Nigeria clashes kill over 50 in northeastern city

[gogannaka]

Dave,sometimes i marvel at how people conclude things.
What made you conclude that most of the people agitating for sharia implementation want even christians to be subjected to the law?

And why is it that the west is not bothered by the practice of sharia in countries like saudi arabia,egypt etc.
Is it only in Nigeria that the implementation of sharia is seen as 'anti-democratic'?
Doesn't democracy give people to the right to practice their religion freely?

Don't generalize please over issues you jut read about in the newspapers.

[Cekenah]

Unsurprisingly there is the strong temptation, especially among southerners and Western spectators, to portray the Boko Haram incident as part of the 'Pandora's box' effect of political sharia's introduction into Northern Nigeria. I'm not sure about that; we had a similar incident in the Maitatsine riots  which claimed much more lives, and long before the present political dispensation. I strongly believe that even in the absence of Sharia, similar movements would have sprung up and made a mess of things.

Northern Nigeria is particulary susceptible to this sort of religious radicalism, not least due to perpetual socio-economic underdevelopment. The other issue I see here is the porous northern border with Niger, Chad and Cameroon. Where else did these militants have gotten hold of such high-tech weaponry? It would not be the first time that foreign elements have taken part in civil disturbances in the North.

[nasr19]

You may be right Dave, when speaking of those violently agitating for sharia for reasons aptly captured by Cekenah. But as Gogannaka tried to point out, such people constitute only a tiny fraction of the muslim population and one should resist the temptation to generalize.

The mainstream muslim population is law-abiding and accept democratic government with its inherent imperfections as presently practiced but certainly not at the expense of sharia which is their reason d'être. Is sharia necessarily mutually exclusive with democracy?

[HUSNAA]

Unsurprisingly there is the strong temptation, especially among southerners and Western spectators, to portray the Boko Haram incident as part of the 'Pandora's box' effect of political sharia's introduction into Northern Nigeria. I'm not sure about that; we had a similar incident in the Maitatsine riots  which claimed much more lives, and long before the present political dispensation. I strongly believe that even in the absence of Sharia, similar movements would have sprung up and made a mess of things.

Northern Nigeria is particulary susceptible to this sort of religious radicalism, not least due to perpetual socio-economic underdevelopment. The other issue I see here is the porous northern border with Niger, Chad and Cameroon. Where else did these militants have gotten hold of such high-tech weaponry? It would not be the first time that foreign elements have taken part in civil disturbances in the North.

I am glad to see that we have at least one southerner who is intelligent educated and well informed and doesnt make wild damning prejudiced and hate filled tirades like  usman 11 does. Usman 11, never rejoice in the misfortunes of others, you dont know when ur own will strike with a greater magnitude than the one you rejoice in. You are glad that this has happened. We' ll see what the emboldened Niger Delta youth will perpetrate in yr own neck of the woods since they have been patted on the head by no less than the president for their nefarious actions.

Assalamu alaikum,

R>I>P MY.

Did I sound supportive of his actions? I hope not. :D

You hope not that others will conclude that you support him. Well its glaringly obvious you sympathise with him at least. Lets hope u are not of the same vein as he, in yr views about western education.

[Dave_McEwan_Hill]

Gogannaka
I did not generalise and I fully recognise that not all Moslems want to enforce Sharia law instead of secular law. I didn't say that at any point.
And it is no more or no less questionable in Nigeria than it is in any other country. I didn't say otherwise either.
However, are you sure that it is a "tiny" minority?
As far as I can see and from what I hear ( I still have connections in Kano)there is constasnt well supported campaign going on to enforce Sharia law on everybody. Turning a blind eye or giving covert support while pretending not to is much of this problem.

I remember somebody warning on this site a few months ago that there was armed religious zealot infiltrators flooding into the north.
I well remember the Maitatsini bloodbath. I was working with the Min of Ed at the KERC at Gandun Albasa at the time and I had to make my way past corpses at the roadside on several occasions.

[HUSNAA]

Gogannaka
I did not generalise and I fully recognise that not all Moslems want to enforce Sharia law instead of secular law. I didn't say that at any point.
And it is no more or no less questionable in Nigeria than it is in any other country. I didn't say otherwise either.
However, are you sure that it is a "tiny" minority?
As far as I can see and from what I hear ( I still have connections in Kano)there is constasnt well supported campaign going on to enforce Sharia law on everybody. Turning a blind eye or giving covert support while pretending not to is much of this problem.

If yr contacts are ppl like usman 11 then you are getting highly inflammatory, phobic and prejudiced information.
These boko haram followers are a result of  poverty, breakdown of civic infrastructures for ones  basic physiological needs,unemployment, lack of proper governance and the lackadaisical attitudes of law enforcers at all levels. These ppl are suffering the same frustrations that  drove the niger delta youths to commit all sorts of dastardly acts.
My only regret is that these boko haram ppl chose a misguided way to channel their grievances. Obviously from the way they were able to withstand the police and military during the drawn out battles they seemed a  highly organized lot. The irony of it is that quite a number of these ppl were first and second degree holders with the potential to become able leaders in the future and the ability to make some great positive contribution to our society had the circumstances been different.
The police as always acted in an underhanded manner by summarily (albeit in a horrible way) dispatching Muhammad Yusuf to Barzakh after he was apprehended and handed over to them. I hope a panel of enquiry is set up to probe this. The danger of letting this matter die down is that it gives the police the wherewithal to begin to murder apprehended citizens and some of the citizens could well be just ordinary muslims without any sectional affiliations.

