The promulgation of Shari'a in 12 northern Nigerian states has ushered in a period of testing times for the nascent Nigerian democracy, writes Gamal Nkrumah Mercifully, no one has yet been stoned to death for adultery in Northern Nigeria. Yet, the subject has hit news headlines. One case, currently under the spotlight, is that of Amina Lawal, a Muslim woman, sentenced to death by stoning for adultery by an Islamic Shari'a court in Katsina state, northern Nigeria. On 19 August, a Shari'a court of appeal in Funtua, Katsina, upheld the death sentence. Judge Aliyu Abdullahi told Lawal that this judgment would be carried out as soon as her daughter was weaned. Lawal's case has sparked heated debate. The international media sensationalised the tragic affair, confusing the issues concerned, Shari'a advocates claim. They warn of the dire consequences of human rights groups, Western and Nigerian, which have jumped on the opportunity to denigrate Nigeria's Muslim majority population with whom they traditionally cross swords. Significantly enough, Christian and Muslim leaders in the northern and predominantly Muslim northern state of Kaduna signed a declaration of peace between the two communities last week. The symbolic gesture went almost unnoticed amid the brouhaha concerning Lawal. Kaduna is one of 12 northern Nigerian states which have instituted the Islamic Shari'a penal code. In northern Nigeria, Shari'a sanctions flogging for alcohol consumption, amputation for theft and stoning for adultery. Several convicted thieves have had their hands amputated in accordance with the strictly applied Shari'a. Supporters of the imposition of Shari'a claim that crime rates have been drastically reduced since the promulgation of Shari'a. They say that secularists are interfering with the democratic process in northern Nigeria since most northerners have voted for the promulgation of Shari'a. Nigeria, like Sudan, is predominantly Muslim in the north and Christian and animist in the south. The numerical superiority of the northern Nigerian Muslims has meant that political power tended to be concentrated in the hands of the northern elite, whose stranglehold on the military establishment remains a key political feature of post-independence Nigeria. This power was eroded somewhat after the sudden death, under mysterious circumstances, of the country's last military ruler Sani Abacha in 1997. A southern Christian, and former military head of state, Olusegun Obasanjo, was duly elected. Obasanjo was sworn in as the country's new civilian head of state with the blessing of the traditional Muslim military elite. His government is, therefore, exceptionally sensitive to Muslim sensibilities. Obasanjo, widely viewed as pragmatic and capable, has dismissed single-issue politics as an interruption to his democratisation plans, in which he firmly believes. Presidential adviser for women's affairs, Titi Ajanaku, said that the ruling was a breach of human rights. Human rights groups protest the selective application of Shari'a which appears to be biased in favour of men. The law, they say, seems to be more mercilessly enforced on poor and underprivileged groups. What especially galled anti-Shari'a activists was that the harsh judgment was not meted out against Yahaya Mohamed, the alleged father and fellow adulterer. The recurrent tug-of-war between secularists and Islamists over the imposition of Shari'a in northern Nigeria has threatened the political stability of the country. Nigerian officials are at pains to proclaim that the Nigerian federal government is secular and upholds human rights. Nigeria's Justice Minister Kanu Agabi issued a strong statement in support of defending Lawal's right to life. "We are totally opposed to it," he said in the first unequivocal government statement on the Lawal case. "The Nigerian government is a strong advocate of human rights. We are not in support of the court ruling," Christopher Ariyo, minister at the Nigerian Embassy in Cairo told Al-Ahram Weekly. Nigerian officials also caution against arbitrary condemnation of the Nigerian legal system. "The process of law is not yet complete. The [Nigerian] Supreme Court has not made a final decision," Ariyo explained. "You would recall that the Supreme Court overturned the sentencing to death of another woman," he added, referring to the acquittal in March of another Muslim Nigerian woman, Safiya Husseini. Click to view caption Nigerian democracy has faced many serious challenges since independence from Britain in October 1960, especially since the return of the country to civilian rule and multi-party democracy in 1999, but religious tensions have been the most combustible. Leading secularist, Nigerian Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka called for sanctions against states implementing Shari'a. Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today Programme, Soyinka recommended "punitive internal sanctions against states which take any action that make them de facto independent states -- theocratic states -- within what is a secular constitutional arrangement". Soyinka said that the ruling was a "very sadistic charade in which human beings are being made pawns in a political game". He charged that the "application of Shari'a is unconstitutional" and that it represents a "very idiosyncratic interpretation of the Shari'a" by "cynical people who are playing politics with faith". Strong words, but many leading Nigerian Muslims concur. "People are trying to exploit religion in order to support their hidden political agendas," Nigeria's Ambassador to Egypt Alhaji Abubakar Udo told the Weekly. "Those who promote violence want to further their own personal and political interests. It is the common people who suffer and are killed, and not those who incite violence," Ambassador Udo said. He pointed out that social factors, such as rampant unemployment, are at work. "An idle mind is an evil mind. If a young man is unemployed five years after graduation, he is most likely to be a very angry man," he pointed out. There is also a widespread perception that power is being abused and that the system, as a whole, is unjust. Violence, Udo said, was a means of venting the deep resentment and frustration felt by the man in the street because people are not given equal opportunities and do not see a way out of their predicament. Nigeria, a federation of 36 states, instituted a new Human Rights Violations Commission, inaugurated by President Obasanjo two years ago, to examine atrocities committed under previous military administrations. Many ordinary Nigerians have petitioned the commission over violations of their basic rights, including imprisonment and torture in military jails, and President Obasanjo himself has made two appearances before the commission. The country is rich in mineral and agricultural resources, but since the 1980s, oil has emerged as the mainstay of the Nigerian economy. Oil, the country's main foreign exchange earner, has become a major source of tension, largely because oil revenues have not been equitably distributed. Nigerian women in the oil-producing Niger River Delta area have been peacefully demonstrating and taking over oil installations in a desperate bid to highlight their worsening socio-economic woes. The women demand jobs for their men folk, and improved health, sanitation and social services. Even though oil is produced in the south, there is a perception that the oil wealth has been siphoned off by the giant Western oil corporations and squandered by the military dominated by northern Nigerian Muslim elite. The irony is that while the southern states tend to be more industrially and socially developed, the northern states tend to be poorer and less developed. These underlying contradictions have created a tense and uneasy political situation. There are growing fears in the country and abroad that the spate of religious violence that periodically erupts with alarming regularity may undermine the entire Nigerian democratic process. Religious tensions have intensified since the imposition of Islamic Shari'a in northern Nigerian states. Opponents of the Shari'a argue that these courts impose harsh laws and sentence people to floggings and amputations which are not sanctioned under Nigerian federal laws. Floggings have become public spectacles and draw large crowds of onlookers in the northern states. While such punishments are not supposed to be applied to non-Muslims, many Christians are disgruntled by the introduction of Shari'a and feel that they infringe on their rights. Bars, nightclubs and even cinemas have been closed down in compliance with Shari'a. Non-governmental organisations and Christian churches have voiced strong opposition. Community Development and Welfare Agenda, a vociferous pressure group, openly declares the Shari'a court rulings to be a fundamental assault on the sovereignty and legality of the Nigerian state. The Campaign for Democracy (CD), the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) and the Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) have spoken out loudly against the Lawal case ruling, and the imposition of Shari'a in general. The Shari'a was first introduced in Zamfara state, one of Nigeria's poorest and most backward states. Eleven other, predominantly Muslim, northern Nigerian states followed suit. However, in some states like Kaduna, non-Muslims constitute large minorities -- 40 per cent of Kaduna's population is Christian, about 10 per cent, animists. States like Kaduna, with a religiously heterogeneous population, have witnessed the most ferocious religious disturbances. In February 2000, over 2,000 people were killed in clashes between Muslims and Christians. There have also been incidents of violence in Kano, which is the economic powerhouse of northern Nigeria, and which has a relatively large and prosperous Christian minority. Similar clashes have also taken place in Plateau state. Last year, the most populous and cosmopolitan of northern states, Kano, also banned prostitution, gambling, and alcohol consumption. The sale of alcohol is strictly prohibited in public places and the owners of bars and liquor stores -- invariably Christian southerners -- bitterly complain about the ruin of their businesses. Last year, the Independent Shari'a Implementation Committee seized and destroyed a consignment of alcohol worth $10,000. The Christian merchant involved was understandably piqued. The sale of alcohol was prohibited after the imposition of Shari'a even though authorities promised that the law wouldn't impact non- Muslims. As a result, the Kano suburb of Zangon, inhabited mainly by Christians from the south of Nigeria, went up in flames, with churches burnt and shops ransacked. Police raided several militant Islamist organisation headquarters and detained some leaders. The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has openly criticised the imposition of Shari'a in northern Nigerian states. And, in the wake of the 11 September attacks on New York and Washington DC, CAN has protested the controversial arms purchases by a number of northern Nigerian state governors ostensibly to "defend Islam".
