Unveiling The Hijab

By Ray Ekpu  

Hijab, the veil that Moslem women wear which covers the head and the chest, is being gradually unveiled in Osun State with an immense potential for katakata. Here are the facts: Recently the Osun State Moslem community filed a case against the state government urging it to allow Moslem female students to use the hijab in public schools. Justice Jide Falola of the Osun State High Court on June 3 this year gave a verdict that Moslem female students should be allowed to wear hijab in all public schools in the state because it is their fundamental human right. The Moslems gave the verdict a storm of applause.

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in the state says it will do two things: appeal against the judgment and mobilise Christian students to turn up in schools in their full religious regalia which will include choir robes and full white garment ensemble, the trademarks of some of the feuding mainstream and Pentecostal churches.

The State Governor, Rauf Aregbesola, who has been in the trenches with his workers over nonpayment of their salaries, is now in the eye of a different tornado. The state government fully aware that the state may explode in a rage of religious combat is now fretting like a fuzzy storm. The truth is that even though the governor is a Moslem the state is almost evenly divided in population between moslems and Christians and the invocation of the hijab as the ultimate expression of fundamental human rights for female moslem students has convulsed the state because the Christians suspect rightly or wrongly that this may be a first step towards the Islamisation of schools in the state.

 The security agencies have invited the Moslem and Christian leaders for a meeting to avoid a breakdown of law and order. The twist in the tale is that, truly speaking, these public schools are not public schools. They are schools that were founded and funded by Christian missionaries which were forcibly taken over by military governments when they ruled the roost. In some states, these schools have been handed over back to their original owners but that is not the case in Osun State. That is perhaps the meat of the matter.

The hijab is gradually becoming a major subject of public discourse in Nigeria. It is perhaps time to fully address or undress it. In December last year, a group of Moslem youths under the aegis of Moslem Youths in Da’wab wanted the hijab introduced into the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) programme. They went to the headquarters of the NYSC to protest against the ban of the use of the hijab for female Moslem corps members during the orientation period. They said that the rights of the female corps members were being infringed upon if they were not allowed to use the hijab. The then Director General , Brigadier General Johnson Olawumi, told them that he was a respecter of the rights of all corps members but that the ban was for security reasons.

It did not apparently occur to these youths that the NYSC is a national institution that had been in existence since 1973 with its rules, regulations and a nationally identifiable uniform used throughout all the states of the federation. It didn’t also occur to them that since terrorists had made the hijab an instrument for suicide bombing something had to give if people’s lives were to be guaranteed by the NYSC authorities. It did not also dawn on them that in the hierarchy of rights the right to life is the pre-eminent right that stands atop other rights or freedoms. However, the Director General gave them a reason that was difficult to counter. They may not have been satisfied but they have been quiet since then.

Kaduna Anti-Christian Bill: First Step To Islamisation

By Clement Udegbe

Nasir El Rufai appears to be one of the arrows aimed at making Christians very uncomfortable in Nigeria by anti-Christian forces of this country. In January 2013, the former FCT Minister wishing to please his godfathers in politics, as a governorship aspirant in Kaduna State, tweeted an insult on the person of Jesus Christ. 

*Gov Nasir el-Rufai

Christians reacted  to his insensitive, irresponsible and offensive saying about Christ, and his attack on the sensibilities of Christians globally, which betrayed his lack of respect for our Lord Jesus Christ and obvious hatred for Christians. His reply which added insults to the injury includes “I must say I am taken aback by the extent of desperate misrepresentation of what was an innocuous attempt to show the godlessness of the Jonathanians to denigrate anyone that dares to ask them to be accountable...To those who were genuinely offended by the retweet, I apologise. I did not mean to offend anyone. Jesus or Isa Alaihis Salaam is a respected prophet of Islam. Every Muslim accepts this in addition to his miraculous virgin birth. It is therefore absurd for any Muslim believer to disrespect Jesus Christ,” he added. 

The Christian Association of Nigeria(CAN) scribe said there was a portion of the response that insulted the Christian faith, pointing out that the association is convinced Mr. El-Rufai "is set on a war path with Christians in Nigeria.”  The association warned him to stop taking Christians for granted with such foolish comments. 

Unfolding events have confirmed that CAN was right, El- Rufai hates Christians! Malam El-Rufai was a Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, not a Minister of any person or party. The problem is godfatherism, and that is why such an uncouth comment could come from a Minister of this nation, and he went ahead to become a Governor! In Igboland, a proverb says that when a child is dancing on the main road, someone must be beating the drums for him in the bush. Someone must be beating the drum from a hidden position, to which Malam El-Rufai is dancing in the public.

 In 2013, the APC wanted to field a Muslim-Muslim ticket for the posts of President and Vice President. In 2014, they quickly abandoned a muslim-muslim ticket, and exploited an in road via the Redeemed Christian Church of God, where Vice President Osibanjo SAN, was a Senior Pastor, and that did the job for All Progressives Congress (APC). While the north voted massively for APC on both ethnic and religious grounds, votes were divided elsewhere in the country. The church had a distracted or shifted focus, and in what appears now like a compromise by the church, Kaduna state Governor became emboldened to unleash more insults on the Church of God. The fears expressed by Christians over APC and Buhari’s leadership persists, in spite of the campaign promises of a changed Buhari.