The Sultan of Sokoto and President General of Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), His Eminence, Dr. Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, CFR, mni, would be 68 years old in August, a date he shares with the late Bashorun MKO Abiola, the Nigerian President-elect who was prevented from assuming office.
His Eminence was about 50 years old when he ascended the exalted throne of the great Sokoto Caliphate in November, 2006 as the 20th Sultan of that great Caliphate. But typical of his exemplary humility and dedication to man’s humanity to man, His Eminence does not celebrate birthday for two reasons:
In emulation of Prophet Muhammad (SAW), he deliberately abstains from ventilating a joyous atmosphere for himself in a situation where many ordinary people are wallowing in penury.
He personally perceives aristocracy of birth, if there is one at all, as a rare privilege rather than a right. To him, such a privilege must not be flamboyantly celebrated in a way to arouse any psychological chagrin in underprivileged people. Thus, instead of sitting down glamorously, to celebrate birthday in royal regalia, like his royal colleagues, His Eminence deliberated with the Governor in the Northern State and shared thoughts and ideas with him on how to settle the crisis in that State. That was because, as usual, the Sultan abhors any act of violence let alone killings and counter killings as a perennial case in that State.
That is Sultan Mahammad Sa’ad Abubakar for you. And, he had embarked on similar mission severally in most parts of the country ever since he ascended the Sultanate’s throne in 2006.
Preamble
Leaders are not those who ascribe leadership to themselves politically by whim or by caprice. The real leaders are the very few ones who are sincerely acknowledged by their followers, publicly or privately, as effective leaders in intent and in action. This Sultan is a typical example of the latter category. The great man’s leadership traits are not, in anyway, hidden. He neither speaks just to be heard nor acts just to be seen. His utterances which are in tandem with his actions, are always timely and meaningful, not just for the Muslim Ummah in Nigeria, but also, for the entire black race. And, he combines certain qualities, the likes of which distinguished the second Caliph in Islam, Umar Bn Khattab, clearly among the first four Caliphs.
For Nigerian Muslims of today, Sultan Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar is a vivid reminder of Umar Bn Khattab’s leadership prowess at the early stage of Islam. This Sultan is a bold and charismatic soldier like Umar Bn Khattab. He is visionary, firm, humble and affable like Umar Bn Khattab. And, he believes so much in leadership by example just like Umar Bn Khattab. Perhaps that is why he is so close to the ordinary people in his day to day running of the Sultanate administration in Sokoto and that of the NSCIA just as Umar Bn Khattab was.
His Royal Antecedent
Over a decade ago, Sultan Abubakar spoke passionately with touching concern, at a public function, on three important issues, each of which is now vividly manifesting in Nigeria. First, he advised the three tiers of government to use the then booming oil revenue to ventilate the economic environment for possible mass employment of the teeming youths in the country. Secondly, he warned the people in government, at that time, against sustenance of mass unemployment of youths which he described as a time bomb that could explode anytime. Thirdly, he attributed the rising rate of criminal tendencies in the country to mass unemployment of able bodied youths and ravaging poverty in the land. He then cautioned those in government against criminal consequences of that ugly situation. At the time the Sultan made that speech, the menace of banditry, kidnapping and Boko Haram /ISWAP insurgency had not become as much a threat as they are today.
Admonition
On the occasion at which he delivered the above mentioned highly valuable speech, His Eminence also admonished Nigerian Muslims not to be bellicose towards non-Muslims in reaction to provocative utterances and obnoxious conducts of some disgruntled charlatans in the country who were masquerading in the cloak of religion.
He counselled the Ummah to rather educate any non-Muslim who might want to tread the path of religious transgression against Islam than resort to hate speech and mudslinging. In that speech, His Eminence concluded that it was only in a peaceful atmosphere that people of diverse spiritual and temporal backgrounds could comfortably co-exist in a multi religious and multi tribal society like Nigeria.
