Preamble
It was another day of history, last Friday, at Ile-Ife, Osun State. The actively mobile train of the Muslim Ummah of South West Nigeria (MUSWEN) moved to the ancient city that is the cradle of Yoruba nation.
The delegation was led by the President of MUSWEN, His Excellency, Dr. Sakariyahu O. Babalola, OON, who is also the Deputy President General (South) of Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA). On his entourage was a galaxy of who is who from all the six states of the Southwest. These included MUSWEN’s BOT Chairman, His Eminence, Justice (Prince) Bola Ajibola SAN (retd), KBE, LLD, D. LITT who was represented by Alhaji S. O. Aweda and the Executive Secretary of MUSWEN, Professor Daud O. S. Noibi, OBE, D. Sc.
Others were the Chairman, MUSWEN’s Finance Committee, Alhaji Rafiu Ebiti FCA, (from Lagos); the Chairman, MUSWEN’s Task Force, Barr. Y. K. O. Kareem (from Lagos); the Chairman, MUSWEN’s Education Committee, Professor M. O. Opeloye (of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife); the acting Chairman, Osun State’s Muslim Community, Alh. Mustapha Olawuyi; the former Chairman, Ekiti State’s Muslim Community, Alh. S. Afolabi Ogunlayi; the Chairman, MUSWEN’s 2017 General Assembly Planning Committee, Dr. Wole Abbas (of the University of Ibadan). Also on the entourage were the National President, National Council of Muslim Youth Associations (NACOMYO), Alh. Kamal Akintunde (from Ogun State); the Chief Imam, Ife Central Mosque, Sheikh Abdus-Sami’ Abdul Hamid and a host of others.
Mission
The mission of that visit was to pay a sympathy and solidarity visit to the people and residents of that city over the recent fortuitous crisis that pitched the Yoruba residents of the city against their Hausa counterparts. Coming unexpectedly, the sad incident held the nation spellbound.
MUSWEN’s first point of call in the city was the palace of His Royal Majesty, Oba Kayode Enitan Ogunwusi, Ojaja II, the Ooni of Ife, where the delegation was received with the grandeur of customary royalty and uniqueness of Yoruba traditional hospitality.
MUSWEN president’s speech
Below is an excerpt from the speech delivered by the President of MUSWEN who led the delegation of prominent Muslims from the six states of the Southwest of Nigeria:
“Your Majesty, first, on behalf of the leadership of the Muslim Community in the Southwest region, under the auspices of the Muslim Ummah of South West Nigeria (MUSWEN), I want to congratulate you on your ascension to this great throne.
We had planned last year to pay a courtesy call on Your Majesty after your coronation, but owing to some unavoidable circumstances, the plan could not materialise.
Peaceful coexistence
Your Majesty, we are glad that Allah has chosen you to occupy this majestic office at this particular time. Your efforts to promote peaceful coexistence among the peoples of the Southwest region and beyond are widely acknowledged. Indeed, within this short period of your ascension to the throne, you have earned your place of honour as a global ambassador of peace.
Incidentally, this is what Islam teaches as accentuated in the Qur’an thus:
“O mankind! We (Allah) created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know (and interact positively with) one another. Verily the most honourable among you in the sight of Allah are the most righteous of you. Allah has full knowledge and He is well acquainted (with all things).”[Qur’an 49:13]
In Islam, home is wherever a Muslim finds himself. Islam neither makes a distinction among people on the basis of ethnicity nor elevates any race or tribe above another. Rather, Islam treats as sacred the life of every human being.
The recent crisis
Your Majesty, against this background, we were greatly alarmed on learning of the recent disturbances within this ancient city that has all along provided a peaceful home for indigenes, settlers and foreigners alike. However, we were greatly relieved by your words of assurances and actions in providing the much-needed balm with which to calm the unwarranted tension thereby preventing the crisis from escalating. Your royal action in the circumstance especially your call for forgiveness rather than retaliation and your strong words of caution to those who wanted to give the sad incident unnecessary ethnic and religious colouration further confirmed your standing as a model of the well-cherished ‘omoluwabi’ values.
This extraordinary display of grace is in concomitance with Qur’anic characterisation of believers as:
“Those who control their wrath and are forgiving toward mankind; Allah loves those who do good” [Qur’an 3:134]
Commiseration
Your Majesty, on behalf of all Muslims in the Southwest region, we commiserate with you and all the good people of Ile-Ife on the recent crisis. We pray Allah to grant you more wisdom and courage to do what is right, just and fair at all times.
