By Moses Oludele Idowu
Where exactly is Nigeria headed as a nation in the next 5 or 10 years? We do not know and cannot know; but if we may hazard a guess and make postulations based on current realities, events and happenings, we can safely and correctly say that it is not good. Unless the Mercies of God intervenes Nigeria is headed for war, poverty, division, crisis and chaos.
Why?
Because of the belief system and testament of those who speak to the masses of her population. You can ignore the practice and even the actions of a people but do not ignore the testamental statement framing the ideology that shapes the doctrine of the belief system guiding the religious and social behaviours of those people. The testament is the reason why wars happened. The testament you ignore today will be the reason why whole armies will march tomorrow. So you ignore it at your own peril.
When Karl Marx and his friend, Engels issued their Communist Manifesto Europe did not even know and Britain did not even notice and did not care. When he died the nation did not even notice that a great man had passed. Only 11 people attended his burial. He was ignored.
But less than a hundred years later whole armies and nations marched in frontier wars over those same testament and ideology.
When Friedrick Nietzsche and Swinburne issued their respective testaments on the “death” of God and the glory of Man most did not take notice of these philosophers but subsequent events in public affairs and human attitudes corroborate their statements.
That is why you may not ignore a testament.
In the last one or two weeks the Social Media has come alive again in respect of the statements from three clerics all speaking at different times and all saying the same thing. I will allow each of them to state the words exactly as it was presented and in the order of time it came to my possession.
Islam Can Enslave Infidels: The Testament of Enslavement
The first was from one Yoruba cleric Shafiy Adeba on Sahara Yoruba TV who claimed that Islam allows the Muslims to enslave non- Muslims and infidels reading from their holy book. He also urged that if the Muslims did not do what the god of Islam enjoins then the infidels have a right to do to the Muslims as they please. Isn’t that incitement?
Yet he was not wrong. What he read was correct and factual from the Koran. He wasn’t lying. Islam actually enslaves and allows Muslim warriors to enslave their captives. There is a long history of association and collusion between Islam and slavery. The worst forms of slavery have been perpetrated and perpetuated in the name of Islam.
There is even a video where Fulani bandits and warriors were arguing among themselves how many slaves they would share and what would be the ratio of sharing after the war. Their scripture allows them to enslave others as long as they are not Muslims. Equality under an Islamic system is a ruse.
In a day when people of the world are thinking of progress and civilizational uplift through technological advancement and breakthrough some people are thinking of holding and capturing their fellow humans and fellow citizens as slaves because their depraved mentalities are still locked in a 7th century era and a moribund caliphate.
I have bad news for you: those who want to catch other Nigerians as slaves will themselves become the slaves. Remember the story of Samuel Ajayi Crowther,- the very night he was taken to the high seas for slavery he was rescued and the enslaver was arrested. A role reversal. The slave driver will become the slave.
The God of Heaven and Earth has made me free, I will not be slave to any man or any system. And I am also speaking for millions of other Nigerians. Rather than for us to be slaves then Nigeria will cease to exist – Nigeria as we know it – and in its place a New Nigeria where justice and equality will reign.
The Testament of Dispossession
The next statement within the same week was from Katsina State when an Islamic cleric and public commentator whose name could not be identified also released his testament in a video shared on social media.
Unlike the cleric above who did not directly mention Christians but infidels this politician actually came out openly without hiding anything. He was particularly crude, inciteful and daring and bellicose in his attitudes but his statement follows the same jihadist framing and language of domination.
He spoke in pure Hausa language. Here is an interpretation of what he said:👇👇
“If I become the Governor of Katsina State, I will sack every Christian inf!del civil servant in the state, chase them all out, and ensure every private sector employer, like banks, does the same so I can replace them with Muslims.”
Our friend did not stop there. He also added that he would take the campaign to other governors of the Northwest region of the country to do the same. He also abused the current governors calling them cowards for not cleansing Christians out of the public space. He then urged his unfortunate hearers to vote in Islamic fundamentalists who will be able to carry out their agenda.. He spoke in Hausa.
This is the kind of actions that has created the toxic political and religious climate that made the North a breeding ground and hotbed of religious intolerance, terrorism and also the poverty capital of the world.
Why do these people find Christians so much an object of hatred? Why do the mere sight of Christians provoke them within the same space? Is there something about Islam that we do not yet know? Yet, your own brothers and sisters are working in the South without anyone molesting them even when they become odious in their dealings as they sometimes do. And we are supposed to be one nation.
This is the kind of language and behaviour that produced Boko Haram and other terrorists that are now besetting and besieging Nigeria.
These are the kinds of people that are troubling Nigeria because they are above the law. Reinforced in a culture of impunity and barricaded by religious immunity and security they say anything and get away with anything. They know that no one will question them or arrest them. They are not only above the law they are the law.
The sad thing is that there are many in the North and even in the South among Muslims who think the same way but out of politeness will not voice them out.
