(Motto:
Dialogue, Not Violence)
Address:
No. 5, Oba Ayoka Street, Off LASU-Igando Road, Off Iba Junction, near Iba LG
Office, Iba, Lagos State. Tel.
08033464974, 09074524976
Email:
muslimrights@gmail.com Website:
www.muricnigeria.com
PRESS CONFERENCE ON FALSE CLAIMS BY CHRISTIAN
LEADERS THAT IT IS ONLY CHRISTIANS THAT ARE BEING KILLED IN NIGERIA ORGANISED
BY THE MUSLIM RIGHTS CONCERN (MURIC), HELD AT MURIC HEADQUARTERS, IBA, LAGOS
STATE ON THURSDAY, 4TH AUGUST, 2022
Distinguished Leaders of Islamic
organisations,
Brothers and Sisters in Islam,
Members of MURIC here present …Greatest
Muricians!
Gentlemen of the Press
As-Salaam Alaykunm wa rahmatullahi wa barakaatuhu
It gives me immense pleasure to rub
minds with you on false claims emanating from Christian leaders in Nigeria that
Christians are the only ones being killed in this country. They exposed their
bad intention towards their Muslim neighbours when they did not stop at lying
within the boarders of Nigeria but went as far as the United States of America
to pour venom on their compatriots and demarket their own country in a most
unpatriotic and uncharitable manner.
Misled by the false stories, five
American senators recently asked the United States Secretary of State, Antony
Blinken, to re-label Nigeria as a country of particular concern (CPC). Earlier
in 2020, the US had listed Nigeria among countries blacklisted for “violating
religious freedom” under the CPC designation. Nigeria was, however, removed
from the list in November 2021.
It is noteworthy that the Christian
Association of Nigeria (CAN) rejected this delisting. It demanded that Nigeria
should be relisted as one of the countries violating religious freedom. CAN
continued to pursue this ignoble agenda from November 2021 by lobbying powerful
US politicians until five US senators swallowed its bait, hook, line and
sinker.
As a result of this, the five US
senators, namely, Josh Hawley, Marco Rubio,
Mike Braun, James Inhofe and Tom Cotton addressed a letter to the US Secretary of State dated
June 29, 2022 alleging that “Mere expression of one’s Christian
faith has become tantamount to a death sentence in many parts of Nigeria”.
They
added that more than 4,650 Nigerian Christians were killed for their faiths in
2021, that Nigeria has for the second consecutive year been the deadliest
country on earth for Christians, that the Nigerian government is failing to
protect the religious freedom and safety of its Christian citizens and that Nigerian
government directly participated in the persecution of Christians through
blasphemy laws.
We
are asking where this statistics came from. We are asking who counted the 4,650
dead bodies, where, when and how? While it is true that Nigeria has had serious
security challenges in the past two years (2021 and 2022), it has been tough
for all citizens. Muslims, Christians and animists have faced daunting security
challenges but it is the Muslims in the North who have been killed the most and
kidnapped in their hundreds.
To claim that the Nigerian Government
is failing to protect the religious freedom of its Christian citizens is a
shameless attempt to upturn the facts of history. Millions of Muslims live under
duress, intimidation and harassment in Southern Nigeria where Christian
governors and government officials openly dehumanize Muslims and deprive them
of their Allah-given fundamental human rights.
Female
Muslim students are locked out of schools merely for manifesting their Islamic
faith by using hijab. Eminently qualified Muslims are denied employment unless
they converted to Christianity. Political appointments are anathema for Muslims
in Southern Nigeria under Christian governors.
It must be noted that only one state
has a Muslim governor out of the seventeen states in Southern Nigeria and
Muslims live under religious apartheid in all the sixteen states controlled by
Christians. So which government are the US senators referring to as violators
of religious freedom? We assume that a critical, holistic and comprehensive
assessment will be objective here. Selective appraisal will do justice and
fairness no good.
Those
who speak of blasphemy laws also need to contextualise their assertion. Which
blasphemy law and which government? Federal or state? Just like in the US, Nigerian
states have their own legal peculiarities based on the heterogeneity of our
polity. It will be unfair and even naïve of the US senators to judge the
Federal Government of Nigeria by the actions or legislations of any of its
states. Yet Christian leaders who take such reports to US politicians know the
truth of the matter. They are just being deliberately malicious by not putting
information in its proper perspective.
