Once upon a time there was this girl who had four boyfriends.
She loved the 4th boyfriend the most and adorned him with rich robes and treated him to the finest of delicacies. She gave him nothing but the best.
She also loved the 3rd boyfriend very much and was always showing him off to neighboring kingdoms. However, she feared that one day he would leave her for another.
She also loved her 2nd boyfriend. He was her confidant and was always kind, considerate and patient with her. Whenever this girl faced a problem, she could confide in him, and he would help her get through the difficult times.
The girl's 1st boyfriend was a very loyal partner and had made great contributions in maintaining her wealth and kingdom. However, she did not love the first boyfriend. Although he loved her deeply, she hardly took notice of him!
One day, the girl fell ill and she knew her time was short. She thought of her luxurious life and wondered, I now have four boyfriends with me, but when I die, I'll be all alone.'
Thus, she asked the 4th boyfriend, 'I loved you the most, endowed you with the finest clothing and showered great care over you. Now that I'm dying, will you follow me and keep me company?'
'No way!', replied the 4th boyfriend, and he walked away without another word.
His answer cut like a sharp knife right into her heart.
The sad girl then asked the 3rd boyfriend, 'I loved you all my life. Now that I'm dying, will you follow me and keep me company?'
'No!', replied the 3rd boyfriend. 'Life is too good! When you die, I'm going to marry someone else!'
Her heart sank and turned cold.
She then asked the 2nd boyfriend, 'I have always
turned to you for help and you've always been there for me. When I die, will you follow me and keep me company?'
'I'm sorry, I can't help you out this time!', replied the 2nd boyfriend. 'At the very most, I can only walk with you to your grave.'
His answer struck her like a bolt of lightning, and the girl was devastated.
Then a voice called out: 'I'll go with you. I'll follow you no matter where you go.'
The girl looked up, and there was her first boyfriend. He was very skinny as he suffered from malnutrition and neglect.
Greatly grieved, the girl said, 'I should have taken much better care of you when I had the chance!'
In truth, you have 4 boyfriends in your lives:
Your 4th boyfriend is your body. No matter how much time and effort you lavish in making it look good, it will leave you when you die.
Your 3rd boyfriend is your possessions, status and wealth. When you die, it will all go to others.
Your 2nd boyfriend is your family and friends. No matter how much they have been there for you, the furthest they can stay by you is up to the grave.
And your 1st boyfriend is your Soul. Often neglected in pursuit of wealth, power and pleasures of the world.
However, your Soul is the only thing that will follow you where ever you go. Cultivate, strengthen and cherish it now, for it is the only part of you that will follow you to the throne of God and continue with you throughout Eternity.
Thought for the day: Remember, when the world pushes you to your knees, you're in the perfect position to pray.
Pass this on to someone you care about - I just did.
Friday, October 15, 2010
THE SPREAD OF ISLAM IN NIGERIA.
THE SPREAD OF ISLAM IN NIGERIA
A HISTORICAL SURVEY
Islam has been, and will be for a long time to come, one of the major challenges to Nigerians in the development of peace, justice and prosperity in the country.
A survey of the history of Islam in Nigeria should examine how and why Islam has made the gains it has made. This involves its attraction to the religious sense of the people, its political and economic advantages, as well as the factor of coercion. Our survey also needs to observe which social classes were primarily affected by Islam and for what reasons, and why others were not affected. Islam also has many different tendencies. The one that threatens us most is that of violent intolerance. In our history we have to ask how and why this has taken root in certain circles.
Islamic presence in the territory now comprising Nigeria can conveniently be periodized by its orientation first to the Sahara and North Africa, secondly to the Atlantic, and lastly its ubiquitous orientation in the period of independence.
The period of trans-Saharan orientation
Trans-Saharan trade opens the way
The raids into the central Sahara by `Uqba ibn-Nafi` in 667, told by Ibn-`Abdalhakam, (1) opened the route to Kanem and Borno. In each town he raided `Uqba imposed a tribute of 360 slaves. From that time until the end of the 19th century, the central African trade route specialized in slaves taken from the hinterland of Borno.
Later, `Uqba's grandson `Ubaydallâh ibn al-Habhâb made a raid across the western Sahara and discovered gold. The demand for gold led to the emergence of the Ghana empire and the predominance of gold in the western trans-Saharan trade up to the 11th century.
The Muslim traders lived in separate quarters that were a transplant of Muslim life in North Africa. Yet the Berbers of Sijilmasa and Tahirt (in Algeria) adopted Khârijite Islam because it maintained racial equality against the Arabs who considered themselves superior. They therefore easily interacted with West Africans and promoted a more or less tolerant Islam. The Arab Sunni Muslims, however, who followed Mâlikî law, had reservations about dealing with West Africans. al-Qayrawânî states, "Trading in hostile countries or in the land of the Blacks is disapproved." (2)
Initial Muslim separatism soon gave way to a freeer mixing with West Africans. The Muslim traders needed African trading agents and associates and thus a community of African Muslims grew up around them. Trans-Saharan trade was a stimulus for state-formation in sub-Saharan Africa. African kings welcomed the presence of Muslim traders in their midst for several reasons: The Muslims brought the economic advantages of long-distance trade; these advantages would be greater or surer if the king accepted Islam himself, since it gave him citizenship in the Muslim umma with equality and brotherhood with his trading partners far away. He could then expect respect and trust from them in his dealings, putting to rest al-Qayrawânî's warning about trading in the land of the Sûdân. As Islam gained ground, large scale marketing and transport became a Muslim monopoly and this put pressure on traders to join Islam to become part of the club.
The presence of Muslim scholars was welcome also because they provided an important element in the infrastructure of long-distance trade, namely, written communication in Arabic, the only international language of West Africa until the introduction of Portuguese on the coast in the 15th century and French and English in the 19th century. This made it possible to order goods from a distance and maintain a system of banking or credit. At the same time, Muslims provided the civil service in the expanding Sûdân kingdoms, because their literacy made them the only ones capable of administration. As Muslims literate in Arabic spread throughout the Sahel with the traders, there were few places of importance where a traveller might not find an interpreter and an introduction to the local society, thus eliminating the necessity of the "silent trade" between peoples of different languages.
Complementing or competing with the traditional religion, Muslim clerics had a wide selection of religious medicine to offer, with specific prescriptions for every conceivable disease or any other problem of life, in the form of drink (with ink washed from a slate with Qur'ânic writing), talismans to wear, prayers to say, or other things to do. The Arabic text of the Qur'ân was looked upon as something powerful and beautiful itself, whose secrets could be mastered with patient study and initiation, as could the secrets of the traditional religion. Islamic rites of worship were also attractive for Africans because they were done in common and had an atmosphere of both dramatic festivity and seriousness.
Muslims tolerated, temporarily, a king accepting Islam and at the same time continuing to practice the traditional religion. The king would want to straddle the fence this way because he was expected to be the father and high-priest for all his people. If a significant number of them or even a few prominent citizens adopted a particular religion that did not threaten his power, he would be expected to lead them in their religious practice, thus providing religious leadership to all groups, and not allowing it to go into political opposition.
The kings found Islam a convenient support to their imperial authority, since it was a unifying ideology bridging the many tribes and presenting them with a wider brotherhood, citizenship or nationality. This produced the phenomenon of "state Islam", whereby Islam was controlled and used to promote the interests of the rulers.
A psychological factor disposing people to convert to Islam is the international experience of those involved in long-distance trade. Traditional religion was bound to a village political system and culture with its local deities, spirits and ancestors, whereas inter-tribal economic and cultural interaction required a corresponding universalist social, political and religious structure. The Islamic view of the universe as governed by one God who is to be worshipped in one way by one world-wide community of believers explains why its champions were primarily the merchant class and the clerics who accompanied them. The farmers did not opt for Islam at all, and their rulers straddled the fence, since their interests were balanced between the traditional local society and the wider world that commerce and empire exposed them to. Pastoral peoples, like the Fulani, were as ambivalent as the kings, because of their attachment to the kinship bonds of their clans on the one hand, and on the other their exposure to a wider society which their migrations put them in contact with. (3)
Accepting Islam would also give the king legal immunity from attack by other Muslims. Since raids by desert nomads upon the settled farmers were very frequent anyway, (4) and raids by Muslims upon unbelievers was encouraged by religion, according to the common belief of Muslims, a Sûdân king would have strong motivation to become a Muslim as a pre-emptory defence against attack.
The military factor
Largely because of this last factor, the kings across the savanna, from Senegal to Lake Chad, finally declared for Islam in the 11th century. This was the result of the Murâbit (Almoravid) movement among the Sanhâja Berbers, a religious-military movement which resulted in an empire stretching from Senegal to Spain. The Murâbits were Sunni Muslims, with no respect for the lives or freedom of unbelieving Blacks. They themselves did not engage in warfare against them, but they and successor North African states armed and supported the new savanna Muslim states who waged jihâd against their pagan neighbours and either converted them or made them slaves, selling large numbers of them to North African merchants.
