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The "True Believers" and Anti-Intellectualism: The Opportunistic Roots of Neo-fundamentalist Criticism

Sanusi Lamido Sanusi

[LAGOS]

January 29, 2002

Those who have unilaterally appropriated the right to define Islam and appointed themselves its spokespersons have of recent resorted to the tiresome habit of labeling those who oppose their own views "enemies of Islam" or "enemies of Shariah". Some do this in published articles. Others climb pulpits and make pronouncements in mosques. Others write hate mail and anonymous letters of threat. This of course is to be expected since, as Edward Said has noted, the whole process of Islamic revival often takes the form of a contest within Islam over its meaning in the lived reality of adherents. For me, this search for meaning antedated jamboree-like "launchings" of shariah in multiple locations in northern Nigeria.

An understanding of certain points is critical to anyone interested in intellectual discourse on Islam and Nigerian Society. Nigerian people, including Muslims, live a material reality of poverty and underdevelopment resulting from actions of commission and omission attributable to those who over the years have been responsible for the management of the stupendous resources made available by God for use in the betterment of conditions in our country. The concept of Islam as an alternative to this system means to some of us the creation of a society that is radically transformed and the restoration of good governance and responsible leadership along Islamic lines. This means a radical challenge to existing structures and systems and a people-centred, as opposed to an elite-centred political outlook. Islamisation is not about retaining all the structures of alienation in the political economy while introducing a stiff code. This is what Nazih Ayubi identified as the Saudi or Wahhabi model, a model which limits Islam to disputations on theology ( usually in the form of attacks on Ash'arism), worship (usually in the form of attacks on sufism and all forms of Islamic mysticism) and jurisprudence (usually in the form of attacks on adherence to schools of Law). In reality, Islamisation becomes a transformation of Nigerian society into the Saudi model as established by the House of Saud- the wholesale adoption of the teachings of Wahhabi Islam. The only difference is that while in Saudi Arabia, Islam is welfare plus shariah, in Nigeria it is poverty and unemployment plus shariah. In both cases, Muslims are expected to accept the antinomies and contradictions of their social formation as God-given and natural. It is precisely this conception of Islam as an ahistorical, amaterialist world view that I oppose. The debate between me and the professional mallams who have become ideologues for our corrupt politicians is therefore not so much over the principle of shariah as over its definition.

In late 1998, before the elections which brought the civilian government into power, I published an article entitled "Islam, Christianity and Nigerian Politics: A Tribute to Thomas Paine." In that article I set out what I believe was the clearest statement of my conception of shariah in the Nigerian political economy. In the course of a detailed critique of the northern elite who were fanning the embers of religious discord in the name of shariah I wrote:

"It is a fact for instance, that the second Caliph; Umar, stopped the punishment of the thief by cutting-off the hand in a year of famine due to the possibility of the thief having been compelled to steal due to hunger. What this means is that in a time of economic austerity such as ours, true proponents of the Shariah should address themselves to the question of proper economic management and a return to economic prosperity, as only then will the objective economic conditions be in place that will justify implementation of the law. By downplaying massive corruption and economic mismanagement, it has become possible for Muslim elite to engage in diversionary propaganda and express a hypocritical commitment to Shariah while impacting on objective conditions in a manner that would make the implementation of Shariah, even where adopted, improbable and unjustifiable. Full application of Shariah succeeds, rather than precedes, the creation of its objective conditions. It is the irony of our political situation that in the Vanguard of those calling for full implementation of Shariah we find some who have over the years condoned, rationalized, encouraged, initiated, participated in or benefited from the very processes whose logical culmination is the total negation of the said objective conditions. "

When in 1999 governor Sani Yarima of Zamfara came out to announce his plans for the Shariah project, I wrote several articles defending him against attacks mainly from what we call the Lagos-Ibadan press. A particularly strong article was titled "The Shariah Debate: A Muslim Intervention" and published by both The Guardian and Weekly Trust. In this article I took up Yarima's critics and defended his decision to introduce shariah. However I also stated the basis of my support in the following concluding words:

"It is time for the Guardian to listen to the Zamfara state government. It is time to know that the Quar’an and sunnah enjoin the creation of a just and honest society, and protect freedom of religion and conscience. It is time to ask those who feel there are legal problems to go to a court of competent jurisdiction. Alhaji Ahmed Sani has repeatedly said his priority is good government, education, poverty alleviation and moral rebirth. He has assured non –Muslims of the full protection of their rights. He has never declared Zamfara an Islamic state. Many people, including Muslims, have apprehensions about the shariah project. With the best of intentions, practice is always flawed and imperfect. There is a need for caution, for enlightenment and for sensitivity. Those charged with the responsibility for interpretation and implementation of the shariah themselves need time to be fully trained. They need to be sensitive and to recognize economic and other conditions which should serve as extenuating circumstances when applying the penal code. The government must resist the temptation to exploit the potential propaganda value of religion for political gains. But by far the greatest problem facing the country is prejudice and ignorance, and the inordinate desire to cry wolf where there is none. Of this, the Guardian is guilty."