MURIC
frowns at the lopsided composition of Nigerians invited to the 2nd Annual
International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit in Washington DC on June 28-30,
2022. Information available to us reveals that only the Sultan of Sokoto was
officially invited and he was represented by Professor Usman Yusuf.
On
the Christian side and from Nigeria alone, at the event were the immediate past
President of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Samson Olasupo Adeniyi
Ayokunle, Bishop Sunday Onuoha, Methodist Bishop and co-chair of Inter-faith
Dialogue Forum, Ms. Anne Marie Briggs, John Joseph Hayab, Kaduna State Chairman
Christian Association of Nigeria and Ms. Sarafina N'kenta. The delegation was
heavily skewed in favour of Nigerian Christians.
Expectedly, Muslim-bashing reigned supreme at
the event. Nigerian Christians hammered on “terrorist
Fulanis and Kanuris” who are systematically targeting and killing Nigerian
Christians and armed Muslim militia who are deliberately targeting Christians
and Churches with full complicity of the government.
Yet
they knew in their hearts that most of the victims of terrorist attacks are Muslims
and that the number of mosques destroyed by the terrorists is higher than that
of churches. Boko Haram in particular has killed, maimed and displaced more
Muslims than Christians, more Muslim clerics and more Muslim traditional rulers
have been killed or kidnapped than Christians.
Most
importantly, more Muslim majority states are under siege by these terrorists
than Christian majority states while more Nigerian Muslims have been impoverished
by insecurity than Christians. Insecurity in Nigeria has had greater impact on
Muslims more than Christians but our Christian neighbours are standing history
on its head.
ATTACKS
ON MUSLIMS AND THEIR MOSQUES BY TERRORISTS:
Attacks
directed at Muslims and their mosques by Boko Haram and other terrorists are
too many to recount. But permit us to mention just a few, with references for
the purpose of credibility:
1. Kano Central Mosque was bombed by Boko Haram on 28th
November, 2014. The attack claimed the lives of more than
200 Muslims with more than 160 wounded. The attack occurred (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/11/bomb-blasts-kill-200-kano-central-mosque/;
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-3026686;).
2. 86 Muslims were killed when Boko Haram insurgents bombed a
mosque at Mubi, Adamawa State on 1st May, 2018 (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/5/2/nigeria-mosque-attack-death-toll-rises-to-86).
3. 75 elderly Muslims were killed by Boko Haram in Gworza on
January 31, 2016
(https://www.dailysabah.com/world/africa/75-elders-killed-in-boko-haram-attack-in-northeastern-nigeria).
4. A fully loaded bus was ambushed by bandits in
Sokoto, the bus was set on fire and all the 42 Muslim passengers were burnt to
death
(https://www.capitalpost.ng/2021/12/bandits-set-bus-loaded-with-passengers-on-fire-in-sokoto-42-feared-dead/).
5. On 30th January 2016, at least
85 Muslims lost their lives in Dalori, on the outskirts of Maiduguri when Boko
Haram attacked the city (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Dalori_attack).
HOW
CHRISTIANS HAVE BEEN KILLING MUSLIMS IN NIGERIA :
Nigerian
Christians have launched premeditated and well-coordinated attacks on Muslims
on several occasions. We will mention a few of such incidents of cold-blooded
killing:
1. More than 200 Muslims were mercilessly
massacred and their dead bodies eaten up in a cannibal feast in Jos, Plateau
State on Monday, 29th August, 2011 (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nigeria-violence-jos
idUSTRE77S6Q520110829;
https://www.nairaland.com/863573/cannibalization-muslims-jos-video-where;
https://pmnewsnigeria.com/2011/09/14/jos-christians-are-to-blame-for-the-killings/)
2. Five buses loaded with Muslims returning to
Ondo State were blockaded at Rukuba, Jos in Plateau State by the notorious
Irigwe Christian militia group resulting in the killing of 22 innocent Muslims while
16 were seriously wounded (https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/headlines/479206-how-22-travellers-were-killed-in-plateau-police.html;
https://dailypost.ng/2021/08/15/islamic-group-accuses-christian-militia-of-carrying-out-plateau-killings-slams-lalong/).