The Mali and Songhay empires were the Western source of Islamic influence upon Nigeria. The Hausa states were late on the scene. Although Malian emisaries had come to Kano in the14th century, only in the 16th century did these states come into prominence with their kings' acceptance of Islam. Kebbi, as far as Mokwa, for a time was part of the Songhay empire, and Katsina was a tributary state.
The Hausa states were drawn into the orbit of trans-Saharan trade by the slaves they had to sell, as a result of the constant wars among the numerous Hausa states. Besides skins, such as the "Moroccan leather" which comes from Sokoto goats, they possibly had some gold from the Akan fields through their traffic with Gonja for kola nuts. (5)
During the period of trans-Saharan orientation, from the 8th to the 16th centuries, Islam had come straight across the Sahara to Borno where, from the 11th century it had Muslim kings. It also came to the Western savanna and, from Mali and Songhay, radiated to the Hausa states which had Muslim kings from the 16th century.
The period of Atlantic orientation
The disappearance of empires and emergence of jihâd states
The Songhay empire ended in 1591 with the Moroccan invasion. Afterwards the Moroccans ruled Tinbuktu for some time, while a variety of other small Muslim city-states continued to exist. But for a long time no empire came to replace Songhay, as Songhay had replaced Mali and Mali Ghana. Why? The problem was not in West Africa, but in North Africa.
The main reason for the political decline of the West African savanna at this period was the Turkish occupation of most of North Africa, starting with Egypt in 1517 and Algiers in 1525. The northern coast, from Egypt to Algiers, became part of the Ottoman empire, which extended around the whole eastern and northeastern Mediterranean to the borders of Austria. The Mediterranean itself was an Ottoman lake and a self-contained economic zone. The Turks in North Africa, who controlled only the towns and land along the coast, were interested only in the Mediterranean world and Istanbul, leaving the Sahara to the bedouins and their shaykhs. (6) Trade on a small scale, however, continued with Morocco (outside Ottoman control) and the desert tribes, especially with Senegambia, which exchanged horses for slaves. (7)
With the northern terminus of the trans-Saharan trade cut off, the sub-Saharan empires had no other choice but to die to die, that is, until the Atlantic trade provided a sufficient substitute to cause a revival. The coastal empires were the first to be born: Benin, Oyo, Dahomey, Ashante, the major ones, while the jihâd empires of the interior followed once they were touched by the reverberation of trade routes to the coast.
In the mid-18th century the pagan Bambara set up a state based in Segu which expanded towards the Senegal river to tap its rich trading links with the Atlantic. Slaves were abundant in the Bambara states, and Muslim communities under Bambara rule took full advantage of the opportunity to supply slaves to European trading posts.
As for the Muslims, the widespread situation of their living under pagan rule did not suit Muslim religious sensibilities. If occasionally they were penalized for the practice of their faith, more fundamentally they lived in a permanent state of fitna, a situation in which rule by a law other than Sharî`a constantly invited or permitted the common people to slip away from Islam. Classical Islamic theory allows only two choices for Muslims under such a situation, either to revolt and establish an Islamic state or to emigrate, making a hijrato a land where Sharî`a prevails. In either case leadership is required, and the widespread expectation that amujaddid, a divinely guided reformer, would come at the turn of every Islamic century prepared the way for accepting the leaders that presented themselves.
The economic side of a jihâd was the chance to set up a state in response to a market attraction. The Atlantic trade stimulated supply routes going far to the interior, organized mainly by Mande speaking Dyula. The traders, according to Jobson in 1621, had free recourse through all places even in times of war. They also had some independent bases, as did the Dyakanke at Conjour. Besides these precarious arrangements, the combination of new trading opportunities and religious motivation resulted in a series of jihâds and full-fledged states in the western Sudan.
There were the Zawâyâ in Senegal in 1673, Mâlik Sî in Bondu in the 1680s, the Fulani in Futa Jalon in1725, and in Futa Toro in 1776. From around 1800 Ahmad established a jihâd state in Mâsina, and Umar from 1852 established the Tukolor empire which covered most of the Western savanna. From 1870 Samori established a Malinke empire at the headwaters of the Niger, covering much of present-day Guinea and Ivory Coast. Again in Senegal Ma Ba in 1861 led a jihâd among the Wolof and Serer.
All the earlier jihâd states had their economic basis in exporting slaves to Europeans on the Atlantic. After this market was abolished, there continued to be a good internal market for slaves, who produced legitimate export goods. (8)
The Sokoto jihâd and the fall of Oyo
These jihâd states set the background for the Sokoto jihad. This can only be understood by first considering the Oyo empire.
Whatever may be said of Ife as the "cradle of the Yoruba" or the greater early importance of other Yoruba states, old Oyo was the paramount Yoruba power from the 17th to the early 19th century. The capital, called Katunga in the time of Clapperton and otherwise known as Oyo Ile, was dangerously exposed to Borgu and Nupe enemies. In spite of its destruction in the 16th century it was reoccupied because of its commercial advantages which outweighed the risk its site presented. (9) It lay within the savanna zone where horses could be kept for easy communication with Nupe, Borgu and other Sudanic kingdoms to the north, with the forest kingdoms to the southeast and the coastal kingdoms of Ardrah and Whydah which were accessible through a corridor of savanna reaching to the sea.
Horses obtained from Borno gave the Alafins the military capability to secure their borders against raids from Borgu and Nupe and to consolidate and expand their territory towards the south. The Oyo heartland supplied foodstuffs, notably grains and cattle in the northern parts and yams and palm oil in the southern parts, iron tools and weapons, pottery, and cotton cloth. (10) Such tribute enabled the Alafins to maintain a staff and an army; the populace, in return, enjoyed security and the prosperity generated by a wider market.
In the second half of the 17th century Oyo began to expand to the southwest, all the way to the coast. The savanna conditions permitted the employment of cavalry, but the tsetse fly and the problem of providing fodder for the horses prevented Oyo from permanently conquering or occupying widespread territory in the south. (11)Yet some colonization of the coastal routes did take place, first in the Anago area, west of the river Yewa between Badagry and Porto Novo, at the beginning of the 18th century, then in the mid-18th century in the north of Egbado country, and finally in southern Egbado, including the towns of Ijanna and Ilaro. (12)
Oyo's first dealings with Atlantic trade were through the independent kingdoms of Allada, Porto Novo and Hueda (= Whydah). Oyo raided Allada several times in the late 17th century, (13) presumably to secure better conditions for its own trading activity. Trade continued to be hampered, however, because Allada and Whydah were at war with each other from 1712 to 1722, (14) and in 1717-18 they declared royal monopolies over the slave trade in their respective ports. This action provoked Dahomey to annex Allada in 1724 and Whydah in 1727. (15)Dahomian control of these port kingdoms was a threat to Oyo's interests, and Oyo responded in two ways. First, it campaigned against Dahomey from 1727 to 1730 until Dahomey agreed to become a tributary state, keeping the whole of Whydah and most of Allada except Ajase (a Yoruba name for Porto Novo). (16) Secondly, because of the recurring instability of Whydah and Allada, it developed easterly trade routes leading to Badagry and Lagos through Egbado country.
If we look for the motive of Oyo's intervention in or occupation of these coastal areas we find different opinions. For P. Morton-Williams, the reason is simple; it was to "participate in the coastal trade in slaves with the Europeans". (17) The same opinion was expressed by R. Smith: "The Oyo had become by the late seventeenth century exporters on a large scale of slaves for the Atlantic trade." (18) In spite of the evidence which these authors offer, I.A. Akinjogbin rejects this view altogether. He says, "While Oyo would have derived certain economic advantages from its conquests, it does not appear to have benefited much from the slave trade with the Europeans in the 17th century... For Oyo at that date the coast was really a backwater." (19) Akinjogbin does, however, admit that Oyo was heavily engaged in slave trading in the late 18th century. (20) He says: "The Oyo derived their wealth largely from the export of slaves, a trade which, since the beginning of the reign of Abiodun, seems to have been the main prop of Oyo economy." (21)
The more recent work of Robin law argues more closely the case that Oyo's expansion to the Atlantic was motivated by the slave trade. The witness of Dapper in the 1640s, as well as documents of 1723, 1727 and 1753, refer to the kingdom of "Olukumi" (or one of its variants), meaning a Yoruba kingdom, likely Oyo, as a supplier of the considerable volume of slaves sold through Allada. (22) This evidence confirms the theory that Oyo had little local economic advantage to gain by annexing or exerting influence over neighbouring states towards the coast, since the products of these states were not significantly different from those of the Oyo heartland (apart from salt from evaporated sea water), all these states being in a savanna region. The only advantage of any consequence from this reach to the sea was the booming Atlantic trade.