In other parts of the world Islam is leading the charge for progress (Saudi Arabia) and technological advancement (Iran) new technology and science (UAE) but in our nation our own brand of Islam especially in the North seems different. It is concerned with control, domination, exclusion of others and enslavement – a religion dripping with so much hate, bigotry, morbid intolerance, spite and greed.
The only thing that interests and occupies them is power – not service or serviceability. Not truth, equity or progress but power – power without responsibility. It is not surprising that all the mega looters of the North pray five times a day and make annual pilgrimage. Even bandits and terrorists, based on the testimony of their victims, do not miss their 5 – time prayers.
They scrupulously adhere to the tenets of the religion and keep away from the harams. The only thing that is not haram is their elites’ looting of the treasury and bandits collecting ransom from victims. This is the kind of religion Professor William James warned against in his celebrated classic Varieties of Religious Experience– a religion that is devoted only to self, gratification and satisfaction of self.
Religion generally in Nigeria now verges on the margins of fraud but the worst expression of this we see in Islam, especially the version that is on offer in Northern Nigeria.
Let the truth be told.
The Testament of Exclusion
In the same period of time and within the same space another statement was released by an important cleric of the North. This statement was more consequential than the previous ones because of the source and the place where it was released.
Sheikh Yahaya Jingir is an important cleric with substantial following and hearing. A cleric of his standing cannot be said to be ignorant by any standard.
This is why we need to carefully examine what he said in the light of others above to understand what the testament of Islam now is.
Here is what he said in capitals
“HERE I URGE YOU TO PREPARE YOUR VOTES. LET US SHOW THE WORLD THAT THE INFIDELS ARE LYING THAT THEY OUTNUMBER US. SHOW THE INFIDELS THEIR LIMIT. NIGERIA IS A MUSLIM COUNTRY AND IF YOU DON’T WANT TO ACCEPT A MUSLIM – MUSLIM TICKET YOU SHOULD LEAVE NIGERIA BECAUSE IT BELONGS TO US. IF NOT BECAUSE IF THE MUSLIM – MUSLIM TICKET THE CHRISTIANS IN NIGERIA WILL THINK THEY ARE MORE THAN US. THIS IS WHY EE MUST MAKE SURE THE MUSLIM- MUSLIM TICKET CONTINUES TO SUCCEED SO THAT OUR DOMINANCE WILL REMAIN SUSTAINED’
This statement is pregnant and heavy but it is not new. It represents exactly what Sheikh Abubakar Gumi said in 1986 or thereabout about Nigeria. Only that he left infidels an option: if Christians would not accept Muslims as permanent leaders, he said, then the country should be divided. Sheikh Jingir has removed that window or option. Left for him: the infidels which now include Christians must either accept Muslim leadership permanently or leave the country. Gumi did not go that far.
That is how far Nigeria has “developed” and “progressed” over a space of 40 years. That is how Islam has led us and brought us.
Will Islam be Nigeria’s Cauldron; will the religion of Allah be the collective albatross of Nigerians?
Jingir did not say this in the secret or privacy of a jumaat service inside a mosque; he said it in the open at a political rally where a sitting governor of a state was present and cheering him. So you see this is more than you think. This is not just Jingir’s thought wave playing pranks on him, this is a testament of radical islamic ideology showing the standard operating procedure from now on. He has shown us what the testament is. Exclusion from power.
And the sad thing is that most Muslims believe this even if they do not voice it out publicly. Witness the number of Muslim lawyers that came out to defend the murderers of Deborah Samuel?
They believe in the jihad but they can’t physically participate because of their status. That is why Raymond Ibrahim and Daniel Pipes – two established scholars of Islam – are right: there are no moderate Muslims. A “moderate Muslim” is an oxymoron, either he has not found the right opportunity or he is not yet sufficiently provoked and enabled enough to unleash his anger.. I digress.
Jingir is however too optimistic about numerical superiority. If Muslims were that dominant in Nigeria why could they not bring Muhammadu Buhari to power for three consecutive times and previous times in which he repeatedly lost presidential elections even weeping? If Muslims were so dominant in Nigeria why did the Muslim – Muslim ticket ( which someone calls ‘mumu’ ticket) in 2023 lose Lagos State with the largest population in Nigeria and the industrial capital of Nigeria even with all the rigging, doctoring, intimidation and violence?
Will Islam Be Our Undoing?
What does all these sum up to? Three statements coming to the public domain at about the same time and all saying the same thing in different ways. The first provided the rationale and scriptural validation for enslaving infidels. And urging Muslims to take action. The second declares his aim to dispossess Christians in the employment of a state their daily sustenance by sacking them just for being Christians. [ The fascists of Europe gave us the term “ethnic cleansing” the Islamofascists of Northern Nigeria are about to give us another term “ethno- religious cleansing.”]