3. Christian
Jarawas and Sayawas killed more than 400 Hausa-Fulani Muslims in Tafawa Balewa,
Bauchi State, between June and July, 2001. About 22,000 Muslims were displaced
and till today, the Christians of Tafawa Balewa have not allowed a single
Muslim to enter the city (https://reliefweb.int/report/nigeria/nigeria-renewed-christian-muslim-clashes-claim-lives)
4. Many Fulani herders have been beheaded in
South Eastern Nigeria. Their cattle are often killed, their huts burnt while
they are usually chased out of the south east just because they are Muslims (https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2022/05/10/attacks-on-herders-in-south-east-threat-to-2023-elections-miyetti-allah-warns/;
https://punchng.com/govt-should-deal-with-terrorists-killing-fulani-herders-in-south-east-miyetti-allah/)
5. Suya sellers who are traditionally Hausa
people are killed in barbaric manner in the same South East because they are
Muslims and Northerners (https://punchng.com/killing-of-seven-suya-sellers-in-imo-attempt-to-provoke-ethnic-clashes-hausa-community-leader/;
https://nationaldailyng.com/gunmen-open-fire-on-igbo-hausa-suya-sellers-kill-3/; https://www.nairaland.com/7139829/unknown-gunmen-machetes-suya-seller;
https://neptuneprime.com.ng/2022/05/23/suspected-esn-ipob-gunmen-kill-suya-seller-in-anambra-offer-free-suya-to-villagers/;
6. Yet the most barbaric was the killing of an 8-month
pregnant woman, Harirah Jubril, a Muslim Fulani woman from Adamawa state who
was brutally gunned down with her four hijab-wearing female children by the
Igbo separatist armed group, the Eastern Security Network (ESN) while waiting
for a bus in Isulo Orumba North Local Government Area, Anambra State (https://saharareporters.com/2022/05/25/pregnant-woman-harira-four-children-murdered-gunmen-buried-anambra).
7. An army general, Idris Alkali was killed in Jos, Plateau
State on 3rd September, 2018 because he was a Muslim. His body was
dumped inside a deep well in Plateau State. Several vehicles which laid beneath
the pond in which his car was found led observers to conclude that hundreds of
Muslims killed at blockades in Jos had been made to disappear in the same
manner (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/10/breaking-army-discovers-body-of-missing-general-alkali/).
DISPLAY
OF IMPUNITY BY CHRISTIAN RULERS AND AUTHORITIES:
Nothing
encourages lawlessness, recklessness and criminality like impunity. Christian
governors and Christian authorities have manifested impunity in Nigeria with
reckless abandon. A few examples will suffice:
1. Contrary to Section 10 of the Nigerian
Constitution, a Governor from the South South, Nyesom Wike of Rivers State,
declared his state a Christian state and demolished mosques (https://punchng.com/rivers-is-a-christian-state-wike-insists/;
https://www.thecable.ng/video-wike-lied-he-demolished-my-mosque-says-asari).
2. Joshua Dariye as governor of Plateau State
declared in January 2002 that he was determined to make the state the centre
and pillar of Christianity in Nigeria, contrary to extant laws (https://allafrica.com/stories/200201210086.html).
3. Female Muslim students are robbed of their
religious identity as they are forced to wear Christian school uniforms after
being disallowed from wearing hijab in schools in Southern Nigeria, including
the South West where Muslims are a majority ruled by an elitist Christian
minority (https://guardian.ng/features/nigerian-schools-in-the-throes-of-hijab-crisis/; https://saharareporters.com/2022/02/05/we-will-not-allow-hijab-mission-schools-kwara-christian-association-insists;
https://dailypost.ng/2018/11/15/breaking-hijab-wearing-female-students-bar-ui-school-photos/https://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/07/appeal-court-lifts-ban-hijab-lagos-public-schools/;
https://guardian.ng/news/supreme-court-approves-wearing-of-hijab-in-lagos-schools/).
NIGERIAN
CHRISTIAN LEADERS ARE MERCHANTS OF LIES, DECEIT AND FALSEHOOD:
We assert clearly and unequivocally that Christian
leaders are adept at misleading their followers and leaders of Western
countries with lies, deception and falsehood. We have enough antecedents to
prove this assertion.
