Liberal Democratization: A Process of De-Islamization, the Debate Continues a Response to Dr. Christopher Enakpene

By

Abdul – razaq Ibrahim Fagge

abdulrazaq_ibrahim@yahoo.com

On September 15, 2005, I received an E-mail with a letter titled; what Nigeria need is political reformation and revolution, from Dr. Christopher Enakpene. This followed the previous publication of my article titled; Liberal Democratization; a process of de-Islamization. The article was published on Gamji web site www.gamji.com and is presently in archive 58 in the same web page.

Firstly, I decided not even to write a reply to Dr. Christopher because, he did not only failed to understand the simple language used in the article, but ended up making some observations and comments that are quite parallel to the article’s view point.

The article sees the Western Liberation and democratization as multi-dimensional process involving forceful imposition and legalization of interest (usury), political crusade and to a large extent strategic de-islamization of the world at large. Thus, the clamour for democracy is a clamour for “usuri-cracy”. But, since usury has been denounced by almost every major spiritual leader or religion (Islam and Christianity inclusive) and philosophers of the past three thousand years including both Plato and Aristotle as well as the ancient Greek and Roman laws. The Liberalists had no other idea but the separation of polity from moral code (secularism) which was designed to protect and support the “usurious” Jewish dominated western industrialist interest so much so that they may continuously marginalizing, monopolizing and to a great extent controlling the world Economies, since investment was made to be heavily dependent on the rate of interest (usury).

As a result of such separation, the idea of interest (usury) on money being just and lawful was put forward. There from, usury laws become state laws that specify the maximum legal interest rate at which loans can be made in the economy. In this process, several Islamic laws were violated. To make things even worse, there is the ongoing attempt at imposing alien western and anti-Islamic values on the Nigerians with no regard to our beliefs and religious difference. For instance the attempt at putting in to law, the new bill for inheritance that when putting into law, will equalized the share of the male heir to that of his female counterpart among others.

It was in this connection that the paper called for, specifically, Muslims to be very curious and careful in accepting any none clearly defined western concept and were advised to adhere to the Qur’anic Teachings and the Authentic Traditions of the prophet Muhammad (S.A.W), and not to follow, either consciously or unconsciously, the anti-Islamic Teachings of the west.

But, whether you (Dr. Christopher) misconceived the paper or deliberately decided to deviate from the above fact. I later observed that your letter was full of logical questions and statements that require deserving response. These will be tackled one after another, here under.

Question 1:

Since I was born, there has been practice of the Islamic legal code in most Northern Nigerian states, yet that has neither transformed the people positively nor eliminated stealing, immorality, poverty and oppression of the under privilege people. How many governors from the states where shariah is being practiced have had their hands amputated?

Response:

Since the inception of the first republic, economic blackmail was used to reduce the shariah to personal status only and that the Christian inspired penal code replaced the abridged shariah criminal law in Northern Nigeria. This was acknowledged by the Sardauna when he stated that foreign investment may not be forthcoming without the implementation of legal “reform” that ensured the institutionalization of the Christian inspired penal code when he stated:

Honourable members will be aware that some of the features of the legal and judicial system of the region have provoked criticism not only in Nigeria but also in the United Kingdom and other parts of the world. Honourable members will appreciate that our future prosperity as a region will largely depend upon the confidence, which the world at large places in the probity of our institutions and especially in the courts and system of law, which they administer. If there is any lack of confidence the result will inevitably be that we shall fail to obtain foreign capital and investment that we need in order to expand our economy and develop our social services.

However, since then, Nigerians in general have been left with their eyes wide opened, looking forward, and waiting for the arrival of the desired foreign capital and investment. Even the so-called foreign firms that are operating presently in the economy are mainly mobilizing finance from our local financial institutions not through a direct foreign investment or transfer of capital. All the same, many colonial officials had acknowledged shariah on account of its effectiveness since the colonial era.