I want to use this opportunity to appeal to all Muslims and indeed all the people of Ile-Ife, the Southwest region and Nigeria to choose the path of peace in the interest of all as no people or nation can develop in the absence of peace.
We must also remember, at all times, that we are all citizens of the same country and brothers and sisters in humanity. As members of the human race, we all are indigenes and settlers, once and at the same time depending where we find ourselves individually or collectively.
While praying the Almighty Allah to grant us sustained peace here in Ile-Ife, in Yoruba land, in Nigeria the entire world, I wish to thank Your Majesty for granting us audience and royal hospitality despite the short notice of this visit. May your reign continue to be peaceful and prosperous”.
Ile-Ife Muslim Community
After leaving the palace, the delegation also paid a visit to the city’s Muslim community at the Central Mosque where Jum’at service was jointly observed and peace prayer was collectively offered to the nation. Thereafter, the delegation proceeded to pay a similar visit to the Hausa Community in its Sabo settlement where the Sarkin Hausawa with his chieftains and other Hausa residents received the MUSWEN delegation. Each group expressed delight over MUSWEN’s visit and gesture.
In retrospect
Last Friday was not the first time that the topmost echelon of Nigerian Muslim Ummah paid a courtesy visit to Ile-Ife. The President-General of Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affiars (NSCIA) and Sultan of Sokoto, His Eminence, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, CFR, mni, had severally paid similar visits to Ile-Ife in the recent past. On one of such occasions, His Eminence drew the attention of all and sundry to the symbiotic relationship between the Hausa community of Northern Nigeria and their Yoruba counterpart of the Southwest. Yours sincerely was on the entourage of His Eminence on every occasion he visited Ile-Ife and below is an excerpt from an article I wrote in this column on a particular occasion:
Confluence of cultures
It was a confluence of cultures at Ile-Ife, Osun State where a galaxy of Nigerian juggernauts assembled on the invitation of that ancient city’s monarch the late Ooni of Ife, His Royal Majesty, Oba Okunade Sijuwade. The Sultan and a retinue of Emirs from the north, the Obi of Onitsha and several Ezes from the East and the South-South as well as a galaxy of Obas and Chieftains from the Southwest were all present in full regalia. The venue was Oduduwa Hall, Obafemi Awolowo University (OOU). The State’s Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Adesoji Aregbesola, was not represented as the chief host at that occasion. He was personally present. Some other Southwest Governors who could not afford to come were ably represented by their Deputies.
The occasion was for the public presentation of a book on the history of Ile-Ife, Yoruba monarchs and their domains.
Apparently, the Ooni invited those great Nigerians to the event not much for the purpose of the book presentation as for the symbolic national unity which Nigeria needs very much as a country.
Sultan’s speech
What interested the column called ‘THE MESSAGE’ most on that occasion, was the speech delivered by His Eminence, the Sultan of Sokoto and President General of NSCIA. It went thus:
“…Let me start by expressing my deep gratitude to the Ooni of Ife for his kind invitation and several reminders to attend this undoubtedly great occasion. I am particularly glad to be here not just to listen and learn, but also to witness an epoch in the history of the Yoruba people. I come from a culture and tradition that has great respect for books and which places a high premium on learning. As many of you may have known the founders of the Sokoto Caliphate together wrote over three hundred books and tracts. I therefore feel very comfortable with both the occasion and the location”.
Components of identity
“The history of a people represents a key component of their identity. It brings out their origin, their exploits and their relations with other peoples and delineates their culture and values. We have a lot to learn from our pre-colonial history, particularly the appreciation of those values and precepts that inform the frame of mind of the majority of our people. Our post-colonial democratic institutions will do well to take into account these values which still dominate our socio-cultural environment.
Your Excellencies, your Royal Highnesses, Distinguished Guests, please join me in congratulating the book’s author, Prince Adelegan Adegbola, a renowned Journalist, who has been widely acknowledged as a Custodian of the history and culture of the Yoruba people, for his hard work and dedication, in coming up with this masterful work. We commend him most sincerely and we earnestly call upon other writers and intellectuals to emulate the worthy example of Prince Adelegan Adegbola and to bring to light more of the hidden treasures of our history and culture”.
Dissemination of knowledge
“Distinguished guests, the history and culture of our people, precious as they are, must not be left as the preserve of the elders. We must endeavour to disseminate this knowledge especially among the younger generations. It is in connection with this important task that I wish to call upon the Federal Government, especially our educational agencies, to re-introduce the teaching of history as a compulsory subject in our Primary and Junior Secondary Schools. A situation whereby the majority of our school age population is totally disconnected from its past, and the cultural norms and values it embodies, is not only counter-productive but portends great danger to the development of the country. Our future leaders must be imbued with a clear understanding of the history of our diverse peoples, their character and identity and the value systems which mediated their societal life. We can only ignore this vital aspect of nation-building at our own peril”.