In
the first instance, Pastor Olatoke of Baptist
Church, Ikonifin, Osun State instructed his followers to disguise as Boko Haram and to
invade his own church in an attempt to launch
false Boko Haram attack in the State. Muslims living in Osun State would have
been accused of staging this false attack if it had succeeded.
He
conspired with three people who disguised like Muslims with turbans which
covered half of their faces. They stormed the church during the church service
held on Sunday 18th May, 2014 and threw banga and other
fireworks which sounded like gunfire thus scaring all the worshippers who
thought they were real Boko Haram insurgents. The worshippers took to their
heels, running helter skelter to save their lives. Many of them were injured.
The pretenders then jumped on their getaway motorcycles and sped off into the
dark night.
Unfortunately
for them the ‘attackers’ were stopped at a roadblock mounted by vigilant youths
of the community who heard the explosions. That was when they confessed that
they were recruited by their pastor to stage the ‘drama’. The case was reported
at Bode Osi Police Station, near Iwo.
It is noteworthy that the pastor in question,
Pastor Olatoke, was also the chairman of CAN in Ola Oluwa Local Government. His
comrades in deception were three members of his church, namely, Emmanuel
Atanda, Peter Oyedepo and Ogunniyi Babatope. Christian leaders are
pathological fabricators of mirages.
This story is instructive as it reveals the
way Christians launch false attacks with the aim of blaming Muslims for them. So
how can anyone, least of all the greatest democracy in the world, believe
stories peddled by such pretenders? (https://dailytrust.com/story-of-osun-pastor-who-impersonated-boko-haram;
https://www.informationng.com/2014/05/islamic-group-reacts-to-fake-boko-haram-attack-in-osun.html)
In
the second example, the same leader of Christian groups in Northern Nigeria who
was part of the Christian delegation to the 2nd
Annual International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit in Washington DC on June
28-30, 2022,
specifically Rev. Joseph John Hayab, was the one who tried to deceive Nigerians
by claiming that a terrorist who attempted to bomb the Living Faith Church on Sunday, 2nd
February, 2020, was a Muslim whereas he was a Christian.
Both the Nigerian Police, the accused himself and
the father of the accused later confirmed that the terrorist’s name was
Nathaniel Samuel, a confirmed church-goer. This incident is verifiable. MURIC does
not fabricate stories.
(https://guardian.ng/life/nigerians-react-to-the-news-of-nathaniel-samuels-attempted-suicide
bombing/#:~:text=NATHANIEL%20Samuel%2C%20the%20Christian%20young,to%20bomb%20a%20COCIN%20church;
https://dailypost.ng/2020/02/04/living-faith-church-bomber-nathaniel-samuel-not-first-christian-terrorist-in-nigeria-buharis-aide-onochie/;
https://dailytrust.com/kaduna-bomb-scare-nathaniel-samuel-is-a-christian-not-muslim-suspects-father).
The third example shows
how Christians of Plateau State went out of their way to prevent troops of the
Nigerian Army from discovering the body of a Muslim army general, Idris Alkali
who was murdered by them. The body of the Muslim army general Alkali was dumped
inside a deep well in Plateau State but Christian women demonstrated half naked
at the site to prevent soldiers from conducting searches. Plateau State
government later apologised on behalf of its Christian population. People who
can stage such ridiculous hocus pocus cannot be relied upon for sincerity and
credibility. Why is the US believing hypocrites? (https://dailypost.ng/2018/09/21/women-protest-nude-attack-army-searching-mysterious-pond-plateau-community-missing-general/).
Yet the state governor exposed
his complicity in the whole abracadabra when he apologized after the army found
the general’s corpse in the same vicinity after the search (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/11/alkalis-death-lalong-begs-army-to-forgive-plateau-people/?utm_source=headtopics&utm_medium=news&utm_campaign=2018-11-05;
https://www.herald.ng/muric-flays-gov-lalong-for-begging-the-army/; ).
Lalong as a Christian
governor was simply fulfilling his predecessor’s pledge. It will be recalled
that the former governor of the state, Joshua Dariye, had pledged publicly that
he would make Plateau ‘the centre and pillar’ of Christianity in Nigeria (https://allafrica.com/stories/200201210086.html). Such declarations had been
interpreted by Christians in the state to mean that Muslims had become
legitimate targets for cannibalism, emboldened attacks on innocent Muslims and
turned the Middle Belt region into an extended graveyard for Muslim
personalities.