The slaves sold by Oyo were from four different sources: 1) native criminals, who were not so numerous, 2) war captives, who were the majority, (23) 3) slaves given in tribute by vassal states, such as Dahomey, who were not so many, and 4) slaves bought from Nupe, Borgu and even the Hausa states and Borno, especially in the late 18th century. Adams (1786-1800) refers to the large numbers of Hausa slaves for sale at Porto Novo. (24)
Oyo paid for slaves and horses from the north with European goods obtained from the coast, particularly cowry shells, but also iron bars, cloth, earthenware, beads, rum and guns. (25) Guns, however, were not of much use in Oyo which relied mainly on cavalry and did not know how to use firearms effectively. (26) On the coast slaves were almost the only commodity the European traders were interested in, although Oyo may also have sold a little cloth, ivory and palm oil. (27)
The main beneficiaries of Oyo's economic system were the Alafin, the trading magnates and their hangers-on. The majority farmer people benefited from the empire mainly because its peace and security permitted local markets to prosper. They were not heavily taxed, since the Alafin got food supplies for his retainers and the army from farms run by slaves. Ordinary people also could obtain imported iron for tools and cloth in exchange for kola and palm oil. Some found their fortune by joining the army or becoming retainers of big traders. As a powerful middleman between the north and the Atlantic, Oyo had to maintain an efficient trading complex which we could name "Oyo Incorporated".
The jihâd which `Uthmân Dan Fodiye launched in 1804 to conquer large tracts of northern Nigeria had the religious motivation of purifying the ruling society from its casual attitude towards Islamic practice and its continued patronage of traditional religious practices. We can accept the fact that this was `Uthmân Dan Fodiye's motive for jihâd. Nevertheless this does not exclude economic or social motivations, but rather presupposes them, since Islam purports to be not only the right way to God but also the right formula for economic and social success. The all-inclusiveness of Islam makes Muslims expect that its establishment will bring a better and more prosperous society and a greater enjoyment of the goods of this life as well as those of the next. We may draw a comparison with the hajj, where along with its spiritual benefits, a pilgrim can also legitimately aspire to come home richer, either by trading on the way or by God's special favour.
In the Sokoto federation, however, where slave raiding was important, slaves were used in much greater numbers to augment the population of the emirates and thereby increase local production and revenue for the aristocracy. (28) Export of slaves, nevertheless, was also important, both across the Sahara throughout the 19th century and to the Atlantic up to the middle of the 19th century when the Atlantic slave market ceased to function. (29) The wars among the Hausa states, while contributing to the slave market, in reality prevented the development of this market to any considerable extent, because the fighting made the long-distance trade routes unsafe and prevented the tapping of richer slaving grounds further off, especially in Bauchi and Adamawa, where pagans could be enslaved without any religious scruple. Any slave dealer could see the advantage or necessity of uniting Hausaland and the surrounding areas into a single commonwealth, so that traders and slavers could move freely. We can assume that these traders would be prepared to support any jihâd that promised to effect the desired political unification. (30)
The jihâd of `Uthmân Dan Fodiye answered perfectly the aspirations of the slave dealers. Except for occasional rebellions which the Sokoto authorities had to repress, security for trade movement was assured throughout the emirates. Raids were systematically carried out against the "Middle Belt" pagan areas which provided all the centres of Fulani rule with a rich supply of slaves. What was done with these slaves?
It seems the bulk of the slaves were absorbed locally, either in the cities for crafts or military service or in slave farm villages, increasing the population and prosperity of Hausaland. (31) These slaves adopted the Hausa language and the Islamic religion, and are estimated to have constituted the majority of the population of Sokoto and Kano. Exact statistics are not available, but a rough estimate of this high number is furnished by the literature written by the Fulani of the period, testimonies of European travellers, oral tradition and some studies of the city populations made at the beginning of the British period.
Only newly captured slaves or refractory old ones were normally sold for export. Yet the number exported was considerable enough for slaves to become a standard currency in Hausaland and the surrounding areas, replacing cowries for any larger transactions. (32) Many slaves were exported through the Atlantic market. No doubt the profits and value of this trade in the late 18th century were well known in commercial circles of the north, since northern Muslim traders constantly frequented the routes to the coast. The same traders could report the advantage of securing control of these trade routes and integrating them into the Sokoto caliphate once this was established. Thus, in spite of their proximity, Sokoto and Gwandu made no serious attempt to conquer Argungu or the remnants of Gobir north of Illela. (33) On the contrary, all efforts were expended for a thrust to the sea, by a Muslim-Fulani take-over of Nupe and Oyo. Successful coups were engineered in both these states, mainly through the agency of local Muslim forces, but also with some assistance to Ilorin from Gwandu, the headquarters of the western part of the caliphate. The jihâd thrust to the south certainly catered to the demand for a workforce in the Caliphate heartland. But Samuel Johnson's phrase, "to dip the Qur'ân into the sea", (34) summarized the attraction of the Atlantic market.
The mercantile party of the Sokoto confederation had every interest in pushing the conquest to the coast, since from the beginning of the 19th century until 1830 the Atlantic slave business actually increased. This was the result of increased demand from Brazil, Cuba and Southern United States, in spite of the stop of the slave trade by the British in 1810 and the French in 1815. (35) The Atlantic slave trade dipped sharply after 1840, until it was completely stopped by 1860. So the thrust of Sokoto to the sea was frustrated not merely by the intervening independent states and later British interference, but more importantly by the evaporation of the major economic motive. Expansion to the coast was also blunted by the rise of independent states in the former southern dependencies of Oyo, such as Ibadan, Abeokuta and the coastal city-states, so that the southern end of the trade routes was still subject to the exactions of middlemen and periodic instability and insecurity.
Slaves were also exported across the Sahara. Once the jihâd was consolidated, the Sokoto confederation rivaled Borno for the trans-Saharan trade. Trans-Saharan trade increased throughout the 19th century, in spite of the growth of European trade on the coast. (36) Trans-Saharan slave exporting thrived, especially after the Atlantic slave market vanished.
Yet the attraction of the Atlantic was later renewed because other advantages became apparent. One of these was the supply of firearms, which in the 19th century became not only more common but also indispensable for survival. Even after the British imposed their rule on the whole of modern Nigeria, the heirs to the Sokoto establishment continued to show concern for the route to Lagos and took every available means to assure that it remained open and secure for their trading operations.
The ongoing jihâd conducted by the emirates of the Sokoto federation was a systematic slave-gathering operation. Most slaves were absorbed internally. But it is no accident that the Sokoto jihâd began at a time when the promise of a rich slave-exporting economy looked brightest, and that the extremities of the jihâd farthest from Sokoto were on the one hand the slave grounds of Adamawa and on the other hand the outlet routes controlled by Oyo.
Unfortunately for Sokoto ambitions, just as its hold on the North was consolidated and Oyo destroyed, leaving no major obstacle to the sea, European demand for slaves ended. So the Sokoto confederation confined its attention to the North and the Sahara until trade in other commodities sparked its interest in the Atlantic once more. (37)
The colonial phase
In the colonial period of Nigeria Islam was favoured by several factors: The first was the pax Brittanica which permitted Muslims and everyone to move freeling throughout the country in pursuit of trade or livelihood. Muslims were thus able to build mosques and interact with local people throughout the country, even though the system of sabon gari isolated them somewhat from the local culture. This was not the same for Christians, who were free to move around the country, but were restricted in building churches in Muslim areas and their priests were forbidden to evangelize Muslims.
The second was the system of indirect rule for the north of Nigeria, that is, the former Sokoto and Borno empires. The closure of the Atlantic slave market explains the relative atrophy of the Sokoto caliphate in the second part of the 19th century, so that it had little power to resist a British take-over. Instead of sweeping away these Islamic governmental systems, as the French did in their territories, the British propped them up and increased their authority. This was notable especially in areas, such as the Middle Belt, where most of the rural people were not Muslims
Outside the caliphate, Islam already had a foothold in Etsako and the Niger-Benue confluence area because of Nupe raiding, and was present in the Yoruba towns along the route to Lagos, such as Ogbomoso, Oyo, Ibadan, Sagamu, Ijebu-Ode and Abeokua. Hausa slaves in these towns became integrated in the social and political life of these towns, and many of the chiefs declared themselves Muslims, although they continued to be actively involved in the traditional religion. In these areas Islam came to symbolize the preservation of Yoruba identity against the intrusion of British culture. For the same reason, many Yoruba Muslims resisted Western education and this left the Muslim community at a disadvantage compared with Christians who were more progressive and successful in areas where education counts.