Clapper ton, the European spy who was sent on surveillance mission acknowledged the efficacy of shariah in the former Sokoto caliphate when he wrote that:

The laws of the Qur’an were in his (Bello’s) time so strictly put in force…that the whole country when not in a state of war, was so well regulated that it is common saying that a woman might travel with a casket of gold upon her head from one end of the fellata dominions to the other.

Palmer, one of the colonial officers also, acknowledged the effectiveness of the shariah before the colonial intervention when he stated that:

It is lamentably impossible to deny that in Hausa land the incident of crimes, notably theft, murder, robbery and burglary has grown worse instead of better since British occupation.

Another British commentator summarized the state of the caliphate before its incorporation in to the British Empire, thus:

The area, which was brought under British protections, was the scene of the most effectively organized system of indigenous rule to be found south of the Sahara. Most of the old-established Hausa kingdoms had embraced Islamic faith, and under its influence there had by the sixteenth century developed a well-organized fiscal system, a definite code of land-tenure, a regular scheme of local rule through appointed District Heads, and a trained judiciary administrating tenets of the Mohammedan (Islamic) law.

As such, no governor’s hand will be amputated because this so-called shariah unlike that of the then Sokoto caliphate is more of politics than religious and is heavily deficient of the economic system that is base on the Islamic principles.

Question 2:

Are you saying that they are not stealing our money to marry plenty wives and send their children to the best schools in the western countries?

Response:

No. But the paper was not prepared to talk on the mere symptoms of the problem; it digs into its genesis and the root-courses. Ok?

Question 3:

Last time I was in London, I ran in to 2 of Buhari’s children in London enjoying all the comforts and goodies from a western country. What are they doing there? If everything about western country is evil. Why didn’t he send them to Iran or Saudi-Arabia to learn Islamic education rather than the western education?

Response:

I think, the Buhari or the Buhari’s children you have seen in London enjoying all the comforts and goodies from a western country will best answer these questions. So, kindly have a time to ask them such questions, I am sure they may have something to offer.

Question 4:

Atiku has stolen Nigeria’s money to buy mansion in Maryland, U.S.A. has his land been amputated?

Response:

The hand of the V.P may not have been amputated and would not, because your liberal democracy, which is in operation, is against such a divine punishment. Remember, who ever say education (Islam) is to expensive (harsh) let him try ignorance (liberalism)

Question 5:

Tell me, which country practicing shariah is enjoying peace presently anywhere in the world?

Response:

Against the western claim that Islamic fundamentalism feeds terrorism, one powerful paradox of the twenty first century is often overlooked. Thus, while Islam may be accused of generating more political violence than western culture, western culture generates more street violence than Islam. Islam indeed, does produce a disproportionate share of mujahideen, but western culture produces a disproportionate share of muggers. The largest Muslim city in Africa is Cairo. The largest westernized city is Johannesburg. Cairo is much more populace than Johannesburg, but street violence is only a fraction of what it is in the South-African city. Didn’t Islam help restore relative peace in Cairo?

In terms of quality of life, is the average citizen better off under the excesses of the Islamic state or the excesses of the liberal state, where political tension may be low but social violence has reached crisis proportion? Studies have shown that, Tehran, the capital city of the Islamic Republic of Iran, is a city of some ten millions where families with children picnic in public parks at 11:00 p.m. or midnight. Residents of the capital and other cities stroll late at night, seemingly unafraid of mugging, rape or murder. This is a society that has known large-scale political violence in war and revolution, but one in which petty inter-personal violence is much rare than in Washington, New York, Johannesburg, Lagos and many other western or westernized cities.

Question 6:

By the way, what good has the Islamic Nations brought to the world other than constituting themselves as terrorist group?

Response:

Westerners and western oriented people, like you, tend to think of Islamic societies as backward – looking, oppressed by religion and inhumanely governed, comparing them to your own secular democracies. But, you failed to understand that measurement of cultural distance between Islam and west is a complex undertaking, simply because Islam is not just a religion and certainly not just a fundamentalist political movement. It is a civilization and a way of life and far more humane than most westerners realize. What is to be considered here, therefore, is what path leads to the highest quality of life of the average citizen while avoiding the worst abuses.