The fourth example of deceptions by Christian
leaders is very fresh as it occurred barely two weeks ago. Bishops who attended
the unveiling of the vice-presidential candidate of a Nigerian political party
were labelled ‘fake, carpenters and artisans’ by Christian leaders simply
because leaders of CAN had opposed a Muslim-Muslim ticket and instructed its
followers to distance themselves from the party and its activities.
However, investigations proved that the bishops and
pastors who attended the event were genuine Christian clerics. They came out a
few days later and addressed the press, daring CAN leaders to challenge them.
This proves beyond any scintilla of doubt that Nigeria’s Christian leaders are a
bunch of liars and interlopers. Why must any religious leader lead his
followers with lies? (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2022/07/alleged-fake-bishops-at-shettimas-unveiling-kick-present-proofs-of-ordination/).
The whipping up of anti-Muslim emotions gave rise
to the demonisation of the Muslim faith as well as the mythical Islamisation
and Fulanisation claims. Another fallout of this mirage is the emergence of the
phenomenon of Southern Christians disguising as Hausa-Fulani while committing
crime, thus making it impossible to believe every allegation of criminal
behaviour levelled at Fulani and Hausa people.
This development led to the fifth example of areas of
Christian deception. Three Christians from Southern Kaduna disguised as Fulani
herdsmen to cause mayhem which they intend to hang on the necks of Muslims
later. (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2021/11/suspected-robber-who-disguises-as-herdsman-arrested-in-ogun/; https://www.thecable.ng/police-ekiti-resident-who-impersonates-herdsmen-arrested-for-kidnapping; https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/04/police-edo-arrest-28-suspected-kidnappers-robber-cultists/).
Yet there is a sixth dimension to this Jekyll and Hyde
Christian modus operandi. Muslim children are being kidnapped
particularly from the North and taken either to the South East or to the Middle
Belt in acts of desperation aimed at conversion of underaged Muslim children to
Christianity (https://dailytrust.com/amp/kano-parents-demand-release-of-47-additional-abducted-kids; https://kanofocus.com/2019/10/18/converting-kano-children-to-christians-meant-to-obliterate-their-lineage-jni/; https://www.premiumtimesng.com/regional/nwest/436088-just-in-seven-kidnapped-children-from-kano-found-in-anambra-enugu-official.html; https://muslimnews.com.ng/2022/07/02/shocking-days-after-21-quranic-students-freed-from-ecwa-church-police-rescue-50-children-from-church-cell-in-ondo/). We leave the
American public to decide whether it is ethical to abduct little children from
other religions for forceful conversion to Christianity.
“Whereas Paul says, ‘Do not lie to one another’
(Colossians 3:9-10). Christian leaders find it expedient to pour torrents of
lies on their followers. CAN leaders wilfully ignore the warning in Proverbs,
‘…He who breathes out lies will perish’ (Proverbs 19:9). CAN leaders are not
walking their talk. Neither are they following the teachings of the Bible.
NIGERIAN MUSLIMS CONDEMN TERRORISM:
Nigerian Muslims do not support criminal groups.
They do not represent us. We reject them. True Muslims respect humanity. We are
prepared to peacefully coexist with our Christian neighbours and we have done
so for decades before the marauding Boko Haram gangs came barely fifteen years
ago. They do not have our consent.
Neither
does the Nigerian government support them and this explains why they have been
outlawed and declared terrorists. In fact, the latest attack by ISWAP on the
convoy of President Muhammadu Buhari, a Muslim president, speaks volumes on the
intentions of ISWAP and Boko Haram as well as the non-complicity of President
Buhari (https://guardian.ng/news/buharis-advance-convoy-attacked-in-katsina/).
Nigerian Muslims do not support terrorists. They do
not have our consent. Therefore no act of terror committed by them should be attributed
to Muslims. Also, against the background that Muslims constitute majority of
the victims of terrorism, it will be unfair to blame the same Muslim victims
for the atrocities of terrorists. It stands in contradistinction to the laws of
natural justice.
But should a country as advanced and as civilised
as the US allow itself to be led by the nose by such people? That is the
question. Whether the US and other Western countries should jettison
objectivity and allow sentiments and lies to take the driving seat in the
process of their decision making is left to be decided only by the West itself.