While northern Islam has been firmly reformist and separatist with regard to anything non-Islamic, Yoruba Muslims have been more accommodating. The Yoruba people are first of all Yoruba, secondly Muslim or Christian and lastly Nigerian, so that in one family you can find both Muslims and Christians and some involvement in the traditional religion. But Yoruba Islam is more complex than it first appears. The liberated slaves returning from Brazil brought a rather progressive Islam, and their descendants have not only distinguished themselves in their personal careers, but also have led the way for development within the Muslim community. In the colonial period they led the way in building mosques, noted for their Portuguese-Brazilian style. (38) Yoruba Islam is not organized by the local government as it is in the north. Consequently there are innumerable societies that are the proprietors of mosques, and each has its own ideological orientation and style. There are the Lanose and Bamidele movements which reject anything western and whose men wear turbans and beards, while their women wear ileha or a black shroud covering everything, including their faces. There is the Ansar ud-deen which is also conservative, but promotes Western education. And there are branches of the Muslim Students Society and various other youth groups influenced by Saudi Wahhabi ideas calling for a reformed purist Islam.
There is little information about religious change during the colonial period, but it is a fact that Christian schools attracted many conversions of Muslim students in the south of Nigeria. The only requisite in these schools was for all the students to take classes in religious instruction and to attend opening school prayers. Conversions occurred where parents had no objection or even encouraged their children. Some of these converts later reverted to Islam, while most Muslim students retained their religion together with an appreciation of their education, including the familiarity they acquired of the Christian religion.
Since Indepedence
Throughout their colonies, the British were careful to limit Arabian influence which could stir up an Islamic insurgency. The number of pilgrims was limited and official contacts were moderated. Independence changed that. To reward the north for their cooperation and compliance, as opposed to the agitation for independence in the south, the British made sure that the heirs of the Sokoto caliphate controlled the Northern Region. And the Northern Region was considered to have the majority of the population, so that it could rule the Federation alone. (39)
Consequently the First Republic was headed by Tafawa Balewa, a northern Muslim. But real power was held by Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto and Premier of the Northern Region. He made numerous trips around the Arab world and was Vice-President of the newly formed, Saudi sponsored, Muslim World League (Râbit al-`âlam al-islâmî). This brought him a lot of Saudi money to build mosques around the north and to distribute cloth to converts in his preaching tours. In a short time he pressurised many chiefs and prominent people to join Islam. At the same time his preaching rallies brought many thousands into the Islamic fold.
Yet the Sardauna stirred up the opposition in the south by his northernisation policy in the north where skilled southerners held many of the best positions, and by his manipulating Yoruba politics in favor of Akintola and imprisoning Awolowo so as to foster his plan of "dipping the Qur'ân in the sea". The Sardauna's assassination in the 1966 coup effectively put an end to Muslim expansion in the North. Yet the massacre of southerners in the north and the civil war, though led by the Christian General Gowon, had overtones of subduing Christian influence in the country. Missionaries were banned or prevented from entering. Immediately after the war schools and hospitals were taken over, a Muslim demand fostered by sectarian rivalry among Christians.
In spite of this blow to the Church, Islam did not grow, and Christianity saw a new and rapid expansion in the north. The temporary absence of a huge southern population in the northern towns permitted the Church to concentrate on the millions of people who had not yet opted for Islam or Christianity. The Church's success was phenomenal, since now most of these people are Christian. In the south as well, in spite of the loss of schools, and partly because of a rise of pentecostal evangelism, Muslims continue to convert to Christianity.
Northern Muslims, however, continued to hold the reigns of government and make things difficult for the Church. Murtala Muhammad's coup against Gowon in July 1975 and the Dimka coup against Murtala Muhammad in 1976 resulted in a purge of Christians from the army leadership, in spite of the fact that Obasanjo was allowed to take the presidency. Yar'adua in the background seemed to hold the real power. Throughout 1977 there was an intense debate about providing for a Federal Sharî`a court of appeal in the new Constitution. The Constitutive Assembly in April 1978 rejected this. The Muslim minority walked out, but later agreed to abide by the new Constitution for the meantime.
In the background to these political events, Abubakar Gumi, the influential spiritual heir of the Sardauna, was mentor to the Izala society (Jamâ`a izâla al-bid`a wa-iqâma as-sunna).. These both espoused Saudi Wahhabism and spread intolerant views and action, not merely against Christians, but also against traditional Muslims who belonged to the popular Sufic brotherhoods, the Tijaniyya and Qadiriyya. (40) They were for full Sharî`a, not as enacted or administered by a Nigerian government, but as the supreme and only law of the Islamic umma, which was their true nation. (41)
With the death of Gumi, the Izala dwindled and the radical side of Islam was captured by the Shî`ites, led by a one-time student in Iran, Ibrahim Zakzaki. He did not press specifically Shî`ite tendencies but rather rallied people to the sovereignty of an Islamic community ruled only by Sharî`a. The Nigerian nation meant nothing to him. His followers were actively confrontational and he was imprisoned for sedition. His followers then became more violent and, together with women with babies on their backs, assaulted police stations, even while being mowed down by machine gun fire. This movement was an embarrassment for the northern Muslim establishment.
The Muslim Students Society was founded in Lagos in 1954. It grew into a national organization and is affiliated with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth which was founded in 1972 under the auspices of the OIC. For a time the movement was radicalized by the Izala, rejecting the Nigerian Constitution and anything secular. Now one meets a wide range of attitudes in this Society.
Another radical manifestation of Islam was the Maitatsine movement, which erupted in Kano in 1980, in Maiduguri in 1982, in Jimetu in 1984 and Gombe in 1985. Much has been written about this movement, but there is virtually no first hand information on what it and its founder stood for. Muslims were embarrassed about it and attributed all sorts of heterodox beliefs and practices to it, but I have never seen an interview of a Maitatsine member on what the movement stood for. I see it as a recrudescence of Khârijism, an egaltarian movement that holds that anyone who is unfaithful to the practices of Islam has abandoned Islam and should be fought or killed. This phenomenon resurfaces in Muslim society whenever there is widespread social injustice.
The 1979 election of Shagari, which many called a "selection", ensured a northern leadership committed to the promotion of Islam. In the 1983 re-election, Muslim leaders openly called on Muslims to vote only for Muslims. Although he was overthrown by a coup on 1 January 1984, the army leadership of Buhari, Babangida and Abacha continued to promote Islam, even though their personal lives were unconstrained by Islamic restrictions. Babangida stirred up a hornet's nest by introducing Nigeria to "full membership" in the O.I.C. (42) Another Constitutive Assembly under Babagida rejected once more the Muslim demand for a Federal Sharî`a court of appeal, and would have removed Sharî`a from all levels of government but for Babangida's military over-ruling of this action by the Christian majority. The rallying of Muslims and Christians around Abiola and his lost cause in 1993 and their united opposition to the Abacha regime influenced the electoral success of Obasanjo in 1999. (43) Both Abiola and Obasanjo attracted the strong but long suppressed Hausa opposition once led by NEPU and Aminu Kano.
Obasanjo, the old general, realized the dangerous situation of the army, and in his first week in office retired all officers he thought could cause trouble. The army lost its Muslim domination. So too did many of the crucial ministries of the government. Northern Muslims began to complain of marginalization, and in response introduced full Sharî`a into many northern states. Obasanjo did little to oppose this. In fact, on 24 February 2001 he went to Cairo to attend a meeting of the "G8", another grouping of Muslim states (Egypt, Malaysia, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria, Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh) which Abacha brought Nigeria into in 1997. (44)
The Sharî`a cause, always supported by Saudi Arabia, has long been a convenient device to rally popular support for politicians of questionable character. But which popular support? Sharî`a, understood in its most radical sense, has appealed to the young Muslim intelligentia, that is, university students and their academic leaders, many whom learned their ideas from studying in Saudi Arabia or going there on pilgrimage. It also has appealed to the unemployed urban poor who have been persuaded that it is the simple answer to their problems. Whipped up by religious fervour, they are willing to overlook the oppressive policies of their leaders once they don the mantle of a champion of Sharî`a. The Muslim business community may support it under pressure, but their heart is against it, because it spells turmoil, and that hurts business.
The proponents of Sharî`a in the north are loud in emphasising that Sharî`a is only for Muslims. They cannot be sincere, because it is well known that the Sharî`a which they propose contains many provisions discriminatory against Christians. Harassment of Christians in the North has been on the increase. Christians are fully sensitized to the danger Sharî`a poses for them, since full Sharî`a puts them firmly in a second-class status in society. The case of St. Dominic's Church, Dashi, outside of Gusau, is a case in point. The governor broke into the church and declared it an Islamic school. Under criticism from CAN, he denied that he did so. Then the church was quietly destroyed one night. The Zamfara government defended this action on the false basis that all the people there had become Muslims. (45) Besides frustrations of their right to worship, Christians are forced to abide by the Muslim code prohibiting alcoholic beverages.
