Nigeria and the Politics of Hijab

(By Abimbola Adelakun) - Hijab not about ‘religious discrimination’ 

        A bill to end “hijab discrimination” has reportedly passed second reading in the House of Representatives. Sponsored by Rep. Saidu Musa Abdullahi of Niger State, the bill, “Religious Discrimination (Prohibition, Prevention) Bill, 2021,” is supposed to protect hijab wearers from various forms of discrimination. Abdullahi was, of course, reacting to the ongoing hijab war in Kwara State that had degenerated into skirmishes. Just as it happened in Osun, Oyo, and Lagos states too, schools considered “Christian” are putting their feet down against their Muslim female students wearing hijab within their premises. Abdullahi managed to dredge up a few other instances of women who have been refrained from performing certain duties on account of their wearing hijab and added that the issue needs to be addressed once and for all. 

        Truly, Nigeria needs a definitive solution to this recurrent hijab issue but framing what is at stake as religious discrimination is a misdiagnosis. In countries where Muslims are a minority or migrants, religious discrimination might be a thing. In Nigeria, no honest person can allege that with a straight face. 

        In Nigeria, a Muslim can petition a whole Inspector-General of Police and threaten violence if an atheist whose opinions unsettle him is not dealt with, and the letter would be honoured in less than 24 hours. Even more shocking, the target of that attack has been indefinitely incarcerated without trial. In Nigeria, a Muslim would petition the Police IG saying that a woman who posted a photograph of herself on Instagram had blasphemed, and then threatened the issue could degenerate into violence. The woman in question almost went into exile even after she withdrew the photo, donned a hijab, and virtually begged for her life. In another country, those that threatened her would have at least been arrested, but not Nigeria. When a religion that can pull those kinds of stunts alleges discrimination, you want to take a closer look.

Hijab Controversies in Nigeria: Kwara State

 

Fela Kuti, His Genius, and Afrobeat

Adichie on "Chimamanda," Arts, Igbo, Biafra, et al.

Religion and Politics: The Church and Education of Politically-Conscious Citizens

Acapella on the Nigerian Condition

#EndSARS Protest: Police Brutality and Reforms in Nigeria

#EndSARS: Johnny Just Drop

#EndSARS: They Don't Care About Us

#EndSARS: Nigeria Is Murdering Its Citizens

(By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie) – Nigeria Is Murdering Its Citizens                               LAGOS, Nigeria [Oct. 21, 2020] — For years, the name SARS hung in the air here in Nigeria like a putrid fog. SARS, which stood for Special Anti-Robbery Squad, was supposed to be the elite Nigerian police unit dedicated to fighting crime, but it was really a moneymaking terror squad with no accountability. SARS was random, vicious, vilely extortionist. SARS officers would raid bars or stop buses on the road and arbitrarily arrest young men for such crimes as wearing their hair in dreadlocks, having tattoos, holding a nice phone or a laptop, driving a nice car. Then they would demand large amounts of money as “bail.” 

          SARS officers once arrested my cousin at a beer parlor because he arrived driving a Mercedes. They accused him of being an armed robber, ignored the work ID cards he showed them, took him to a station where they threatened to photograph him next to a gun and claim he was a robber, unless he paid them a large sum of money. My cousin is one of the fortunate few who could pay an amount large enough for SARS, and who was released. He is not one of the many tortured, or the many disappeared, like Chijioke Iloanya.

Nigeria: #EndSARS #EndPoliceBrutality

Nigeria at 60: Our Roots by Tayo Fatunla

Source: New African magazine

Ajofia Nnewi: Onye Na-Ezi Uzo

 

Ajofia Nnewi: Onye Na-Ezi Uzo

Things Fall Apart: The Stories Nwoye Loves

"Okonkwo was inwardly pleased at his son's development, and he knew it was due to Ikemefuna. He wanted Nwoye to grow into a tough young man capable of ruling his father's household when he was dead and gone to join the ancestors. ...
          "So Okonkwo encouraged the boys to sit with him in his obi, and he told them stories of the land -- masculine stories of violence and bloodshed. Nwoye knew that it was right to be masculine and to be violent, but somehow he still preferred the stories that his mother used to tell, and which she no doubt still told her younger children -- stories of tortoise and his wily way, and of the bird eneke-nti-oba who challenged the whole world to a wrestling contest and was finally thrown by the cat. He remembered the story she often told of the quarrel between Earth and Sky long ago, and how Sky withheld rain for seven years, until crops withered and the dead could not be buried because the hoes broke on the stony Earth. At last Vulture was sent to plead with Sky, and to soften his heart with a song of the suffering of the sons of men. Whenever Nwoye's mother sang this song he felt carried away to the distant scene in the sky where Vulture, Earth's emissary, sang for mercy. At last Sky was moved to pity, and he gave to Vulture rain wrapped in leaves of cocoyam. But as he flew home his long talon pierced the leaves and the rain fell as it had never fallen before. And so heavily did it rain on Vulture that he did not return to deliver his message but flew to a distant land, from where he had espied a fire. And when he got there he found it was a man making a sacrifice. He warmed himself in the fire and ate the entrails.
          "That was the kind of story that Nwoye loved. But he now knew that they were for foolish women and children, and he knew that his father wanted him to be a man. And so he feigned that he no longer cared for women's stories. And when he did this he saw that his father was pleased, and no longer rebuked him or beat him."

Chinua Achebe, 1958 [2010], 39-40

Things Fall Apart (The African Trilogy)

Of Nigerian-Americans and Wake-Keep

(By Rudolf Ogoo Okonkwo) - Walter’s Wake-keep

In the Boston metropolitan area is a Liberian who loved to attend Nigerian parties. (Let us call him Walter, because we have no permission to use his real name.) He loved Nigerian music, jollof rice, pepper soup, Shoki dance and watching Nigerians spray dollar bills like snow flakes at these parties. Trust Nigerians in America, they come up with every reason to throw a party - child dedication, wedding anniversary, birthday, graduation, send-off, wake-keep, etc. 

Every party is special but none is as special as a wake-keep. If you rent a hall to celebrate your 50th birthday or 25th wedding anniversary, or even your child's 5th birthday, or your child’s dedication in church, the general feeling is that you have the money to spare. People will still come, enjoy, and may even give you gifts, but it is mostly not seen as obligatory. But when it is a wake-keep, the party from conception to execution is aimed at raising money to assist the bereaved to go home and attend the funeral of the dead. The MC makes that clear every ten minutes of the event. And since people are expected to "drop something," organizers make sure that there are a lot of food and drinks to justify the things people will "drop".

          Another feature of these wake-keep, other than the fact that most of those for whom the events are held had never been to America, is that there is an unwritten understanding between the organizers and the attendees that whatever the attendee gives is documented, noted and permanently preserved for the time when it would be necessary to return the favor. In Igbo community, they even have a proverb that backs it up. It says: whatever a man gives to another man is a loan waiting to be repaid.