With continued attacks against Christians in the North, Nigerians wonder if the country will ever grow beyond religious violence. Reporter HENRY ODUAH collates their views.
Although Ramadan is a period when Muslims are supposed to show goodwill, mercy, forgiveness, kindness, and share love with people around them, hardliners demonstrate their lack of understanding and attack others for what they term ‘blasphemy’ against Muhammad.
Bridget Agbahime, 74, was mobbed and killed on June 2 in Kofar Wambai Market in the Northern commercial hub of Kano after she prevented a Muslim from performing ablution in front of her shop.
In Kakuri, Kaduna State, perhaps motivated by the slaying of the septuagenarian in neighboruing Kano, another Christian was attacked on June 8 for not observing Ramadan fast.
Francis Emmanuel, 41, a carpenter, received several deep machete cuts in the attack and was taken to St. Gerald’s Catholic Hospital.
Ignorance, overzealousness
Emmanuel narrated to reporters that “I went to buy wood to do some work. When I came back I bought food to eat. As I was eating about six Hausa boys came and asked me whether I am a Muslim or a Christian. I did not answer them.
“They asked why I am not fasting. I told them that I am not a Muslim.
“Before I knew it, one of them slapped me. As I stood up, the rest came and surrounded me and started attacking me with knives. I don’t know them.
“Nobody could come to my aid because of the type of dangerous knives they were carrying. They used machetes, scissors and knives on me. I became unconscious, I don’t even know who brought me to the hospital.”
Michael Igwe, a pastor in the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Gombe Province, blamed the attack on overzealous Muslims.
“Usually it is the overzealousness of some of the adherents of Islam. Sometimes it could be due to ignorance. When people are ignorant of the laws of the land, they may want to take laws into their own hands,” he explained.
“I think Christians have done the right thing; they showed understanding in handling the case. The action of the government helped a lot to calm nerves because some would have gone to retaliate.”
Igwe praised the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) for handling the case without instigating counter-attacks.
“CAN and other groups handled the case maturely. That should be the case with Christians. When such thing happens you demonstrate love.”
He believes the law must be upheld for fanatics to learn that Nigeria is a secular state.
“In a democratic nation like Nigeria, there is freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of religion. Nobody should be forced into any religion.
“When you meet knowledgeable Muslims, they understand that violence is never a tool of Islam.”
Another Pastor in the province, Paul Bambe, recounted the ordeal of another woman in Gombe who lost her life to religious violence.
“There was a woman killed that way too. Her husband was from down South and was working in the Specialist Hospital, Gombe. When he got married, he brought his wife to Gombe.
“She started teaching in Government Secondary School, Gandu. While teaching there, there was a time during exam and some of the children were hiding ‘chips’ in their Qu’ran.
“She tried to find out what was happening after spotting a female student looking into the Qu’ran.
“Suddenly they raised an alarm that she tore the Qu’ran, the school went haywire, fanatics came from outside, dragged her and burnt her alive claiming she desecrated the Qu’ran.”
Solidarity visits
Governors Nasir el-Rufai (Kaduna) and Abdullahi Ganduje (Kano) displayed gallantry and solidarity in their visits to the victims, but it is questionable if such visits can send a No message to Muslims who attack Christians.
Such maddening acts lend justification to El-Rufai’s contentious anti-religious bill.
The Qur’an
Sura 5, ayat 33 in the Qur’an says: “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter.”
The Bible
The Old Testament instituted death penalty for some category of sins (crimes), and those who blaspheme God were punished with death by stoning.
“Two men, scoundrels, came in and sat before him; and the scoundrels witnessed against him, against Naboth, in the presence of the people, saying, ‘Naboth has blasphemed God and the king!’ Then they took him outside the city and stoned him with stones, so that he died” (1 Kings 21:13 NKJV).
However, Jesus Christ abolished the death penalty in the New Testament because this is His dispensation of grace, not revenge. “To him who strikes you on the one cheek, offer the other also” (Luke 6:29 NKJV).
Old Testament: “He that kills any man shall surely be put to death. And he that kills an animal shall make it good; animal for animal. And if a man causes a disfigurement in his neighbor; as he has done, so shall it be done to him; Fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth: as he has caused a disfigurement in a man, so shall it be done to him again. And he that kills an animal, he shall restore it: and he that kills a man, he shall be put to death” (Leviticus 24:17-21 KJV2000).