There is considerable debate within the Muslim world about the meaning of Sharî`a, and many Muslims are opposed to the variety that is advertized by Saudi Arabia and pushed in Nigeria. (46) They see the Saudi call for God's rule as opposed to man's rule as the antithesis of democracy. This is because the slogan "God's rule" is really a cover for rule by the Sharî`a professionals, who dictate their interpretation of God's law, rather than allow people to follow their own conscience. Moreover, religious people have yet fully to realize how religious agitation is often a cover for other non-religious interests, such as economic, political and ethnic causes. (47) It may be that Nigerian Muslim society, like Iran, needs a heavy dose of Sharî`a to get a taste of what it is really like. Then, as now in Iran, there will be agitation to throw off the rule of Sharî`a dictators.
Nigerian Islam first came with trade and ideas across the Sahara, then the Atlantic commanded attention with trade and new ideas from Brazil, Europe and Ameria, finally, with Independence, Islam has a global exposure. Satellite TV and internet open the most closed Sharî`a harems to a world of ideas, not all of them good. But interaction and consequent evolution are inevitable.
A HISTORICAL SURVEY
Islam has been, and will be for a long time to come, one of the major challenges to Nigerians in the development of peace, justice and prosperity in the country.
A survey of the history of Islam in Nigeria should examine how and why Islam has made the gains it has made. This involves its attraction to the religious sense of the people, its political and economic advantages, as well as the factor of coercion. Our survey also needs to observe which social classes were primarily affected by Islam and for what reasons, and why others were not affected. Islam also has many different tendencies. The one that threatens us most is that of violent intolerance. In our history we have to ask how and why this has taken root in certain circles.
Islamic presence in the territory now comprising Nigeria can conveniently be periodized by its orientation first to the Sahara and North Africa, secondly to the Atlantic, and lastly its ubiquitous orientation in the period of independence.
The period of trans-Saharan orientation
Trans-Saharan trade opens the way
The raids into the central Sahara by `Uqba ibn-Nafi` in 667, told by Ibn-`Abdalhakam, (1) opened the route to Kanem and Borno. In each town he raided `Uqba imposed a tribute of 360 slaves. From that time until the end of the 19th century, the central African trade route specialized in slaves taken from the hinterland of Borno.
Later, `Uqba's grandson `Ubaydallâh ibn al-Habhâb made a raid across the western Sahara and discovered gold. The demand for gold led to the emergence of the Ghana empire and the predominance of gold in the western trans-Saharan trade up to the 11th century.
The Muslim traders lived in separate quarters that were a transplant of Muslim life in North Africa. Yet the Berbers of Sijilmasa and Tahirt (in Algeria) adopted Khârijite Islam because it maintained racial equality against the Arabs who considered themselves superior. They therefore easily interacted with West Africans and promoted a more or less tolerant Islam. The Arab Sunni Muslims, however, who followed Mâlikî law, had reservations about dealing with West Africans. al-Qayrawânî states, "Trading in hostile countries or in the land of the Blacks is disapproved." (2)
Initial Muslim separatism soon gave way to a freeer mixing with West Africans. The Muslim traders needed African trading agents and associates and thus a community of African Muslims grew up around them. Trans-Saharan trade was a stimulus for state-formation in sub-Saharan Africa. African kings welcomed the presence of Muslim traders in their midst for several reasons: The Muslims brought the economic advantages of long-distance trade; these advantages would be greater or surer if the king accepted Islam himself, since it gave him citizenship in the Muslim umma with equality and brotherhood with his trading partners far away. He could then expect respect and trust from them in his dealings, putting to rest al-Qayrawânî's warning about trading in the land of the Sûdân. As Islam gained ground, large scale marketing and transport became a Muslim monopoly and this put pressure on traders to join Islam to become part of the club.
The presence of Muslim scholars was welcome also because they provided an important element in the infrastructure of long-distance trade, namely, written communication in Arabic, the only international language of West Africa until the introduction of Portuguese on the coast in the 15th century and French and English in the 19th century. This made it possible to order goods from a distance and maintain a system of banking or credit. At the same time, Muslims provided the civil service in the expanding Sûdân kingdoms, because their literacy made them the only ones capable of administration. As Muslims literate in Arabic spread throughout the Sahel with the traders, there were few places of importance where a traveller might not find an interpreter and an introduction to the local society, thus eliminating the necessity of the "silent trade" between peoples of different languages.
Complementing or competing with the traditional religion, Muslim clerics had a wide selection of religious medicine to offer, with specific prescriptions for every conceivable disease or any other problem of life, in the form of drink (with ink washed from a slate with Qur'ânic writing), talismans to wear, prayers to say, or other things to do. The Arabic text of the Qur'ân was looked upon as something powerful and beautiful itself, whose secrets could be mastered with patient study and initiation, as could the secrets of the traditional religion. Islamic rites of worship were also attractive for Africans because they were done in common and had an atmosphere of both dramatic festivity and seriousness.
Muslims tolerated, temporarily, a king accepting Islam and at the same time continuing to practice the traditional religion. The king would want to straddle the fence this way because he was expected to be the father and high-priest for all his people. If a significant number of them or even a few prominent citizens adopted a particular religion that did not threaten his power, he would be expected to lead them in their religious practice, thus providing religious leadership to all groups, and not allowing it to go into political opposition.
The kings found Islam a convenient support to their imperial authority, since it was a unifying ideology bridging the many tribes and presenting them with a wider brotherhood, citizenship or nationality. This produced the phenomenon of "state Islam", whereby Islam was controlled and used to promote the interests of the rulers.
A psychological factor disposing people to convert to Islam is the international experience of those involved in long-distance trade. Traditional religion was bound to a village political system and culture with its local deities, spirits and ancestors, whereas inter-tribal economic and cultural interaction required a corresponding universalist social, political and religious structure. The Islamic view of the universe as governed by one God who is to be worshipped in one way by one world-wide community of believers explains why its champions were primarily the merchant class and the clerics who accompanied them. The farmers did not opt for Islam at all, and their rulers straddled the fence, since their interests were balanced between the traditional local society and the wider world that commerce and empire exposed them to. Pastoral peoples, like the Fulani, were as ambivalent as the kings, because of their attachment to the kinship bonds of their clans on the one hand, and on the other their exposure to a wider society which their migrations put them in contact with. (3)
Accepting Islam would also give the king legal immunity from attack by other Muslims. Since raids by desert nomads upon the settled farmers were very frequent anyway, (4) and raids by Muslims upon unbelievers was encouraged by religion, according to the common belief of Muslims, a Sûdân king would have strong motivation to become a Muslim as a pre-emptory defence against attack.
The military factor
Largely because of this last factor, the kings across the savanna, from Senegal to Lake Chad, finally declared for Islam in the 11th century. This was the result of the Murâbit (Almoravid) movement among the Sanhâja Berbers, a religious-military movement which resulted in an empire stretching from Senegal to Spain. The Murâbits were Sunni Muslims, with no respect for the lives or freedom of unbelieving Blacks. They themselves did not engage in warfare against them, but they and successor North African states armed and supported the new savanna Muslim states who waged jihâd against their pagan neighbours and either converted them or made them slaves, selling large numbers of them to North African merchants.
The Mali and Songhay empires were the Western source of Islamic influence upon Nigeria. The Hausa states were late on the scene. Although Malian emisaries had come to Kano in the14th century, only in the 16th century did these states come into prominence with their kings' acceptance of Islam. Kebbi, as far as Mokwa, for a time was part of the Songhay empire, and Katsina was a tributary state.
The Hausa states were drawn into the orbit of trans-Saharan trade by the slaves they had to sell, as a result of the constant wars among the numerous Hausa states. Besides skins, such as the "Moroccan leather" which comes from Sokoto goats, they possibly had some gold from the Akan fields through their traffic with Gonja for kola nuts. (5)
During the period of trans-Saharan orientation, from the 8th to the 16th centuries, Islam had come straight across the Sahara to Borno where, from the 11th century it had Muslim kings. It also came to the Western savanna and, from Mali and Songhay, radiated to the Hausa states which had Muslim kings from the 16th century.
The period of Atlantic orientation
The disappearance of empires and emergence of jihâd states
The Songhay empire ended in 1591 with the Moroccan invasion. Afterwards the Moroccans ruled Tinbuktu for some time, while a variety of other small Muslim city-states continued to exist. But for a long time no empire came to replace Songhay, as Songhay had replaced Mali and Mali Ghana. Why? The problem was not in West Africa, but in North Africa.