Inter-relationship
“…We must also understand our history as the record of our collective struggle to interact with one another, and to understand and accommodate one another. The ancient State of Katsina for example, because of these dynamic interactions, was aware of the developments in Yoruba land as early as the seventeenth century. One of its most erudite scholars, Shaykh Muhammad Ibn Umar Al- Kashnawi, popularly known as Dan Masani, who died in 1667, wrote a book which he entitled ‘The History of Yoruba Land’, under the Arabic title of Azhar al-Ruba fi Akhbar Yuruba. Unfortunately, that book is now presumed lost. Similarly, the Nupes and several other peoples also interacted actively and for several centuries with Yoruba land, thereby producing a complex web of relationship which subsists up till today. The point being raised is that the interaction and the inter-relationship between our various peoples were not created by Lord Lugard in 1914. It goes much deeper. We must re-enforce these sturdy historical foundations if we wish to build a virile nation”.
Triumph of history
“Finally, I wish to state that the triumph of history and its attendant glories, should always serve to strengthen of our efforts in uniting our people and in bringing peace and harmony. We must strive to acknowledge the universality of our common humanity and the favours which God Almighty has bountifully bestowed on us. We must always remember the noble words of the Holy Qur’an when it says:
“O Mankind, we created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes that you may know oneanother (not that you may despise one another). Verily, the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is he who is most righteous. And Allah has full knowledge and is well acquainted (with all things) [Qur’an 49:13].
From the hind view
“From the available records, Islam is more than a millennium old in West Africa. From isolated Muslim communities in the 9th century to the trading entry ports of the 10th century, Islam grew by leaps and bounds. However, it was not until the 11th century that it began to emerge as a State Religion. According to Al-Bakri, a historian of the region, it was the Kingdom of Takrur which first acquired this status followed by the Kingdom of Kanem under the Syfawas.
“By the 12th century, Ghana had become Islamized while Mali emerged in the 14th century only to be taken over by Songhai which hosted the Sankore University in Timbuktu in the 16th century. Sankore University was the first University in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Islamization of Hausa States of Northern Nigeria began in earnest from the second half of the 14th century”.
Islam in west africa
“The establishment of Islam in West Africa had always been predicated on multi-ethnic and multi-racial basis. Merchants and traders came from different parts of the world, including Morocco, Tripoli, Yemen, Iraq and Egypt. Scholars also came from those countries bringing various Islamic intellectual traditions which interacted and enriched local ones. These traditions flourished and helped to sustain veritable centers of learning including the famous Universities of Timbuktu and Birni Gazargamo as well as similar institutions in Kano, Katsina, Zaria and other Hausa States.
“The emergence of the Sokoto Caliphate in the early years of the 19th century, led by the erudite scholar, Shaykh Uthman Ibn Fodio brought a dramatic transformation of the Islamic scene in West Africa. The Sokoto Caliphate was a political as well as an intellectual revolution. Politically, it initiated an extensive process of state formation which spanned across several states in Western and Central Africa. The political legacies of the Sokoto Caliphate could be found in present day Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad and the Republic of Cameroon.
Sokoto caliphate
“Intellectually, the Caliphate also succeeded in putting scholars at the helm of public affairs. And as true intellectuals, they had to argue their way through almost every major decision they took and had the time and the foresight to record their thoughts, ideas and justification of their actions for posterity. The Sokoto Triumvirate, namely: Shaykh Uthman Ibn Fodio, Shaykh Abdullah Ibn Fodio and Shaykh Muhammad Bello authored over 300 books and pamphlets. Other Caliphate leaders were also prolific writers (despite the enormous state responsibility with which they were saddled). Nana Asma’u (a woman) alone wrote over 70 poems and tracts.
“But despite these achievements, probably one of the Caliphate’s most enduring legacies had been in the areas of values. Next to this is primacy of Justice as the basis of good governance. Shaykh Uthman Ibn Fodio was emphatic on this when he said: “Seeing to welfare of the people is more effective than the use of force…. And the crown of the leader is his integrity while impartiality is his strong hold even as his wealth is the prosperity of his people”.
From the above, it is evident that human life is like a building, the foundation of which is solid education, the structure of which is value-based culture and the roof of which is Justice. These three are closely interrelated. And whoever toils with them toils with life. Can anybody fault that?