Impact of His Leadership
Since his assumption of office as the Sultan the impact of His Eminence’s leadership both as a royal father and the Commander of Nigerian Muslim Ummah as well as the CUSTODIAN OF NIGERIA’S NATIONAL MOSQUE, has been unprecedented in history. This Dr. Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakr, CFR, mni, is one of the most mobile personalities in thoughts and in action in Nigeria as well as in the entire world. The reverberating echoes of the historic lectures about peace and harmony which he delivered at Harvard, Cambridge and Oxford Universities in 2011 are vehement attestation to the above assertion about his leadership.
In Retrospect
When this great man was five years old on the throne in 2011, yours sincerely wrote an article about him in this column which remains as relevant today as it was then. An excerpt from that article is as follows:
“In every crowd of horizontal men there is always one vertical man who deserves honour not much because of his vertical position but because of the significant difference which that position makes in a society.”
History and Man
“History and man are like Siamese twins or a pair of scissors. The one cannot function effectively without the other. History makes man just as man makes history. And, the reciprocal baton that symbolises their togetherness continues to change hands between them as long as they remain in existence”.
“In November 2006, an official announcement of the sighting of a human crescent which had remained hidden in the firmaments of the orbit was made. That crescent turned out to be the towering personality generally known today as the Sultan of Sokoto. His name, Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar did not ring any bell in Nigeria before the referred historic announcement. But thereafter, he was crowned ‘The Sultan of Sokoto’ precisely on November 6, 2006.
Thus, the emergence of Brigadier General Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar (rtd.) as the successor to the exalted throne of the great Sokoto Caliphate without any controversy came as a surprise to many Nigerians. At 50 years of age then, many people thought that he was one of the youngest men to ascend that throne in many decades. But he humbly disagreed with that assumption as he recalled that his own father, Sultan Abubakar Sadiq III who died in 1988 ascended the throne at the age of 37.
His Pedigree
With a sound military background coupled with a sound intellectual aristocracy and a high level diplomatic exposure, this Sultan has been perceived, since coming into office, as a millennial royal Commander divinely designated to pilot the affairs of Islam and the Muslim Ummah with unequalled success.
Philosophers’ Assertion
Given the qualities highlighted above, only a few people will want to disagree with the Philosophers who once asserted that every new century has a way of producing a great leader. The example of Dr. Abubakar is a manifest attestation to that assertion.
Ever since he assumed the exalted royal office of the Sultan 18 years ago (2006), this great man has convincingly exemplified all the qualities of genuine leadership in an aura of personification. Every statement he has made socially, religiously or politically and every action he has taken publicly or privately has proved to be a school from which all well-meaning people continue to learn one lesson or another.
As ABU Chancellor
Five years after his assumption of office, the symbiotic relationship of history and man was reconfirmed in Zaria, on Wednesday, (November 23, 2011), when a galaxy of well-meaning men and women from all walks of life and from all parts of the world, assembled to say “we are here to bear witness”. That was the day His Eminence was installed as the Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria. The occasion was just one of many on which laurels that have been accruing to him since he assumed the royal office as Sultan.
An American President, Harry S. Truman (1884-1972), once described a leader as “a man who has the ability to get other people to do what they don’t want to do and like it”. By his activities and functions so far, Sultan Abubakar has proved Truman right by demonstrating to the Ummah that the time has come for the reformation, not only of the NSCIA, but also of the Sultanate.
Education in Islam
In Islam, education is the first law. It is only through it that man can understand life in all its ramifications. That was why Allah’s very first revelation to Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in the Qur’an, ordained education for Muslims thus: “Read in the name of Allah Who created; He created man from clots of blood; Read! Your Lord is the Most Bountiful One, Who taught man by the pen; He taught man what he (man) did not know…”Q. 96:1-4.
To further emphasise the compelling need for education in Islam, Prophet Muhammad (SAW) was reported to have said in one Hadith that “knowledge is a lost treasure. Muslims should search for it and pick it wherever they could find it”.
But information is the main source of education just as education is the source of knowledge. Without information there can be no education. And without education there can be no progress. That is why the Sultan started his reformation of the Sultanate from the premise of education. It is only with education that most problems in man’s world can be solved without much ado.