The main reason for the political decline of the West African savanna at this period was the Turkish occupation of most of North Africa, starting with Egypt in 1517 and Algiers in 1525. The northern coast, from Egypt to Algiers, became part of the Ottoman empire, which extended around the whole eastern and northeastern Mediterranean to the borders of Austria. The Mediterranean itself was an Ottoman lake and a self-contained economic zone. The Turks in North Africa, who controlled only the towns and land along the coast, were interested only in the Mediterranean world and Istanbul, leaving the Sahara to the bedouins and their shaykhs. (6) Trade on a small scale, however, continued with Morocco (outside Ottoman control) and the desert tribes, especially with Senegambia, which exchanged horses for slaves. (7)
With the northern terminus of the trans-Saharan trade cut off, the sub-Saharan empires had no other choice but to die to die, that is, until the Atlantic trade provided a sufficient substitute to cause a revival. The coastal empires were the first to be born: Benin, Oyo, Dahomey, Ashante, the major ones, while the jihâd empires of the interior followed once they were touched by the reverberation of trade routes to the coast.
In the mid-18th century the pagan Bambara set up a state based in Segu which expanded towards the Senegal river to tap its rich trading links with the Atlantic. Slaves were abundant in the Bambara states, and Muslim communities under Bambara rule took full advantage of the opportunity to supply slaves to European trading posts.
As for the Muslims, the widespread situation of their living under pagan rule did not suit Muslim religious sensibilities. If occasionally they were penalized for the practice of their faith, more fundamentally they lived in a permanent state of fitna, a situation in which rule by a law other than Sharî`a constantly invited or permitted the common people to slip away from Islam. Classical Islamic theory allows only two choices for Muslims under such a situation, either to revolt and establish an Islamic state or to emigrate, making a hijrato a land where Sharî`a prevails. In either case leadership is required, and the widespread expectation that amujaddid, a divinely guided reformer, would come at the turn of every Islamic century prepared the way for accepting the leaders that presented themselves.
The economic side of a jihâd was the chance to set up a state in response to a market attraction. The Atlantic trade stimulated supply routes going far to the interior, organized mainly by Mande speaking Dyula. The traders, according to Jobson in 1621, had free recourse through all places even in times of war. They also had some independent bases, as did the Dyakanke at Conjour. Besides these precarious arrangements, the combination of new trading opportunities and religious motivation resulted in a series of jihâds and full-fledged states in the western Sudan.
There were the Zawâyâ in Senegal in 1673, Mâlik Sî in Bondu in the 1680s, the Fulani in Futa Jalon in1725, and in Futa Toro in 1776. From around 1800 Ahmad established a jihâd state in Mâsina, and Umar from 1852 established the Tukolor empire which covered most of the Western savanna. From 1870 Samori established a Malinke empire at the headwaters of the Niger, covering much of present-day Guinea and Ivory Coast. Again in Senegal Ma Ba in 1861 led a jihâd among the Wolof and Serer.
All the earlier jihâd states had their economic basis in exporting slaves to Europeans on the Atlantic. After this market was abolished, there continued to be a good internal market for slaves, who produced legitimate export goods. (8)
The Sokoto jihâd and the fall of Oyo
These jihâd states set the background for the Sokoto jihad. This can only be understood by first considering the Oyo empire.
Whatever may be said of Ife as the "cradle of the Yoruba" or the greater early importance of other Yoruba states, old Oyo was the paramount Yoruba power from the 17th to the early 19th century. The capital, called Katunga in the time of Clapperton and otherwise known as Oyo Ile, was dangerously exposed to Borgu and Nupe enemies. In spite of its destruction in the 16th century it was reoccupied because of its commercial advantages which outweighed the risk its site presented. (9) It lay within the savanna zone where horses could be kept for easy communication with Nupe, Borgu and other Sudanic kingdoms to the north, with the forest kingdoms to the southeast and the coastal kingdoms of Ardrah and Whydah which were accessible through a corridor of savanna reaching to the sea.
Horses obtained from Borno gave the Alafins the military capability to secure their borders against raids from Borgu and Nupe and to consolidate and expand their territory towards the south. The Oyo heartland supplied foodstuffs, notably grains and cattle in the northern parts and yams and palm oil in the southern parts, iron tools and weapons, pottery, and cotton cloth. (10) Such tribute enabled the Alafins to maintain a staff and an army; the populace, in return, enjoyed security and the prosperity generated by a wider market.
In the second half of the 17th century Oyo began to expand to the southwest, all the way to the coast. The savanna conditions permitted the employment of cavalry, but the tsetse fly and the problem of providing fodder for the horses prevented Oyo from permanently conquering or occupying widespread territory in the south. (11)Yet some colonization of the coastal routes did take place, first in the Anago area, west of the river Yewa between Badagry and Porto Novo, at the beginning of the 18th century, then in the mid-18th century in the north of Egbado country, and finally in southern Egbado, including the towns of Ijanna and Ilaro. (12)
Oyo's first dealings with Atlantic trade were through the independent kingdoms of Allada, Porto Novo and Hueda (= Whydah). Oyo raided Allada several times in the late 17th century, (13) presumably to secure better conditions for its own trading activity. Trade continued to be hampered, however, because Allada and Whydah were at war with each other from 1712 to 1722, (14) and in 1717-18 they declared royal monopolies over the slave trade in their respective ports. This action provoked Dahomey to annex Allada in 1724 and Whydah in 1727. (15)Dahomian control of these port kingdoms was a threat to Oyo's interests, and Oyo responded in two ways. First, it campaigned against Dahomey from 1727 to 1730 until Dahomey agreed to become a tributary state, keeping the whole of Whydah and most of Allada except Ajase (a Yoruba name for Porto Novo). (16) Secondly, because of the recurring instability of Whydah and Allada, it developed easterly trade routes leading to Badagry and Lagos through Egbado country.
If we look for the motive of Oyo's intervention in or occupation of these coastal areas we find different opinions. For P. Morton-Williams, the reason is simple; it was to "participate in the coastal trade in slaves with the Europeans". (17) The same opinion was expressed by R. Smith: "The Oyo had become by the late seventeenth century exporters on a large scale of slaves for the Atlantic trade." (18) In spite of the evidence which these authors offer, I.A. Akinjogbin rejects this view altogether. He says, "While Oyo would have derived certain economic advantages from its conquests, it does not appear to have benefited much from the slave trade with the Europeans in the 17th century... For Oyo at that date the coast was really a backwater." (19) Akinjogbin does, however, admit that Oyo was heavily engaged in slave trading in the late 18th century. (20) He says: "The Oyo derived their wealth largely from the export of slaves, a trade which, since the beginning of the reign of Abiodun, seems to have been the main prop of Oyo economy." (21)
The more recent work of Robin law argues more closely the case that Oyo's expansion to the Atlantic was motivated by the slave trade. The witness of Dapper in the 1640s, as well as documents of 1723, 1727 and 1753, refer to the kingdom of "Olukumi" (or one of its variants), meaning a Yoruba kingdom, likely Oyo, as a supplier of the considerable volume of slaves sold through Allada. (22) This evidence confirms the theory that Oyo had little local economic advantage to gain by annexing or exerting influence over neighbouring states towards the coast, since the products of these states were not significantly different from those of the Oyo heartland (apart from salt from evaporated sea water), all these states being in a savanna region. The only advantage of any consequence from this reach to the sea was the booming Atlantic trade.
The slaves sold by Oyo were from four different sources: 1) native criminals, who were not so numerous, 2) war captives, who were the majority, (23) 3) slaves given in tribute by vassal states, such as Dahomey, who were not so many, and 4) slaves bought from Nupe, Borgu and even the Hausa states and Borno, especially in the late 18th century. Adams (1786-1800) refers to the large numbers of Hausa slaves for sale at Porto Novo. (24)
Oyo paid for slaves and horses from the north with European goods obtained from the coast, particularly cowry shells, but also iron bars, cloth, earthenware, beads, rum and guns. (25) Guns, however, were not of much use in Oyo which relied mainly on cavalry and did not know how to use firearms effectively. (26) On the coast slaves were almost the only commodity the European traders were interested in, although Oyo may also have sold a little cloth, ivory and palm oil. (27)
The main beneficiaries of Oyo's economic system were the Alafin, the trading magnates and their hangers-on. The majority farmer people benefited from the empire mainly because its peace and security permitted local markets to prosper. They were not heavily taxed, since the Alafin got food supplies for his retainers and the army from farms run by slaves. Ordinary people also could obtain imported iron for tools and cloth in exchange for kola and palm oil. Some found their fortune by joining the army or becoming retainers of big traders. As a powerful middleman between the north and the Atlantic, Oyo had to maintain an efficient trading complex which we could name "Oyo Incorporated".
