced to compromise God and embrace Satanism. This is the cause of the war between them and the Oluwo of Iwo Land, Emperor Alhaji AbdulRasheed Adewale Akanbi, Telu I. For this reason of the war, they have taken the Oluwo’s name to their satanic shrines offering what they consider taboos to their “Esu” (satan) with the belief that the repercussion will pounce on the king. For what crime? Because he travelled to Makkah and Madinah in the far away Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to perform Hajj that is one of five pillars of his Islamic religion and they said he left his head uncovered. What reasonable culture presents this kind of complaint in any civilized world that its people would not need to cover their eyes with shame? Much beautiful the Yoruba culture of Language and use of words are, this hypocritical distortion is misrepresenting and making it unsellable to the outside world. Something fast must be done in the overall interest of the Nigerian peoples.

The concluding part:

The decease that hatred and hypocrisy cause the heart is not little. The Sultan of Sokoto is not our mate, Islam which is not our religion but the evidential religion for the Muslims should be respected for them. It is their religious value and nobody, I repeat, nobody, must come the way of the Muslims in the exercisation of their fundamental rights of that religious practice, with its law and worship, except such person wants war, and Fulani is not the cause of our troubles in Yoruba Land.

We are, ourselves, the cause of our own problems and so we should stop all the misinformation and publicity of hate against Muslims, be they of Yoruba Land or Hausa Land, and their religion of Islam anywhere in Nigeria especially in the Yoruba’s South West. There is no common sense in claim that, by Muslims formalised Shariah and by Sultan of Sokoto backing their rights to do so, Fulani has come to finally capture Yoruba race. Are all Yoruba Muslims? Does Shariah affect non-Muslims? They where is the justification for the Yoruba antagonism? It dies nit add up.

Currently our country is not governed by the Fulani but our fellow Yoruba man in Bola Tinubu. We should look inward for the cause of our problems rather than trying to make more enemies than friends especially among a Northern community where the people are the best natured and good hearted characters that Nigeria can have.

A stitch in time, saves nine!

*Obego writes from Khabarovsk, the largest city and the administrative centre of Kahabarovsk Krai in Russia.