Nigerian government has been advised to allow Christian and Muslim students to study separately to avoid any possibility of insulting each other’s faith.
This was the submission of a group of Christian leaders under the auspices of Civil Consciousness Global Initiative. The group which has Rev. Solomon Adegbolagun as President, and a former Commissioner in Lagos State Professor Idowu Sobowale as Chairman in a press conference in Lagos called on the government most especially in the religious volatile northern part of Nigeria to allow students from different faiths to study separately to avoid a situation that led to the gruesome killing of Deborah Samuel, a Christian student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto in the northern part of Nigeria.
Deborah Samuel was last Thursday hacked down by overzealous youth of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto who accused her of blaspheming against their religious leader and Founder Prophet Muhammed. He was not only killed in broad daylight but her remains were set on fire.
Responding to the dastardly act the members of the Civic Consciousness Global Initiative believed if something was not done about it, it would be very dangerous to allow Christians and Muslims students to study together henceforth.
They chorused, “We cannot feign ignorance of separation that Islam expected between male and female, nor are we ready to be pretentious about the right of every Christian, we therefore recommend that Christian students be given exclusively their own educational facility where they could freely express themselves, and where the hope of ignorantly annoying the faith of their Muslim colleagues would not exist,” as they pleaded that “the government should give Nigeria ONE MUTUALLY AGREED CONSTITUTION which will guarantee peace, and where peace and justice truly reigns.”
They also called on the concerned authorities to arrest the initiators of the satanic act in Deborah’s class and their army of collaborators who took the law into their hands to kill Deborah, and that they must be brought to book.
The Christian leaders who went down the memory lane mentioned various cases of killings which had sent many Christians in the northern part of Nigeria to their early grave in the name of Christians infringing on Islamic religion. Cases mentioned included those of Tafawa Balewa University students of 2004, the RCCG woman murdered during early morning cry in Abuja, the federal capital, the beheaded Akaluka incident in Kano, and some others.
“There is also the very annoying case of a government teacher who was transfered to a school in Gombe State, Northern Nigeria and while invigilating in an internal examination, she tried to prevent a student from cheating by seizing the student’s bag and throwing it where other students’ bags were kept. The cheating student instantly raised a false alarm that the teacher had desecrated her copy of the holy Quran! The teacher was lynched and beaten to death.”
The group which lamented the state of insecurity in Nigeria stressed that “Insecurity has reached its highest level in our history as a Nation, and the events leading to the Nigeria Civil war seem a child play when compared with the present happenings!
The Christian leaders attributed the Nigerian problems to “the problems of forced unity in a nation being ruled with two constitutions in one.”
They blamed the current leaders for the smuggling of the Islamic Sharia Laws into the Nigerian constitution which has “ab-initio been the bane of divisions among all loving Nigerians.
“Those who smuggled it in had a hidden intention and those who saw the evil or danger inherent in it, out of the fear of losing out kept quiet, which is responsible for the recurring stone age jungle justice,” part of which was responsible for the recent darstardly act of the murdering of Deborah Yakubu Emmanuel, a young student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Kano over an alleged blasphemy against their religious leader.
“The killing of Deborah Samuel, a 200 Level student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto speaks volume for our constitution, Rule of Law and administration of justice. We are traumatised! We stand in shame before the global community! We therefore condemn the killing of Deborah Samuel. We also need to call the attention of the global community to the protest for the release of certain persons who were arrested in connection with the crime.”
The Christian leaders who refused to believe that the reason behind the killing was religious posited that the practice of Islam in Nigeria was more political than being religious.
They further noted, “That religion is the reason behind the killing is a fallacy, (as) well meaning Muslims have come out to condemn the killing, notable among them is His Excellency, Aminu Tambuwal, the Executive Governor of Sokoto State and the Sultan of Sokoto, the Supreme Leader of Islam in Nigeria to whom all muslims must defer in all matters of their religion.
“It is sad to note the person and office to interprete the appearance of the moon is judged to be in error over this condemnation,” as they wondered why the former Vice President and now a Presidential aspirant, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar was rumoured to have withdrawn his condemnation over the killing.
They also opined that “The mob in the video and those who came out to protest against the civility of the Governor and the Sultan are intellectually incapable of electoral decision.”
They therefore suggested that Nigeria “as a matter of urgency,” should use their literacy level to determine the condition of eligibility of voters in Nigeria, stressing that “If persons to be voted into offices require a level of educational qualification, it is needful that those to decide that fate must have an aligning level of knowledge.”
They therefore called on President Buhari to express their concern over the deteriorating value for human life in Nigeria, saying “the sokoto killing unlike many others before the advent of technology didn’t save us from a video sighting of an evil of psychological trauma.
Continuing they affirmed, “The question it raises, is for the constitution to answer and for the office of the president to defend. The question on very many lips is when will the next one happen?”
They therefore called on the concerned authorities to arrest the initiators in Deborah’s class and their army of collaborators who took the law into their hands to kill the poor Deborah.
In attendance at the briefing were the Secretary to the body, Rev. Dr. J.B. Odofin, the Assistant Secretary Apostle Bolaji O. Akinyemi, and a former Governorship Candidate in Lagos State, Bishop Funso Awe.
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