The jihâd which `Uthmân Dan Fodiye launched in 1804 to conquer large tracts of northern Nigeria had the religious motivation of purifying the ruling society from its casual attitude towards Islamic practice and its continued patronage of traditional religious practices. We can accept the fact that this was `Uthmân Dan Fodiye's motive for jihâd. Nevertheless this does not exclude economic or social motivations, but rather presupposes them, since Islam purports to be not only the right way to God but also the right formula for economic and social success. The all-inclusiveness of Islam makes Muslims expect that its establishment will bring a better and more prosperous society and a greater enjoyment of the goods of this life as well as those of the next. We may draw a comparison with the hajj, where along with its spiritual benefits, a pilgrim can also legitimately aspire to come home richer, either by trading on the way or by God's special favour.
In the Sokoto federation, however, where slave raiding was important, slaves were used in much greater numbers to augment the population of the emirates and thereby increase local production and revenue for the aristocracy. (28) Export of slaves, nevertheless, was also important, both across the Sahara throughout the 19th century and to the Atlantic up to the middle of the 19th century when the Atlantic slave market ceased to function. (29) The wars among the Hausa states, while contributing to the slave market, in reality prevented the development of this market to any considerable extent, because the fighting made the long-distance trade routes unsafe and prevented the tapping of richer slaving grounds further off, especially in Bauchi and Adamawa, where pagans could be enslaved without any religious scruple. Any slave dealer could see the advantage or necessity of uniting Hausaland and the surrounding areas into a single commonwealth, so that traders and slavers could move freely. We can assume that these traders would be prepared to support any jihâd that promised to effect the desired political unification. (30)
The jihâd of `Uthmân Dan Fodiye answered perfectly the aspirations of the slave dealers. Except for occasional rebellions which the Sokoto authorities had to repress, security for trade movement was assured throughout the emirates. Raids were systematically carried out against the "Middle Belt" pagan areas which provided all the centres of Fulani rule with a rich supply of slaves. What was done with these slaves?
It seems the bulk of the slaves were absorbed locally, either in the cities for crafts or military service or in slave farm villages, increasing the population and prosperity of Hausaland. (31) These slaves adopted the Hausa language and the Islamic religion, and are estimated to have constituted the majority of the population of Sokoto and Kano. Exact statistics are not available, but a rough estimate of this high number is furnished by the literature written by the Fulani of the period, testimonies of European travellers, oral tradition and some studies of the city populations made at the beginning of the British period.
Only newly captured slaves or refractory old ones were normally sold for export. Yet the number exported was considerable enough for slaves to become a standard currency in Hausaland and the surrounding areas, replacing cowries for any larger transactions. (32) Many slaves were exported through the Atlantic market. No doubt the profits and value of this trade in the late 18th century were well known in commercial circles of the north, since northern Muslim traders constantly frequented the routes to the coast. The same traders could report the advantage of securing control of these trade routes and integrating them into the Sokoto caliphate once this was established. Thus, in spite of their proximity, Sokoto and Gwandu made no serious attempt to conquer Argungu or the remnants of Gobir north of Illela. (33) On the contrary, all efforts were expended for a thrust to the sea, by a Muslim-Fulani take-over of Nupe and Oyo. Successful coups were engineered in both these states, mainly through the agency of local Muslim forces, but also with some assistance to Ilorin from Gwandu, the headquarters of the western part of the caliphate. The jihâd thrust to the south certainly catered to the demand for a workforce in the Caliphate heartland. But Samuel Johnson's phrase, "to dip the Qur'ân into the sea", (34) summarized the attraction of the Atlantic market.
The mercantile party of the Sokoto confederation had every interest in pushing the conquest to the coast, since from the beginning of the 19th century until 1830 the Atlantic slave business actually increased. This was the result of increased demand from Brazil, Cuba and Southern United States, in spite of the stop of the slave trade by the British in 1810 and the French in 1815. (35) The Atlantic slave trade dipped sharply after 1840, until it was completely stopped by 1860. So the thrust of Sokoto to the sea was frustrated not merely by the intervening independent states and later British interference, but more importantly by the evaporation of the major economic motive. Expansion to the coast was also blunted by the rise of independent states in the former southern dependencies of Oyo, such as Ibadan, Abeokuta and the coastal city-states, so that the southern end of the trade routes was still subject to the exactions of middlemen and periodic instability and insecurity.
Slaves were also exported across the Sahara. Once the jihâd was consolidated, the Sokoto confederation rivaled Borno for the trans-Saharan trade. Trans-Saharan trade increased throughout the 19th century, in spite of the growth of European trade on the coast. (36) Trans-Saharan slave exporting thrived, especially after the Atlantic slave market vanished.
Yet the attraction of the Atlantic was later renewed because other advantages became apparent. One of these was the supply of firearms, which in the 19th century became not only more common but also indispensable for survival. Even after the British imposed their rule on the whole of modern Nigeria, the heirs to the Sokoto establishment continued to show concern for the route to Lagos and took every available means to assure that it remained open and secure for their trading operations.
The ongoing jihâd conducted by the emirates of the Sokoto federation was a systematic slave-gathering operation. Most slaves were absorbed internally. But it is no accident that the Sokoto jihâd began at a time when the promise of a rich slave-exporting economy looked brightest, and that the extremities of the jihâd farthest from Sokoto were on the one hand the slave grounds of Adamawa and on the other hand the outlet routes controlled by Oyo.
Unfortunately for Sokoto ambitions, just as its hold on the North was consolidated and Oyo destroyed, leaving no major obstacle to the sea, European demand for slaves ended. So the Sokoto confederation confined its attention to the North and the Sahara until trade in other commodities sparked its interest in the Atlantic once more. (37)
The colonial phase
In the colonial period of Nigeria Islam was favoured by several factors: The first was the pax Brittanica which permitted Muslims and everyone to move freeling throughout the country in pursuit of trade or livelihood. Muslims were thus able to build mosques and interact with local people throughout the country, even though the system of sabon gari isolated them somewhat from the local culture. This was not the same for Christians, who were free to move around the country, but were restricted in building churches in Muslim areas and their priests were forbidden to evangelize Muslims.
The second was the system of indirect rule for the north of Nigeria, that is, the former Sokoto and Borno empires. The closure of the Atlantic slave market explains the relative atrophy of the Sokoto caliphate in the second part of the 19th century, so that it had little power to resist a British take-over. Instead of sweeping away these Islamic governmental systems, as the French did in their territories, the British propped them up and increased their authority. This was notable especially in areas, such as the Middle Belt, where most of the rural people were not Muslims
Outside the caliphate, Islam already had a foothold in Etsako and the Niger-Benue confluence area because of Nupe raiding, and was present in the Yoruba towns along the route to Lagos, such as Ogbomoso, Oyo, Ibadan, Sagamu, Ijebu-Ode and Abeokua. Hausa slaves in these towns became integrated in the social and political life of these towns, and many of the chiefs declared themselves Muslims, although they continued to be actively involved in the traditional religion. In these areas Islam came to symbolize the preservation of Yoruba identity against the intrusion of British culture. For the same reason, many Yoruba Muslims resisted Western education and this left the Muslim community at a disadvantage compared with Christians who were more progressive and successful in areas where education counts.
While northern Islam has been firmly reformist and separatist with regard to anything non-Islamic, Yoruba Muslims have been more accommodating. The Yoruba people are first of all Yoruba, secondly Muslim or Christian and lastly Nigerian, so that in one family you can find both Muslims and Christians and some involvement in the traditional religion. But Yoruba Islam is more complex than it first appears. The liberated slaves returning from Brazil brought a rather progressive Islam, and their descendants have not only distinguished themselves in their personal careers, but also have led the way for development within the Muslim community. In the colonial period they led the way in building mosques, noted for their Portuguese-Brazilian style. (38) Yoruba Islam is not organized by the local government as it is in the north. Consequently there are innumerable societies that are the proprietors of mosques, and each has its own ideological orientation and style. There are the Lanose and Bamidele movements which reject anything western and whose men wear turbans and beards, while their women wear ileha or a black shroud covering everything, including their faces. There is the Ansar ud-deen which is also conservative, but promotes Western education. And there are branches of the Muslim Students Society and various other youth groups influenced by Saudi Wahhabi ideas calling for a reformed purist Islam.
There is little information about religious change during the colonial period, but it is a fact that Christian schools attracted many conversions of Muslim students in the south of Nigeria. The only requisite in these schools was for all the students to take classes in religious instruction and to attend opening school prayers. Conversions occurred where parents had no objection or even encouraged their children. Some of these converts later reverted to Islam, while most Muslim students retained their religion together with an appreciation of their education, including the familiarity they acquired of the Christian religion.