Thus, Islam is often criticized, by people like you, for not producing the best, but seldom congratulated by wise, civilized and objective thinkers, for an ethic that has averted the worst. In other words, cultures should be judged not merely by the heights of achievement to which they have ascended but the depths of brutality to which they have descended. In the twentieth century, for example, Islam has not often proved fertile ground for democracy and its virtues. On the other hand, Islamic culture has not been hospitable to nazism, fascism or communism, unlike the Christian culture (as in Germany, Italy, Russia and Czechoslovakia), the Buddhist culture (in Japan before and during world war II, Pol pot’s Cambodia, Vietnam, North Korea), or Confucian culture (as in Mao’s China).

Terrorism, however, is another complex undertaking. For instance, if we take a terrorist to be a person who causes terror, the way a robber is terrified when he sees a policeman, we may say, the policeman is terrorist to the robber. Similarly, every Muslim should be a terrorist for the anti-social element of the society, such as the thieves, rapists, murderers, and burglars. Whenever such an anti-social element sees a Muslim, he should be terrified. This in essence, defined the position of any person; I mean any, who call Muslims as terrorists. In fact, a Muslim should be a source of peace for the common innocent people.

 The word Islam is derived from the Arabic word ‘salam’ which means peace. It is a religion of peace whose fundamentals teach its followers to maintain and promote peace throughout the world. Thus, every Muslim should be a fundamentalist; he should follow the fundamentals of the religion of peace; Islam. He should be a terrorist only towards the anti-social elements in order to promote peace and justice in the society.

 

Contrary to the western view of terrorism, the way they associated it with Islam. Terrorism and all evils are in the DNA of the western culture. No one out of the two disastrous World wars was initiated or sourced by a Muslim or Islamic Nation. Colonialism with all its evils and exploitative tendencies was a product of western culture. The guns, bombs, atomic and nuclear missiles as well as most if not all explosives were innovated and developed out of terrorism and destructive elements associated with the western culture. A war is to the American government what oil is to the Nigerian government, i.e. one  major source of revenue; it has become an American tradition to plan an attack on its interest, people or property in order to justify a prepared and a planned war.

James Bomfard in his book, on the National Security Agency, Body of secrets; Anatomy of the ultra-secret National Security Agency, released in late spring of the year 2001. He concluded that, the joint chiefs of staff “proposed launching a secret and bloody war of terrorism against their own country in order to trick the American public in to supporting an ill-conceived war they intended to launch against Cuba” in the early 1960s.

Moreover, the incidence that happened on December 7/ 1941 at Pearl Harbor that led to the death of over 2, 403 Americans was not an accident, but the will of the American government to win the support of the American public to engage in the Second World War. The attack was planned after the previous protest against the war. Such an attack, however, solve the president F.D Roosevelt’s most pressing problem as immediately after the attack he received overwhelming support when he asked the congress for a declaration of war against Japan.

Robert B. Stinnett in his book “Day of Deceit”; the truth about F.D Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor exposed the long hidden evidence that shatters every secret of Pearl Harbor. It shows that not only was the attack expected, it was deliberately provoked through an eight-step program devised by the American Navy.

On June 8, 1967 another terrorist attack was carried out by the Israeli military in collaboration with the U.S. government on the U.S.S. Liberty. In 1979, Lt. Com. James Ennes, Jr., a member of the Liberty crew, wrote the first book on the subject. “Assault on the Liberty: The True story of the Israeli Attack on an American intelligence.”

The 1998 Oklahoma city bombing which led to the death of no less than 168 persons, was not carried out by the Muslims or Islamic Nation, but a westerner, Timothy Mcveigh and that it was deliberately allowed to happened, as such the then Clinton administration used it to force the congress to enact anti-terrorist legislation. One may ask, who really are these terrorists?