We
strongly suspect that Republican insurrectionists were behind the memorandum of
US Senators. Unfortunately that memo is a plethora of lies from the pit of Jahannam
itself. We know Americans are champions of democracy and lovers of freedom.
Therefore, they will not allow themselves to be deceived by anti-Islam
Republicans and enemies of democracy who had demonstrated their stock in trade
by starting their administration with banning citizens of Muslim countries from
travelling to America.
The US should not encourage Nigerian Christians who
are entangled in a cobweb of entitlement syndrome. Christian leaders are taking
advantage of the precarious security situation in Nigeria which has been
compounded by the Libya factor.
CROWD
TARGET MENTALITY OF BANDITS:
Attacks
on churches and mosques as well as schools, buses and trains explains the
‘crowd mentality’ of Nigerian terrorists’. They are attacking such places not
for religious reasons but in order to kidnap as many people as possible for
ransom. They are targeting places where people assemble in large number. When bandits stop a train or a vehicle,
or when they enter a village, they don’t ask about anyone’s religion. They just
pack as many people as they can conveniently take away.
Terrorists are like pandemics. They seek the
largest concentration of targets. The more the number of captives the higher
the ransom. It is for pecuniary benefits. Terrorists do not discriminate between
Christians and Muslims or between churches and mosques.
Perhaps it will be easier to understand the reason
behind their quest for money at all cost if people can remember where they are
coming from. The Libyan factor readily comes to mind. Many of the commanders of
ISWAP and Boko Haram had served as mercenaries in Libya and the collapse of the
Ghadafi regime without an alternative arrangement in place ignited a southward
drift to West African countries. It also caused a proliferation of dangerous weapons
south of the Sahara.
DATA ON KILLING OF MUSLIMS BY TERRORISTS:
We challenge the data where the US senators claimed
that 4,000 Christians were killed in Nigeria as at 2021 while ignoring more
than 40,000 Muslims who had been killed at the same period. Christian leaders
are simply capitalising on the enormity of the security challenge facing
Nigeria.
But the fact remains that 90% of the victims of Boko
Haram and ISWAP are Muslims and the operations of these terrorist groups are mainly
restricted to the North where Muslims are the majority. Therefore, Muslims
constitute majority of the victims of violence in Nigeria. No data can dispute
that even if it is from a satellite operating on Jupiter.
The reason killing of Christians appear more
pronounced is due to difference in burial culture. Nigerian Christians display
bodies of their victims and may even delay their burial for days, if not months
while Muslims bury their victims almost immediately without any fuss. It is
photo trick and camera magic that egg on emotions.
According to the AlJazira network news, we can confirm that more than 20,000 people
have been killed in the Boko Haram insurgency that began in 2009, which has
also forced some two million to flee their homes (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/5/2/nigeria-mosque-attack-death-toll-rises-to-86).
Relief workers who visit camps of Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) can
confirm that 95% of IDPs are Muslims.
1,854
Muslims were killed in Plateau State between 1994 and 2011
(https://www.vanguardngr.com/2011/12/a-cycle-of-reprisals-turns-jos-into-killing-field/;
Amnesty International, “More than 1,500 Killed in Armed Conflict in
North-Eastern Nigeria in Early 2014,” March 2014,
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/sites/default/files/nigeria__more_than_1500_killed_in_armed_conflict_0.pdf.
9)
Boko Haram killed thirty seven thousand, five hundred
(37,500) persons from 2015 to 2018. Of this figure, thirty two thousand
(32,000) were Muslims while five
thousand, five hundred (5,500) were Christians. This means that 85% of those
killed were Muslims. Mosques have been bombed or burned. Imams, Shaykhs and
emirs have been abducted and killed. But CAN still wants to deceive the world
by claiming that it is Christians alone who are being killed in Nigeria. CAN has
lost all credibility.
Boko
Haram killed the Emir of Gwoza, Alhaji Idrissa Timta on 30th May,
2014 (https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/161743-boko-haram-killed-emir-gwoza-borno-government.html; https://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/05/boko-haram-attacks-three-emirs-kills-one/).