New Testament: “You have heard that it has been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That you resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue you at the law, and take away your coat, let him have your cloak also” (Matthew 5:38-40 KJV2000).
Old Testament: “The man who commits adultery with another man’s wife, he who commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress, shall surely be put to death” (Leviticus 20:10 NKJV). “You shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones” (Deuteronomy 22:24 NKJV).
New Testament: When a woman caught in adultery was brought before Jesus Christ, her accusers reiterated that the Old Testament law demanded that she be stoned to death. Jesus Christ told them, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first” (John 8:7 NKJV).
He stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger. All the accusers went away, one by one.
“When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, ‘Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said to her, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more’” (John 8:10-11 NKJV).
In the Old Testament, the sin of adultery attracted immediate capital punishment for both the man and the woman, without room for repentance and forgiveness.
In the New Testament, however, Jesus Christ saw that the woman caught in adultery repented in her heart and told her to “go and sin no more” (John 8:11 NKJV).
By this, Jesus Christ abolishes instant capital punishment in New Testament, giving sinners (or criminals in civil society) the opportunity to repent in this dispensation of grace.
If sinners fail to repent, they will still die – but naturally
What it means is that, in the New Testament, someone who commits crime deserving the death penalty is to be tried in the court of law and sent to jail, “the cities of refuge” (Numbers 35:11-28 NKJV), to repent.
If a sinner or criminal does not repent in prison, or after serving out a jail term (exhausting the grace period), he or she will still face the death penalty in the end and go to hell, but it will be through a natural death, not one effected by fellow man.
The Old Testament law repaid evil for evil. But the New Testament says, “See that none render evil for evil unto any man; but ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves, and to all men” (1 Thessalonians 5:15 KJV2000). “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse …. Repay no one evil for evil” (Romans 12:14, 17 NKJV).
Response from Aso Rock
A statement issued by President Muhammadu Buhari’s Media Adviser, Femi Adeshina, expressed the president’s condolences with Bridget Agbahime’s husband, Mike, who is a pastor.
“The incident at Kofar Wambai Market, Kano city, is utterly condemnable, and the state government has been quite proactive.
“When law and order breaks down, those who become victims are never distinguished on the basis of religion or ethnicity.
“Let us ensure that we keep the peace, as justice will be done. Let us learn to respect each other’s faith, so that we can know each other and live together in peace,” the statement read.
CAN vocal against killings
Although the Presidency has shown interest in the case by declaring that the slain would get justice, many warn of the religious volatility in the country.
The killing pegged on blasphemy and non-observance of Ramadan has formed bad blood among religious leaders in the North and beyond. CAN is very vocal on the killing of Christians.
After a meeting with Southern Nigeria Christian Elders’ Forum, CAN South East urged Northern governors to protect lives and property in their domain regardless of religious or ethnic differences.
“How can Christians be treated like cows and goats in the Northern part of Nigeria with impunity while we claim that Nigeria is a secular state?” the group wondered in a communique issued after the meeting.
“This is a sign of total Islamisation of Nigeria, which is very dangerous to the corporate existence of the entity called Nigeria.
“The beheading of Bridget in Kano and the murder attempt on Emmanuel in Kaduna should be the first and last of such because no one man or section has the monopoly of violence and we must do everything to stop such from reoccurring.
“All the Muslims in the South should as a matter of urgency speak to their people in the North to desist, because if the killings continue, it will affect everybody both in the North and in the South.
“If God has brought us together, then let us live in unity.
“We call for adequate compensation for the lives lost and the medical bills of Francis Emmanuel be paid fully by the state governments involved.”
Religious intolerance
Legal practitioners argued that Agbahime had the right to allow or refuse whatever would be done around her place of livelihood irrespective of religious observances. Analysts said Emmanuel was attacked because of religious intolerance since he has a Christian name and by virtue of that has nothing to do with Ramadan.
Amid calls for the arrest and prosecution of the perpetrators, some wonder if Muslim leaders bother to re-orient their members to shun violence.
Teaching against violence would help tackle the problem at the root instead of the fire brigade approach of arrest and prosecution.