It should be noted that, the possibility of the entire 112-story building (W.T.C.) to have collapsed the way it did, on September 11, 2001, with just an impact of a single plane is in itself doubtful. Aaron Swirsky, one of the architects who designed the World Trade Center, has expressed his doubt when he said that, we designed the towers to withstand something like a plane flying into the side. One eye witness whose office is near the WTC told AFP that he was standing among a crowd of people about two – and – a half blocks from the south tower, when he saw a number of brief light sources being emitted from inside the building between floors 10 and 15. He saw about six of these brief flashes accompanied by a cracking sound before the tower collapsed.

Lovie Cacchioli, one of the first firefighters in the stricken second tower, told weekly on Sept. 24, 2001:

“I was taking firefighters up in the elevator to the 24th floor to get in position to evacuate workers. On the last trip up a bomb went off. We think there were bombs set in the building.”

Thus, it was clearly proved that the world Trade Center finally collapsed with the help of bombs that have been planted at strategic locations in various parts of the building, which were only to have detonated after the plane had struck.

Some well-documented evidences, further, proved that some of the alleged hijacked listed by F. B. I. Were still alive after the sep. 11, 2001 incidence. Among whom were, a Saudi-national Waheed Al-Shehri (flight 11), Abdul-Aziz Al-Omari (flight 11), Salem Al-Hazmi (flight 77), and Saeed Al-Ghamdi (flight 93), among others.

Question 7:

We seem to be anti-west forgetting that we are all consumers of the products that come from the west, but not from the so-called Islamic nation. All the wealth that is abound in Saudi-Arabia for closed to 5 decades, name any of your cars or even your bath-tub that is manufactured from there?

Response:

Well, it is very unwise to say I am anti-west, but I must tell you that I am anti-western imperialism. The statement that, we are consumers of western products is in itself lopsided, because while we consume hi-tech industrial products from the west, they in turn consume primary mineral and agricultural products from the third world countries, the Muslims nations inclusive. This was made possible with the help of restrictive polices imposed on the international Transfer of Technology in favour of the west and the unjust and unequal international division of labour in its favour.

A number of studies have shown and unveiled the exploitative nature of this division of labour and of its terms of trade. For instance, as a result of direct U.S. overseas investment between 1950 and 1965, there was a net capital flow of $16 billion to the united state. Also according to De’souza and porter, for the years 1950 – 1965 the united state repatriated from the under-developed countries nearly three times, as much money as was invested.

Further, Britain enjoyed a trade balance of over £1 billion trading with Nigeria alone in 1980, West Africa No 3321, 1980. Raul Prebisch, in his study, collecting data from 1870-1936 has discovered that the terms of trade between U.K and its trading partners had improved in U.K by over 30% while that of its trading partners in the less developed countries have depreciated by over 35%. He further concluded that during the world wars, the Latin American economies recorded the highest economic growth ever, while the west was busy at war.

These unfavourable terms of trade did not only discouraged trade between the west and the third world nations, but led to the redirection from western oriented consumption to a consumption pattern that is mainly domestic to the third world nations. It is not surprising that, most of the consumer electronics we use today are not western, but products of the Asian Tigers, China, Japan and the South – East Asia including Indonesia and Malaysia, hence, two Muslim – majority countries. Motorcycles are mainly coming from China, S. Korea, and Japan. One of the most qualitative tyres now consume is Yazid, importing from Iran. Textiles materials are mainly from Indonesia, Malaysia, Chine, India and Pakistan.

Question 8:

How many of us can religion put food on our tables?

Response:

Religion put food not only on our tables, but in to our mouths. God has bestowed upon man, natural wealth sufficient enough for the satisfaction of his wants and needs;

Allah it is He who created the heavens and the earth, and sent down out of heaven water wherewith He brought forth fruits to be your sustenance. And He subjected to you the ships to run upon the sea at His commandment; and He subjected to you the rivers and He subjected to you the sun and moon constant upon their courses, and He subjected to you the night and the day, and gave you of all you asked Him. If you count Allah’s blessing, you will never number it, surely man is sinful, unthankful! Qur’an 14: 32 – 34.