And the third provided the reason why they should exclude Christians as infidels from power because it is a Muslim country.
You may think these three things are unrelated but they are actually saying the same thing. Exclusion, enslavement and dispossession.
This is why they referred to Christians as infidels rather than as “People of the Book” which even their holy book was fair enough to acknowledge. Because to enslave or harm a people it is first necessary to deconstruct them and delegitimise them.
You must rob them of their image and humanity before you can do all manner of evil against them. This language is consistent with the way of oppressors, hegemonists and genocidists.
Observe that the before the genocide in Rwanda the other party did not call their ethnic opponents by their tribe’s name but as rats, termites, cockroaches, vultures etc., and other derogatory epithets. That way it makes the conscience clear when evil is unleashed having deprived them of their humanity.
You must delegitimise them first. “…You should leave the country because it belongs to us.” He has robbed us, the rest of us that are not Muslims of our citizenship and our nationality. This is how it always begin.
Three statements coming out of the arsenal of Islam cannot be all a mistake. In the mouth of two or three witnesses every statement or truth is established. What we have is not an accidental discharge from an uncoordinated cranks but a real message framing the ideology and testament of Radical Islam and their vision for Nigeria.
God in His Mercy has warned us through these men about what lay ahead but we can ignore the warning. And we can also do something about it. It is your choice.
Jingir has stated how he and others see Nigeria – as a Muslim country- and how they see the rest of us, as infidels. Just like that.
This does not stop them however from collecting hundreds of billions from Federation Account derived largely from oil from East and South- South that are predominantly Christian states because logic is not part of what they learned in their theology and religion. Only combat and capture and domination – “grab it and run with it”, as one of their confessors aptly stated it
The Provocation
When I read and heard these three statements from the clerics and politician I wasn’t moved or fazed. There is nothing they said that could not be found in Islam’s tortuous and atrocious history or even scripture. It didn’t provoke me in anyway and it didn’t move me. The real provocation was when I heard the Sultan days after in another programme where he counselled Christians and Muslims to be tolerant of each other and they should stop insulting each other. Here is his words: –
“We must be honest with ourselves that Christians can stop insulting Muslims. Muslims can stop insulting Christians. And that’s how we live in peace.”
Then he went on to the usual politically-correct statement about non- superiority of one faith over another.
Is that the problem? How many Muslims really believe this in their hearts that they are not superior to others? Do the Jingir, Adeba, Gumis of this world believe that? If Muslims truly believe in the equality of all why insist on a Muslim – Muslim ticket?
Was the Sultan not aware of the provocative incendiary rhetorics of his men of faith and kinsmen as the head of all Muslims in Nigeria? Why has he not a word of rebuke for them for raising tension if he himself truly believes that he is not superior to anyone?
Rather than rebuke and frontally condemn the arrogance and ignorance of his clerics and kinsmen and sharply correct them dousing the tension he instead went on the usual official double- speak for which Nigerian officials are well known.
This is the same Sultan who declared in 2011 at Harvard University that the only Constitution he recognized is the Koran.
This is the same man who declared that the social media is terrorism. Not the banditry or kidnapping for ransom or bloodletting and terrorism by herdsmen from his kinsmen but the Social Media is the terrorism – in the vocabulary of the Sultan, the head of all Nigerian Muslims.
And now even after all these threatening and mutinous languages and incendiary rhetorics from his clerics and kinsmen against others, it is still Christians who should stop insulting Muslims. He has reduced a national calamity to a matter of moral equivalency.
How about that? Is there any better way or greater to add insult to injury than this? Is it Christians that are intolerant of Muslims or the other way round?
There may then be some truth to the allegation by Mike Arnold, the American that this present Sultan, Muhammadu Sa’ad Abubakar, by his actions, body language and pronouncements is actually encouraging the jihad and terror or not doing enough to stop it.
A more reassuring and consequential statement however came from the former Emir of Gwandu, Alh.Mustapha Jokolo rebuking and condemning by name the irrational diatribe from Yahaya Jingir and even lecturing him that the prophet of Islam once took refuge with a Christian king and that Christians are not infidels and cannot be infidels as “people of the Book”.
Unfortunately the usual cannon fodder, the unfortunate ignorant masses who are incited to riot and violence would hear Jingir first before Jokolo and heed the cleric rather than the former Emir. That is the tragedy for Nigeria.
Conclusion
We have enough reason to worry. We have enough reason to be alert. What we have heard is not just the off- the – cuff statements from three religious freaks and irritants but the belief of large segments of people and even though some won’t be as impolite they believe exactly the same thing.
With thousands of clerics and politicians like this who do not care about harmony but only power and dominance the future is pretty uncertain. With millions of Muslims who now believe this it is certain Islam won’t be our salvation in Nigeria. But if it will not be our salvation neither should it be our cauldron or albatross.
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© Moses Oludele Idowu
August 15, 2026
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