It is very clear to me that I have always defined my understanding of shariah. It is also clear that it does not tally with what seems to be going on today. I have quoted other articles of mine in my paper on "Basic Needs and Redistributive Justice in Islam". All the papers are availble on the web. Everytime I criticized the shariah project my criticism has been based on perceived deviation from what I see as the appropriate course of action. I have criticized the rush into implementation of the amputation and other punishments without first impacting on the objective conditions that give rise to crime. I have criticised wasteful spending by shariah governments, including using public funds which are supposed to be for hospitals, schools and services to sponsor "mallams" and others in their thousands for pilgrimage and lesser hajj. I have criticised judgements and laws which in my view do not take account of subtle points of dispute in Islamic jurisprudence.

Those mallams and pseudo-mallams who have become defenders of shariah governors should tell us how much money has been received by shariah states since the governors came into power and how much of that was spent on concrete projects and the provision of services. 'Umar Ibn Abdul 'Azeez remains today an exemplary Muslim leader not for the number of hands he cut off or the number of women he stoned but for his elimination of corruption on the part of leaders as well as his redistribution of income and elimination of poverty. That the entire Muslim Ummah, including shiites who are implacable enemies of the Umayyad dynasty, reveres the record of 'Umar suggests to me that he has set the standards for judging our political leaders.

The Italian philosopher and professor of semiotics, Umberto Eco, in one of his brilliant essays defined the role of the intellectual, as opposed to other classes of writer. The "intellectual function", according to Eco lies in expressing boldly and clearly the truth as one can best apprehend it. It lies often in criticising one's fellow-travellers rather than taking sides in a dispute. In making comments on politics in the Muslim north we all have options before us. One option, which some have chosen, is to praise everything done by northern muslim politicians. The hallmark of this group is to blame the Yorubas, or Christians, or the Federal government for every harm befalling northerners. In addition any criticism of northern governors is treated as treachery or, if it has to do with Islam, near-apostasy. This is standard to all students of political economy. Gramsci has noted in "The Modern Prince" that a hegemony survives by allying itself to a section of the intellectual class which seems independent but in fact is part and parcel of the instruments of persuasion. Many mallams who seem independent have no means of livelihood other than preaching in support of the establishment. The shariah project is a means of livelihood. Funds meant for social services go to finance trips for hajj and umrah, charity for those who offer prayers, money for setting up hisbah corps, conferences and conventions on shariah, newsletters for propaganda etc. Islam has become big business. In this I refer not to our traditional scholars in the old cities of Sokoto, Gusau, Kano, Zazzau, Yola etc. I refer to the young mercenaries who returned from universities in the Arab world and built their careers on condemning everything in northern Islam. They first made money from the Gulf states by taking up the role of proto-Wahhabi champions of "sunnah" against "accretions" and "innovations" like Ash'arism and Sufism. With the arrival of shariah in Nigerian politics these mercenaries have been falling over each other and actually struggling for a share of the new source of patronage. The pressure has increased since September 11 as the crack down on transfers from abroad is likely to lead to a drying up of a hitherto lucrative source. To criticise any aspect of the shariah project is to attack the patrons of this group and undermine their means of livelihood.

A second group has chosen the difficult task of standing, if need be, "against the current", to quote Isaiah Berlin. Its task lies in teaching the northern people to ask the right questions from their rulers, including the "mallams" who serve as their spokespersons. They want northerners to ask if their governors are more honest than non-Muslim or secular governors. To ask if their commitment to welfare is more complete, if they are even handed in the administration of justice, if, unlike other states, corruption and waste of public funds is at a minimum and if there is greater transparency in the public service. They teach women to ask why only a woman should be punished for adultery committed with a man and the poor to ask why only the cow and donkey thief should have his hand amputated. In the final analysis it is these question that go to the heart of political economy and they are the ones that induce violent, irrational reactions. For asking, and teaching others to ask, these questions they are accused of "misleading Muslims" and "dividing the ummah". But the ummah is already divided into classes with diametrically opposed interests as is evident to all those not blinded by hypocrisy.

In the final analysis, the issue is beyond Safiya or Jangebe. It is an issue of what they represent-women and the poor. Do northern women and northern poor need assistance and support or punishment? Have those who are quick to punish them given them their due? An argument is not defeated by a deluge of personal attacks but by the quality of reason. The battle is joined, as I have said often, at the level not of faith, but of ideology. Time alone will tell who the true "enemies of Islam" are.