Boko Haram terrorists claimed responsibility for the killing of the popular Shaykh
Muhammad Auwal Adam ‘Albani’ of Zaria, head of the Salafists along with his
wife and 18-year-old son on 3rd February, 2014 (https://www.blueprint.ng/how-we-killed-albani-suspects/;
Salisu Bala, “Salafi Targets for ‘Boko Haram’: The Murder of Shaykh Muhammad
Auwal Adam ‘Albani’ Zaria,” Annual Review of Islam in Africa 12/1 (2013–2014) pages
31–38).
In 2013, Boko
Haram attempted to kill both Emir Ado Bayero and Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II (https://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/01/4-killed-as-gunmen-attack-emir-of-kano/;
See also Will Ross, “Nigeria: Kano Reels after Emir Attack,” BBC News, February
7, 2013). The same Boko Haram insurgents made an attempt on the life of the
Shehu of Borno on 13th July, 2013 (http://www.thisdaylive.com/
articles/shehu-of-borno-dep-gov-escape-death-in-suicide-bomb-blast/119979/57).
Boko Haram also killed a notable Islamic cleric, Shaykh Adamu Misira along with
scores of his followers at Nafada, Gombe State, on 5th November,
2014 (“Boko Haram Kills Scores, Islamic
Cleric in Nafada,” The Sun, November 5, 2014,
http://sunnewsonline.com/new/bokoharam-kills-scores-islamic-cleric-in-nafada/).
.
Is any of the above prominent personalities a Christian?
Terrorists are killing emirs, Shaykhs and Islamic clerics. But CAN is telling
the world that terrorists are killing Christians only. Terrorists are
destroying mosques and killing the Muslim worshippers inside in their hundreds.
Yet Nigerian Christian leaders say only churches are being attacked. It is
absolutely absurd and incomprehensible.
We
urge Nigerian Christians to disregard CAN’s false allegation and incitement. It
has been proved beyond reasonable doubt that CAN is a lying cartel. If CAN has
lied more than once, it can lie again. Interestingly there is evidence that CAN
has lied seven times and here is the list of CAN’s can of worms: (1) Osun fake
Boko Haram attack orchestrated by CAN chairman in Ola Oluwa Local Government,
Osun State; (2) Plateau CAN chapter tried to use women demonstrating half naked
to deceive soldiers searching for the body of General Alkali; (3) three Christians from Southern Kaduna disguised as Fulani
herdsmen to cause mayhem; (4) CAN said the terrorist who tried to bomb COCIN
church was a Muslim but the terrorist turned out to be a Christian and member
of the church; (5) Muslim kids are kidnapped to Christian territories for
secret conversion; (6) CAN said bishops who attended the unveiling of Shettima are fake but it
was later proved that they were real and (7) their claim that it is only
Christians that bandits are kidnapping and terrorists are killing is the
seventh lie. CAN has lied seven times!
It was Stephen King who said, “Fool me once, shame
on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me a third time, shame on both of us.”
Neither Nigerian Christians nor US leaders should allow Nigeria’s deceitful
religious leaders to hoodwink them anymore. The Americans in particular should
remember the words on marble from Abraham Lincoln, “You can fool some of the
people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not
fool all of the people all of the time.”
Those
who have lied to us, not once, not twice, not even three times but SEVEN times
are not worthy of our attention. The intention of those false allegations is to
incite Nigerians particularly the Christians among us against a Muslim leader
and eventually to cause religious war in Nigeria. Let us remember that no
African country will contain us if we destroy our country. Remember the
humongous humanitarian crisis which included hunger, starvation and widespread
disease caused by the wars in Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Sudan, Eritrea, etc. The
main enemies of Nigerians are those who travel to Western countries to spread
false and malicious information.
There is no iota of doubt that there are good
Christians in Nigeria. We call on the good ones to stop this charade by their
leaders. We can live together in love and harmony. We love our Christian
neighbours. We as Muslims are committed to peaceful coexistence but on the
basis of equality and fairness, without intimidation or harassment and
definitely without blackmail. We cherish human dignity and we have respect for
human life. Our advice to the new president of CAN is to tow the path of truth
and patriotism for the sake of the survival of our dear country, Nigeria.
Long Live Nigeria.
God Bless Nigeria. God Bless America.
Greatest Muricians! Greatest Muricians! Greatest of
the Greatest of the Greaaaaaaaaat!!!
Gentlemen of the press, thank you for your time.
Professor
Ishaq Akintola,
Director,
Muslim
Rights Concern,
(MURIC)
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