Since Indepedence
Throughout their colonies, the British were careful to limit Arabian influence which could stir up an Islamic insurgency. The number of pilgrims was limited and official contacts were moderated. Independence changed that. To reward the north for their cooperation and compliance, as opposed to the agitation for independence in the south, the British made sure that the heirs of the Sokoto caliphate controlled the Northern Region. And the Northern Region was considered to have the majority of the population, so that it could rule the Federation alone. (39)
Consequently the First Republic was headed by Tafawa Balewa, a northern Muslim. But real power was held by Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto and Premier of the Northern Region. He made numerous trips around the Arab world and was Vice-President of the newly formed, Saudi sponsored, Muslim World League (Râbit al-`âlam al-islâmî). This brought him a lot of Saudi money to build mosques around the north and to distribute cloth to converts in his preaching tours. In a short time he pressurised many chiefs and prominent people to join Islam. At the same time his preaching rallies brought many thousands into the Islamic fold.
Yet the Sardauna stirred up the opposition in the south by his northernisation policy in the north where skilled southerners held many of the best positions, and by his manipulating Yoruba politics in favor of Akintola and imprisoning Awolowo so as to foster his plan of "dipping the Qur'ân in the sea". The Sardauna's assassination in the 1966 coup effectively put an end to Muslim expansion in the North. Yet the massacre of southerners in the north and the civil war, though led by the Christian General Gowon, had overtones of subduing Christian influence in the country. Missionaries were banned or prevented from entering. Immediately after the war schools and hospitals were taken over, a Muslim demand fostered by sectarian rivalry among Christians.
In spite of this blow to the Church, Islam did not grow, and Christianity saw a new and rapid expansion in the north. The temporary absence of a huge southern population in the northern towns permitted the Church to concentrate on the millions of people who had not yet opted for Islam or Christianity. The Church's success was phenomenal, since now most of these people are Christian. In the south as well, in spite of the loss of schools, and partly because of a rise of pentecostal evangelism, Muslims continue to convert to Christianity.
Northern Muslims, however, continued to hold the reigns of government and make things difficult for the Church. Murtala Muhammad's coup against Gowon in July 1975 and the Dimka coup against Murtala Muhammad in 1976 resulted in a purge of Christians from the army leadership, in spite of the fact that Obasanjo was allowed to take the presidency. Yar'adua in the background seemed to hold the real power. Throughout 1977 there was an intense debate about providing for a Federal Sharî`a court of appeal in the new Constitution. The Constitutive Assembly in April 1978 rejected this. The Muslim minority walked out, but later agreed to abide by the new Constitution for the meantime.
In the background to these political events, Abubakar Gumi, the influential spiritual heir of the Sardauna, was mentor to the Izala society (Jamâ`a izâla al-bid`a wa-iqâma as-sunna).. These both espoused Saudi Wahhabism and spread intolerant views and action, not merely against Christians, but also against traditional Muslims who belonged to the popular Sufic brotherhoods, the Tijaniyya and Qadiriyya. (40) They were for full Sharî`a, not as enacted or administered by a Nigerian government, but as the supreme and only law of the Islamic umma, which was their true nation. (41)
With the death of Gumi, the Izala dwindled and the radical side of Islam was captured by the Shî`ites, led by a one-time student in Iran, Ibrahim Zakzaki. He did not press specifically Shî`ite tendencies but rather rallied people to the sovereignty of an Islamic community ruled only by Sharî`a. The Nigerian nation meant nothing to him. His followers were actively confrontational and he was imprisoned for sedition. His followers then became more violent and, together with women with babies on their backs, assaulted police stations, even while being mowed down by machine gun fire. This movement was an embarrassment for the northern Muslim establishment.
The Muslim Students Society was founded in Lagos in 1954. It grew into a national organization and is affiliated with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth which was founded in 1972 under the auspices of the OIC. For a time the movement was radicalized by the Izala, rejecting the Nigerian Constitution and anything secular. Now one meets a wide range of attitudes in this Society.
Another radical manifestation of Islam was the Maitatsine movement, which erupted in Kano in 1980, in Maiduguri in 1982, in Jimetu in 1984 and Gombe in 1985. Much has been written about this movement, but there is virtually no first hand information on what it and its founder stood for. Muslims were embarrassed about it and attributed all sorts of heterodox beliefs and practices to it, but I have never seen an interview of a Maitatsine member on what the movement stood for. I see it as a recrudescence of Khârijism, an egaltarian movement that holds that anyone who is unfaithful to the practices of Islam has abandoned Islam and should be fought or killed. This phenomenon resurfaces in Muslim society whenever there is widespread social injustice.
The 1979 election of Shagari, which many called a "selection", ensured a northern leadership committed to the promotion of Islam. In the 1983 re-election, Muslim leaders openly called on Muslims to vote only for Muslims. Although he was overthrown by a coup on 1 January 1984, the army leadership of Buhari, Babangida and Abacha continued to promote Islam, even though their personal lives were unconstrained by Islamic restrictions. Babangida stirred up a hornet's nest by introducing Nigeria to "full membership" in the O.I.C. (42) Another Constitutive Assembly under Babagida rejected once more the Muslim demand for a Federal Sharî`a court of appeal, and would have removed Sharî`a from all levels of government but for Babangida's military over-ruling of this action by the Christian majority. The rallying of Muslims and Christians around Abiola and his lost cause in 1993 and their united opposition to the Abacha regime influenced the electoral success of Obasanjo in 1999. (43) Both Abiola and Obasanjo attracted the strong but long suppressed Hausa opposition once led by NEPU and Aminu Kano.
Obasanjo, the old general, realized the dangerous situation of the army, and in his first week in office retired all officers he thought could cause trouble. The army lost its Muslim domination. So too did many of the crucial ministries of the government. Northern Muslims began to complain of marginalization, and in response introduced full Sharî`a into many northern states. Obasanjo did little to oppose this. In fact, on 24 February 2001 he went to Cairo to attend a meeting of the "G8", another grouping of Muslim states (Egypt, Malaysia, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria, Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh) which Abacha brought Nigeria into in 1997. (44)
The Sharî`a cause, always supported by Saudi Arabia, has long been a convenient device to rally popular support for politicians of questionable character. But which popular support? Sharî`a, understood in its most radical sense, has appealed to the young Muslim intelligentia, that is, university students and their academic leaders, many whom learned their ideas from studying in Saudi Arabia or going there on pilgrimage. It also has appealed to the unemployed urban poor who have been persuaded that it is the simple answer to their problems. Whipped up by religious fervour, they are willing to overlook the oppressive policies of their leaders once they don the mantle of a champion of Sharî`a. The Muslim business community may support it under pressure, but their heart is against it, because it spells turmoil, and that hurts business.
The proponents of Sharî`a in the north are loud in emphasising that Sharî`a is only for Muslims. They cannot be sincere, because it is well known that the Sharî`a which they propose contains many provisions discriminatory against Christians. Harassment of Christians in the North has been on the increase. Christians are fully sensitized to the danger Sharî`a poses for them, since full Sharî`a puts them firmly in a second-class status in society. The case of St. Dominic's Church, Dashi, outside of Gusau, is a case in point. The governor broke into the church and declared it an Islamic school. Under criticism from CAN, he denied that he did so. Then the church was quietly destroyed one night. The Zamfara government defended this action on the false basis that all the people there had become Muslims. (45) Besides frustrations of their right to worship, Christians are forced to abide by the Muslim code prohibiting alcoholic beverages.
There is considerable debate within the Muslim world about the meaning of Sharî`a, and many Muslims are opposed to the variety that is advertized by Saudi Arabia and pushed in Nigeria. (46) They see the Saudi call for God's rule as opposed to man's rule as the antithesis of democracy. This is because the slogan "God's rule" is really a cover for rule by the Sharî`a professionals, who dictate their interpretation of God's law, rather than allow people to follow their own conscience. Moreover, religious people have yet fully to realize how religious agitation is often a cover for other non-religious interests, such as economic, political and ethnic causes. (47) It may be that Nigerian Muslim society, like Iran, needs a heavy dose of Sharî`a to get a taste of what it is really like. Then, as now in Iran, there will be agitation to throw off the rule of Sharî`a dictators.
Nigerian Islam first came with trade and ideas across the Sahara, then the Atlantic commanded attention with trade and new ideas from Brazil, Europe and Ameria, finally, with Independence, Islam has a global exposure. Satellite TV and internet open the most closed Sharî`a harems to a world of ideas, not all of them good. But interaction and consequent evolution are inevitable.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
WHAT IS THIS LIFE WORTH?
*THE END OF EVERY HOPE IS DEATH* My house, my car, my children, my certificates, my job, my husband, my wife, my families, my clothes,...
WORLD CORRENCY EXCHANGE
-
The solution to this problem is that everyone should re-examine this entire issue. If he is serious about it, he will certainly reach the co...
-
*THE END OF EVERY HOPE IS DEATH* My house, my car, my children, my certificates, my job, my husband, my wife, my families, my clothes,... -
*Money Mistake 1* Never borrow money that accrues interest to start a business . That is to say, never borrow money to start a busine...