These holy verses after exhibiting the sources of wealth which Allah has bestowed upon man, have gone further to have indicated that the actual difficulty did not arose from the niggardness of nature or its inability in responding to man’s needs; But, due to the man’s injustice as regard to the distribution of wealth and his ungratefulness in respect of gifts of Allah. The two paired reasons for the life, which the miserable man (Nigerians inclusive), has been living ever since the remotest ages of History.

Question 9:

Why don’t we leave God to fight for himself than indulging in uncivilized and barbaric method of imposing unpopular religion on people? You do not need to fight for people to accept what is good for them.

Response:

We must not leave God to indulge our selves in uncivilized and barbaric western values. We are Muslims and duty bound to act according to the dictates of our creator. It has never been our intention to impose our belief on any body. In fact, such an action is against Islamic provision;

Let there be no compulsion in religion. Truth stands out clear from Error; whoever rejects Tagut and believes in Allah hath grasped the trustworthiest hand – hold, which never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things. Qur’an 2:256

But, because we exist in a plural country, co-existing with the adherents of other religions than ours does not mean that we should do away with what we believe in order to live peacefully with those that have different beliefs. We are duty bound to live as Muslims, to act as Muslims and to be governed by the Islamic principles, laws and systems.

Therefore, for some one to say we should live together with people of different beliefs while keeping our belief system aside is imposing the will of the minority on us. Thus, the erroneous but widely spread rumor that we Muslims are trying to turn Nigeria in to an Islamic Nation is not true. All we are saying is that the system should not temper with or restrict our value system, thus the Muslims should be allowed to use Islamic principles in the governance of Muslim Ummah (people) and Qur’an must be accepted as the ultimate and supreme sources of jurisdiction to all Muslims.

Question 10:

In 6 years of imposing shariah on the people, are these states better than others?

Response:

I don’t think there is a state, presently in Nigeria, where shari’ah is being practicing because, as I have said earlier in this paper, right from the first republic economic blackmail was used to reduce the shari’ah to personal levels and Christian inspired penal code replaced the abridged Shari’ah criminal law in all parts of Northern Nigeria. Let not the works of politicians who use religion to maintain their status quo and win the hearts of voters deceive us. Thus, there was no historical epoch where the Islamic shariah (legal system) operated, the way it is, under a liberal constitution, because Qur’an deserves the supremacy, which the liberal constitution claims. I must tell you that Islam is not just a religion or legal system. It is a way of life with social, political and economic systems that are quite different from that of liberalism.

Malam Ibrahim Yaquob El-Zakzaky, the leader of Islamic movement in Nigeria, when asked, what can you say about the recent development in Zamfara and other Northern states in their quest to install shari’ah? He said and I quote, “My view is that these happenings in Zamfara, Kebbi and Katsina states; are signs of growing awareness on the part of those elected to at least address some of the yearnings and aspirations of those who elected them. We may say this is a good development but it is far from reaching the desired goal because, Islam as a belief system has its own ways and methods, and you know methods have to be followed strictly.” Nigerian OUT-LOOK, THE HARD TRUTH, No 28 October 18, 1999.

            Christopher:

Any way, I think it is because there is oil in Nigeria that is bringing all these insults. Let the oil get dried today or the Niger – Delta decided to part their ways, people like you will be the first to come and condemn our leaders who are stashing our money in foreign banks. If the country breaks up, which is just around the corner except people like you stop fuelling the already ignited flame, it is the so – called Muslim states that will bear the most brunt perhaps for a century until something dramatic start milking in their land.

