Tag: Sultan

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Saad Muhammed Abubakar, yesterday deplored the forcible conversion to Islam of the Christian contingent of the over 200 students of  Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok by their Boko Haram abductors.

The Sultan, who is also the President-General, Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs and leader of the Nigerian Muslim community, said in Ibadan, Oyo State, that Islam is not in favour of forcible conversion, adding that the action of the Boko Haram sect is in utter contravention of Islamic principles.

He spoke at the commissioning of the Bodija Estate and Environs Muslim Community Islamic Centre.

The Sultan described the abduction of the girls as ungodly, un-Islamic and a negation of the teachings of Prophet Mohammed on peaceful co-existence.

He charged the Muslim community to let the generality of Nigerians understand that Boko Haram members are not genuine Muslims but criminals.

Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State shared the Sultan’s views, saying there is absolutely no connection between Islam and Boko Haram’s activities.

Governor Ajimobi described Islam as a religion of peace and urged Muslims to always play active roles in Islamic activities for the development of the religion.

The Chairman of the Islamic community, Alhaji Tiamiyu Giwa, also condemned Boko Harams’ continued abductions and killings in the North, while the guest lecturer at the event, Prof. Abdul-Ganiyu Oladosu, berated the insurgent group for converting the abducted girls to Muslims.

“This is not an Islamic injunction, but an aberration,” he said.

The Sultan will tomorrow in Abuja lead Muslims at a special prayer session as part of the effort to check the security challenge caused by Boko Haram in the country.

He has invited prominent Muslim leaders and clerics to the prayers slated for the National Mosque in Abuja.

The National Muslims Prayers for Peace and Security in Nigeria is aimed at helping the country in “overcoming the current security challenges facing the country.”

The prayers are coming on the heels of an open letter to the Sultan by a prominent Northern rights activist and author, Mallam Shehu Sani,  who has been part of several past efforts to end Boko Haram’s five-year deadly uprising through dialogue.

Sani said Nigeria’s top clerics should do more to help secure the release of more than 200 school girls held hostage by Boko Haram, whose mass  abduction from a school in Chibok in the northeast on April 14 has drawn worldwide condemnation.

“Religious clerics, particularly in the north, should move beyond prayers and independently move further to reach out to the insurgents and amicably retrieve these girls via means that will guarantee their safe return,” Sani wrote  during the week.

“The Chibok girls have guns on their heads and chains on their hands and we have a dangling sword of posterity hanging over our heads,” he added.

Even outside the massive air conditioned hall where its session take place, the National Conference keeps living up to its billing as a contentious enterprises.

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Saad Abubakar III, led some Muslim leaders to President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday at the Presidential Villa to protest the conference’s composition.

The Sultan declined to speak to reporters at the end of the closed door meeting with the President, the Secretary General of the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, said the President assured them that there was no deliberate move to marginalise Muslims.

Speaking with State House correspondents, Oloyede said: “We are happy we consulted with him, and he has given us reasons to re-assure the Muslims that Muslims in Nigeria are not deliberately marginalised and he has asked us to convey the feelings of the government, the genuineness of the government, the fairness of the government to the entire populace.”

“That if there are issues that are not as they ought to be, they were not definitely deliberate and we want to believe that Mr. President told us his mind, but we also want to believe that it is proper to protest; it is also proper to assume that a leader will always be just, even if there are mistakes thereafter.”

He went on: “We just felt that we must convey the feelings of the Muslims in Nigeria to Mr. President and he has given us his word to re-assure the Muslims community that he is a genuine and committed Christian who will not be unjust to others even …”

Oloyede, however, declined to give details about the feelings of the Muslims the group conveyed to the President.

“Those feelings; may be because you are not a Muslim. If you are a Muslim, you will know the feelings of the Muslims presently about the composition of the National Conference,” he said.

With the Sultan were Shehu of Borno, Abubakar Ibn Garbai, former Head of Service of the Federation, Yayale Ahmed and former Chief Justice of Nigeria Mohammad Uwais.

The Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI) has opposed the composition of the National Conference, claiming that Muslims are being marginalised as the number of Christians at the conference is more than the number of Muslims.

Stressing that the selection of delegates to the national conference was not handled in a free and fair manner, Secretary General Dr. Khalid Abubakar Aliyu said at a news conference in Kaduna that Muslim were cheated in spite of “having the largest population”.

He said: “Although democracy is a game of numbers, this has not been respected. For instance, while Muslims constitute the majority in the country, Christians, who by all acceptable records, are not more than 40 per cent of the country’s population, ironically constitute 62 per cent of the total delegates.”

“We find it as disrespect to the conscience of the Muslims that of the 20 delegates of the Federal Government, only six are Muslims. No Muslim is deemed fit to make the list of delegates from the Nigerian Economic Summit. In fact, in the representation of the security agencies, Muslims have been so unimaginably short-changed, with only one Muslim out of the six retired military and security personnel, one out of six retired security and NIA officers, and two out of delegates of the Association of Retired Police Officers. This means, of the 18 security experts belonging to these three groups, only four (22.2 per cent) are Muslims. The question is, why is this serious short-changing of Muslims in these very sensitive groups?”

THE Sultan of Sokoto Alhaji Saad Abubakar, has urged Muslims to fervently pray for peace to reign in Nigeria.

The Sultan advised Muslims nationwide to recite the Al-Qunut special supplication in all mosques across the country during the five obligatory daily prayers.