[Muhsin]

Assalamu alaikum,

R>I>P MY.

Did I sound supportive of his actions? I hope not. :D

You hope not that others will conclude that you support him. Well its glaringly obvious you sympathise with him at least. Lets hope u are not of the same vein as he, in yr views about western education.

Yeah, I sympathise with him and all the guys killed in the crises. And am more than certain you know my stand regarding the Western Education, don't you? lol ;D

[HUSNAA]

Lol Muhsin mu gudu ko mu tsaya? Kai ma dan Boko haram dinne? If so tell us what makes u guys tick.

[HUSNAA]

Like I said before the Nigerian security forces and intelligence community should be congratulated for not letting the situation become worse than what it is.  I find it interesting that when Nigeria falls under civilian rule religious fanaticism rears its ugly head.  But when Nigeria is under military rule, it appears the military is better and more prepared to confine religious fundamentalism.  Any comments?

That appears to be a correct observation. There is little or no bureaucracy where the military is concerned. An order is given and it is executed pronto. There is no file passing throu in and out trays to 'approve' a directive by an executive... no red tape in other words. That is why things get done a lot quicker under the military, especially when it involves some  blood letting (as this is the favorite pasttime of the military).

[Dave_McEwan_Hill]

No Husnaa, my contacts are not unreliable or inflamatory.
They are responsible and senior people.
They have no doubt that there is an appetite to enforce Sharia across the board and a blind eye is being turned to unconstitutional progress of this campaign.
If it continues it will destroy Nigeria.
Some will perhaps enjoy that. 
Others will have to make their minds up about whether they want a democratic Nigeria to survive in which people are free worship their God and make thir own moral judgements as they choose or instead have their lives completely controlled by religious zealots in a broken up and fragmented state .
Believe me, once religious zealots are swept to power they will take more and more control till eventually they control everything and destroy all who disagree with them. Many societies have been down this road before and it is an insidious process that starts with a few and eventually captures the many.

[HUSNAA]

Nevertheless Dave, I feel certain that your contacts are not muslims, and in so far as you will get a non muslim's opinion on Islam especially as it pertains to that hotpot Northern Nigeria in general, you will certainly get a lot of misgivings from yr contacts. You could also get yr information from what someone termed as coca cola muslims, i.e. thoroughly westernized and thoroughly ignorant (on matters of the religion itself) muslims, who chafe at  restrictions imposed by Islam on  lifestyle choices.
I suggest that you get friendly with one reknowned  respected and forward looking Sheikh, like Aminudeen Abubakar, or someone like that, who is both well versed in western and Islamic learning. That way you will get a better insight into the complexities of the Northern Nigerian communities. 

On the subject of religious zealotry, for as long as there will be social discontent and unrest engendered by ineffective governance, you will find ppl with extremist views who appeal to a section of the society simply because nothing concrete is getting done to improve the lot of  society's malcontents. If we could get legitimate governments in place and also get conscienscious ppl to run those  governments, the flames of religious fanaticism like the Boko Haram one just experienced, wont have a chance to flare.

[Dave_McEwan_Hill]

As you say and others have noted the social disintegration which is destroying the lives of poor Nigerians fuels much of the extremism.
I have a fairly decent grasp of the complexities of Northern Nigerian society and, believe me, my contacts are responsible moslems.

The fact remains however that the institution of Sharia law will destabilise Nigeria which is in no position to withstand any more destablisation.
If there is majority public support for Sharia law in parts of the north the Federation should be split. You cannot have two non complementary codes of law operating in the same political unit. If there is not majority support Sharia law should remain as a moral code which can be voluntarily followed by moslems who choose to do so.
This is what is happening in UK law where some aspects of sharia law (usually to do with marriage customs)are being accommodated in moslem communities who choose to follow it -but not in any area where it conflicts with UK law or affects the free rights of any person resident in UK

It is time for some serious thought about the long term implications of what is happening presently.

[usman11]