Response:

One thing that you don’t know and even the oil – endowed, not oil – producing areas because they don’t produce oil or contribute to its production, is that the cost of earning oil is very high, so the net is very minimal. According to Prof. Sam Aluko, if Nigeria earns $ 25 per barrel, the net value accruing to it is about $ 15 before oil – industry – related expenses. The professor stated, however, that after meeting the cash call commitments to oil firms, the government is left with only about $ 6 per barrel. These commitments, he said, include purchase of the oil firm’s equipments, high cost of maintenance of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), 28 depots and four refineries. Thus, if you look at it, we get more money on customs, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and some other company taxes than we get from oil. He further argued that, the total Gross of oil contributes only 12 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) the wealth of Nigeria. He also stated that in comparism, agriculture alone accounts for 42 percent. That is an amount equivalent to 3 ½ times that of oil.

It is also pertinent to note that, oil deposit is not peculiar to south – south in Nigeria. Many Northerners have been accusing the government and oil firms of ignoring the potentials of their mainly – Muslim religion which borders on oil containing areas of Chad and Niger, and thus of excluding them from the Nigeria’s successful export business. As such, in September 2005, a firm, known as New Nigeria Development Company (NNDC), set up by the 19 Northern States has signed a US $134 million deal with a South African firm, Energem Petroleum Corporation, to buy the exploration rights to two oil blocks in the basin of the Benue river and two in the lake Chad region. “NNDC signed a US $ 134 million agreement for oil exploration in the Chad basin and Benue Trough which geophysics and geologic surveys have indicated are replete with oil and gas deposits.” NNDC Deputy Managing Director, Mohammad Auwal Haruna said.

Another important mineral deposit discovered in the Cross River and five Northern states is the radioactive ore. According to the document titled, “An inventory of solid mineral potentials” made available in Abuja in October 2005, the uranium found was by the Atomic Energy Division of the Geological surveys of Great Britain. Ministry sources said; the highly sourced and priced radioactive mineral could be second to oil in revenue generation when fully exploited.

According to studies, not many countries of the world are endowed with the radioactive mineral, which makes it highly priced. The mineral was first discovered in the Riruai Hills in Kano and in Kigo Hills near Dorawa on the Jos Plateau in 1947. The six states are Cross – River, Adamawa, Taraba, Plateau, Bauchi and Kano, a document from the Federal Ministry of Solid Mineral Development has said.

Note, all these are discovered in the presence of the Niger – Delta’s oil and earlier than the Niger – Deltas started thinking of parting away. Therefore, it is your state or geo – political zone that will bear the most brunt, may be till the next millennium, if the Niger – Delta’s oil get dried up or if they decided to part their way.

For your information, all these discoveries are in addition to the agricultural potentials of the Muslim majority north, which during its time, and prior to oil discovery, Nigerians were economically, better – up. And that in terms of net revenue it still contributes more than oil to the Nigeria’s GDP, Prof. Sam Aluko 1999.

Question 11:

What else does a country need when she is already flouting her own currency?

Response:

A number of socio – economic and political systems have been tested and condemned in Nigeria. Parliamentary democratic system was tested and threw away since the collapsed of the first republic. Presidential democratic system has been in progression, in every sphere of civil rule since the inception of the second republic. Buhari’s administration with all its inherent socialist ideology was strongly criticized and shortly toppled by another capitalist regime. Since then, capitalism has been on the increase to wipe out the fake and confused mixed – economy.

However, over a decade or two, capitalism has failed to yield the desired result, with the fact that, in terms of state ownership of assets, Nigeria is more a capitalist economy than the US. Instead, the country’s resources are constantly dwindling in financing unproductive projects and to a large extent, through diversion to personal accounts. Problems of the people are daily multiplying, unemployment has been on the increase, inflation keeps skyrocketing and Naira is continuously devaluating along with its purchasing power in and out side the economy. What a system made Nigeria, with all its agricultural potentials, mineral endowment and abundant labour, 19th in the poverty ranking.

Each problem, they say, has its solution. Only that, some may not know its where about. Thus, it is possible to overcome the difficulty by the explanation of it on the human basis and putting to an end to injustice and ingratitude through creation of equitable relations of distribution and the mobilization of all the material forces for the fructification of nature and the uncovering of all its treasures. Shouldn’t we try Islamic economic system? It is not the only, but the best alternative.