He said the prayers were necessary to ward off further “human or natural catastrophe”.

Sultan Abubakar condemned the killing of students in Buni Yadi, Yobe State, saying it was a senseless act perpetrated by criminals.

“The barbaric and heinous attack is utterly condemnable in its totality,” the Sultan said.

He recalled similar attacks in the past and called on the Federal Government to wake up to its responsibility of protecting lives and property of Nigerians, especially in the Northeast.

The Northern Elders Forum said yesterday that it walked out a government delegation from its meeting with Northern Traditional Rulers in Kaduna because they were not invited.

Sultan of Sokoto Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar diplomatically walked out the delegation to avoid chaos, when tempers rose.

Forum’s Deputy National Chair Paul Unongo said they wrote to rulers requesting a meeting, but were surprised to see uninvited guests.

The NEF wrote to the Northern Traditional Council for a meeting on insecurity, unemployment and poverty in the North.

The December 2 letter was signed by Chairman of the Forum Yusuf Maitama Sule.

Unongo said they were surprised to see the National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, represented by Gen Sarki Yaki Bello (rtd), Governors Isa Yuguda (Bauchi), Saidu Dakingari (Kebbi), Muazu Aliyu Babangida (Niger), represented by his deputy, Ahmed Musa Ibeto, and Muhktar Ramalan Yero (Kaduna) at the meeting.

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar yesterday accused political leaders in the north of slowing down the quest for a peaceful and developed region. He said the Northern governors have failed to implement recommendation by traditional rulers on the way forward.

Addressing a joint meeting of the Northern Traditional Rulers Council and Northern Elders Forum (NEF) in Kaduna, the Sultan said the northern governors were yet to act or respond to the position paper presented to them last year by the Council.

Sultan Abubakar who said the traditional institution had been in existence long before the amalgamation of Nigeria in 1914 noted that the traditional institution has a strong leadership and vision to see their communities live in peace, remain more developed and more prosperous, therefore, they were in a better position to advise the political leaders.

According to him, “in our quest to develop the north because we are northern leaders, first we always try to reach out to our political leaders. I want to put it on record here that, even last year, we presented a position paper to the northern governors forum on the way forward to reduce the suffering of our people by lack of education, by insecurity and all sort of things.

“The paper has been given to them and I want to draw the attention of the northern governors forum that we are yet to hear anything on that paper we gave them. They should reach out to us to brief us so that we can continue to contribute on how really to sustain the peace and develop the north.

“We are here to continue our deliberations in our quest to have a peaceful, stable and developed north, as most of you know, in the days of Ahmadu Bello of blessed memory, things were much better than they are now.

“In our quest to have a stable and developed north, we keep up looking to all and sundry, most importantly, look up to our political leaders because they have the leading mandate to administer the north.

“Now, before the present democratic dispensation, traditional institutions have been there. Long before Nigeria was amalgamated, traditional leaders have been ruling and leading people. Today, we have our governors and other political office holders and elders here.

“I want to assure all and sundry that the northern traditional institutions do not have a political party but we are the administrators of our people. Not having a political party does not mean we will not tell our political leaders the truth when they go off the road. We will tell them where they are going wrong when we see it and tell them what to do to bring development to our people. When we give such advice, we will be very happy because we have done our responsibilities.

“If we give them the advice, it is left to them to either accept our advice or not. While we are giving advice, we can always contribute rightly to the development and peaceful coexistence of people in our various places. I want to assure you once again that we don’t have political party. Our political party is the welfare of our people wherever they are and that is our concern and nothing more.

“I read some of the Shehu Danfodio’s literature where he said since the welfare of your people is more important than the use of force, You cannot use force to develop or move people forward. If you take care of their welfare, you will find out that they are always ready to do their best to move the society forward.

“I believe this meeting is very important coming at the time when we have so much challenges in form of insecurity in the north in particular. We all see what happened yesterday in Borno and Bama. When you go to Bama, you will virtually see that there is nobody in the street.

“I think it is important for us to always look ahead to plan into the future. After our meeting and hearing from our northern elders, we will issue a communique that will still be sent to the governors forum because they are our political leaders.

“We are administrators and we will continue doing our best, Insha Allah in our quest for the political leaders to achieve designed goals of our people which is good leadership as they always ask where are the Sardaunas of today. We should also know that we are going to account to Allah our actions as leaders on the D-day. Our political leaders must fear Allah in their dealings with the people”.

Chairman of the Northern state Governors Forum and governor of Niger State, Dr. Muazu Babangida Aliyu, said Nigeria was passing through one of the most difficult times in its history as a nation.

Represented by his deputy, Ahmed Musa Ibeto, Aliyu said political and electoral tension, social and economic insecurity, communal conflicts and civil unrest had reached unprecedented levels in the country, requiring the collective dedication of all Nigerians to address.

Kaduna State Governor Muktar Yero, said: “It is obvious that the present arrangement which places huge expectations on traditional rulers, without any Constitutional or legal provision, has to be changed. The responsibilities, powers and obligations of traditional institutions must be clearly defined by law and some of us are willing to support such move, anytime the issue is up for debate.

“Consequently, I believe it is time to consider an official role for our traditional institutions. Invariably, I am of the notion that the ongoing Constitution Amendment process and the proposed National Conference, has availed us viable platforms for exhaustive debate on ways to legally engage traditional leaders in the process of building a peaceful and prosperous nation”.