Sultan Abubakar also believes that education without social harmony is like a virtue without value and that there can be no harmony in a society where people are overwhelmed by ignorance and poverty as in Nigeria. Thus, he has consistently focused on both.
Installation as Chancellor
At his installation as the Chancellor of ABU in 2011, Sultan Abubakar told the crowd that “the current socio economic indices in Nigeria were a clear indication that the country had begun to drift”. He lamented the fact that despite the nation’s unprecedented resources, development had failed to match the national wealth.
In his words: “Corruption has emasculated our progress even as poverty and unemployment have pushed citizens to the brinks, fueling and confounding social conflicts even as inter-communal crisis has extracted heavy toll in both human lives and property”. He went further to say that: “Persistent insecurity has generated panic and anxiety; our social and physical infrastructures are far from meeting the needs of the nation; the country appears to be adrift and at the core of all these is moral decay engendered by ignorance and greed.” He also noted that no reformation of the tertiary education sector in the country could be effective without putting in place, the progressive developments required in the basic and senior secondary education sectors”. His Eminence insisted that: “our state governments, especially those of the North, must begin to realize the enormity of the challenges facing the education sector and take urgent and necessary steps to address these challenges.” He lauded the founding fathers of the ABU, particularly, the late Sarduana of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello, and urged the authorities of the school to continue to abide by the cardinal principles on which the institution was founded.
Royal Voice Against Corruption
This Nigeria’s renascent Sultan is a man who, though at the topmost echelon of the tree of comfort still feels so much concerned about the plight of the peasants who are hopelessly consigned to the weeding of the shrubs by official policies. He has never relented in his advocacy for good governance, denunciation of corruption and religious intolerance.
Interfaith Engagements
When His Eminence was invited in January 2010 to a religious seminar organised by the Nigerian Christian with the theme: ‘Knowing Your Muslim Neighbour’, he delivered an historic speech that reverberated meaningfully across the entire world. And in May, same year, he also invited the leadership of CAN to a special conference of the NSCIA held in Kaduna. The theme of that conference was: ‘Islam in the Eyes of the Christians’. He is the first Nigerian first class Monarch ever to engage in such an interfaith affair at the national level and his speech on that occasion was quite electrifying as usual.
Electoral Reform
In his special counsel to the National Assembly, and indeed all tiers of Government, His Eminence said those in government should not relent in their efforts to engineer electoral reform and to ensure that Nigerians have a genuine electoral process that guarantees free and fair elections. “Unless and until we do that, our nation will continue to be haunted by the unholy alliance between fraudulent elections and illegitimate electoral outcomes, the consequences of which we all know very well. We must break away from this vicious circle and confer on Nigerians the power and indeed the ability to decide, freely and willingly, who leads them at all levels of governance”.
“….There is also the urgent need for us to re-evaluate our conception of leadership as a nation…. needless to add, that there is no way we can make genuine progress as a nation when a significant number of our populace wallows in abject poverty unable to secure the requisite means for their sustenance and to cater for the health and educational needs of their families. Democracy must build a humane society capable of looking after the legitimate needs of its citizenry. For it to be truly successful, it must be able to bring real progress to all sectors of our diverse society. “Finally we must all work hard to limit the influence of wealth in our society and to support those values that promote social responsibility, excellence and hard work”. Now, where is the role of birth in all these?
Grassroots Interaction
Sultan Abubakar is, no doubt, a leader who knows the problems of his followers and associates with them in solving those problems. Through his humble interaction with all Muslims in Nigeria irrespective of tribal or geographical boundaries, he has become the first Sultan to create a strong feeling of a united Muslim Ummah under a competent and kind leader. And by speaking out incessantly against policies which seem to deliberately impoverish ordinary Nigerians across board, this Sultan has brought a rare hope to Nigeria and the Muslims are the luckiest for it. Such a leader deserves allegiance, loyalty and regular prayer from the Ummah. We pray for the elongation of his life with very sound health and continued Allah’s guidance. Amin!