Nigeria on the brink
By The Times of London
FOUR days of violence in Nigeria have left hundreds dead, destroyed towns and villages across the north, brought the cold-blooded police shooting of an Islamist rabble-rouser and left the outside world horrified. Nigeria, with 140 million people, is Africa's largest country. It is also one of the most corrupt, unstable, unequal and fissiparous: in half a century of independence it has seen civil wars, separatist rebellions, military coups, ethnic vendettas and a terrible descent into virtual ungovernability. What happens in Nigeria matters not only to Africa: it affects the huge diaspora in Britain, distorts the oil market, drives international criminality and opens the gates to extremism and terrorism.
The latest violence comes after an uprising by a bizarre Islamist sect, Boko Haram, that urged followers in several northern states to attack police stations, prisons and churches and burn down schools in an attempt to enforce extreme Sharia and rid the country of all Western education. This is not the first such uprising in the north or the only time that militants, who model themselves on the Afghan Taleban, have clashed with federal authority. At least 10,000 people have been killed in sectarian clashes since the Government, attempting to appease the growing current of Islamic extremism after years of military dictatorship, allowed 12 of the northern states to proclaim Sharia. But President Yar'Adua now sees the very unity of Nigeria at stake. After a warning this week that the sect was preparing to unleash "holy war", he ordered troops to eradicate Boko Haram once and for all.
The order has been carried out with indiscriminate brutality. House-to-house searches, gun battles and helicopter searches have killed sect members in scores. Their leader, a university dropout with a violent agenda and views so benighted that he asserted the world was flat and rain was not caused by evaporation but by Allah, was caught in a goats' pen, and shot dead by police after begging for mercy. It is not only his followers who are outraged: many Nigerians and human rights activists have warned of inevitable reprisals and exacerbation of the nation's religious divide.
The uprising, however, is just a symptom of the social breakdown that has made Nigeria so prone to violence. Rampant corruption has undermined even the feeble central government efforts to tackle social inequality, failing health and education systems, the stinking detritus burying most big cities and widespread unemployment. The oil boom has only exacerbated corruption and inequality, and the dreadful conditions in the Niger Delta have spawned an endemic rebellion, regular kidnappings and crime syndicates that siphon off so much oil that total production is running at millions of barrels below capacity.
Into this maelstrom have stepped Islamist extremists. Al-Qaeda has identified Nigeria as fertile ground for its nihilist message, just as it saw Somalia, another failing African state, as a new base for its operations. It is swiftly spreading the jihadist message, exploiting the unease over Sharia by pushing for the most extremist interpretation and recruiting Nigerians as new agents to infiltrate Western society. This is extremely alarming. There is a large Nigerian community in most European countries, and an especially big one in Britain. Already there are fears that organised crime is exploiting the link to racketeering. If al-Qaeda can recruit sleepers among still largely moderate Muslims living in the West, the security services have a nightmare on their hands.
Nigerians are desperate to see better government in Abuja. The onus is now on President Yar'Adua to overcome doubts about his democratic legitimacy, grasp the urgency of Nigeria's situation and save a failing state before he is swept away by violence, despair or another coup.

    * This piece was published as an editorial in The Times of London on August 1.

[usman11]

Husnna,
I am not the fringe lunatic attacking police stations and innocent people while claiming that the earth is flat, and that rain comes directly from allah. Political correctness is a fallacy because it rationalizes this insanity that you and other broken record like you attempt to offer as a rational explanation when instance such as this occur. For years, Jihadist apologist like you and Muhsin have offered your irrational theories as to the true causes of these satanic outbursts from many of your cousins from the north. I hope you are not offended by my commentary. They say the truth is unpleasant, but hey, it needs to be told.
Islamic radicalism is a northern problem. You people make all the excuses in the World, but have never owned up to the problem. This is your problem and it is also Islam's problem. I think you all should take responsibility for once, and deal with this problem rather than deceiving yourselves by inventing all kinds of fairy tales about the causes of Islamic extremism in your neck of the woods. The sooner you all grab the bull by the horn and see this scourge for what it really is, the better for you.
These terrorists were poised to attack innocent non Muslims as they always do. Obviously, being crazy does multiple numbers on people's head. Rather than attack innocent and unarmed citizens as previously done, they chose instead to take on law enforcement first. Yea! Madness has a way of twisting one's sense of reason. I'm surprised you all didn't blame this on Israel.  ::)

[HUSNAA]

Husnna,
I am not the fringe lunatic attacking police stations and innocent people while claiming that the earth is flat, and that rain comes directly from allah. Political correctness is a fallacy because it rationalizes this insanity that you and other broken record like you attempt to offer as a rational explanation when instance such as this occur. For years, Jihadist apologist like you and Muhsin have offered your irrational theories as to the true causes of these satanic outbursts from many of your cousins from the north. I hope you are not offended by my commentary. They say the truth is unpleasant, but hey, it needs to be told.
Islamic radicalism is a northern problem. You people make all the excuses in the World, but have never owned up to the problem. This is your problem and it is also Islam's problem. I think you all should take responsibility for once, and deal with this problem rather than deceiving yourselves by inventing all kinds of fairy tales about the causes of Islamic extremism in your neck of the woods. The sooner you all grab the bull by the horn and see this scourge for what it really is, the better for you.
These terrorists were poised to attack innocent non Muslims as they always do. Obviously, being crazy does multiple numbers on people's head. Rather than attack innocent and unarmed citizens as previously done, they chose instead to take on law enforcement first. Yea! Madness has a way of twisting one's sense of reason. I'm surprised you all didn't blame this on Israel.  ::)

No I am not offended, because your commentaries are nothing but wild allegations and I have noticed that you are incapable of making cool rational dispassionate and objective comments where Islam is concerned, so you will always react like this and let yr temper get the better of you. Unfortunately this is a failing and a weakness which you must try and overcome. As for me I try to regulate my adrenaline rushes when you go overboard in yr views on Islam, so I am not offended.