Mohammed, the Bishop and a quarrel

A small house will hold a hundreds friends.

African proverb.

As a guest columnist in this newspaper of Tuesday, January 5^th, Bishop Mathew Hasan Kukah put on his most innocent demeanor to protest a “rather acerbic and scurrilous attack” from Mohammed Haruna who he considers a friend. Mohammed Haruna had used his Wednesday 30^th December, 2015 column in this paper to criticize the Bishop over his “attack on Islam.” The Bishop’s response was dripping with indignation and self-righteousness, with words like “cheap calumny” “rabble rousing,” “odious” and “bigotry in matters of religion and region”, giving a hint that this was not a friendly dialogue.  

Mohammed Haruna and Bishop Kukah had crossed swords in public in the past. These are two of the finest minds from the North, people who know each other rather well. Mohammed had taken exception to the Bishop’s latest foray into the complex Muslim – Christian relationships to, in Mohammed’s words, “ride on his hobbyhorse of what he says is the use of Islam by the Northern Muslim elites to impose their hegemony not only on the North but also on the rest of the country.” He was referring to the published Keynote Address by Bishop Kukah delivered at Fountain University, Osogbo to a Muslim organization. Mohammed said, as before, the Bishop had accused Muslim leaders “exclusively of manipulating religion for their selfish ends. Boko Haram, he said, was the dire consequences of such manipulation”.

The Bishop in turn accuses Mohammed of false representation. He claims that he was only continuing a personal tradition of campaigning against “Nigerian political power – mongers and entrepreneurs who have used the religion (sic) to extend their economic and political goals”. His paper, he claims, “focused primarily on how to protect religion (here Islam) from manipulation by politicians. I produced evidence to show how Muslim politicians had done this under our democracy. I concluded that it was this manipulation that created the condition for the emergence and claims of Boko Haram. This is not the same as saying Muslims brought Boko Haram.”

I have chosen not to quote copious portions of the Bishop’s Address which triggered this exchange. I am more interested in the issues which the exchange raise. One of these is that Mohammed has not stepped back from his position of taking on Bishop Kukah’s reputation in some circles as an authority on the interplay between faith in politics in the North and the nation. He is unlikely to put up his hand as the protector-in-chief of Muslim interests, however, and may even accept that exchanging blows with Bishop Kukah is not primarily the solution to Islam’s problems in Nigeria. You can chase flies from the dung, but it is still dung.  

Although even the Bishop may admit that it is not his business to make Islam and Muslims look good, his defence would be stronger if he is as innocent as he wants to be judged. His tendency to appear to be equally fair to Muslims and Christians is what offends many people of both faiths. Sadly, in a context where people of faith with responsibilities to offer guidance and leadership have become critically isolated by a political process that is rooted in the falsehood that faith can be separated from the political process, people like Bishop Kukah create spaces that seek to speak for faith, but cannot free themselves from loyalty to religions. His attempts to walk the thin line of enlightened liberalism is often badly exposed, such as his homily at the funeral of late Governor Patrick Yakowa and his latest clumsy attempts to secure some atonement for President Jonathan in relation to his past.

It is probably difficult for people like Bishop Kukah to accept that in spite of his best efforts to build bridges across religious divides (to which I testify), he will always be a leading clergy of the Christian faith, which no sophistry will change. Many Muslims are offended by his seeming attempt to hide behind his cloth and connections to hurt their faith, while he overlooks numerous injustices against Muslims in many parts of the North. His access to leading Muslim traditional and religions leaders and northern intellectuals, and the garb of a bridge-builder which he wears when he relates with the international community does little service to either Christians or Muslims. Christians still complain of severe restrictions to their rights to worship in the North, and even in Sokoto where for symbolism alone, the Vatican chose to post Bishop Kukah. Muslim communities in parts of Kaduna, Plateau, Adamawa, Bauchi, Gombe and Taraba States complain of gross discrimination against them on grounds of their faith alone. Policing inter-faith boundries is a challenging endeavor which is not made easier by people who appear to walk on both sides of the fence. The 2015 elections had breached the walls of faith, but the hold of the clergy on the ballot is still very powerful.

Still, Bishop Kukah will continue to speak in the manner which offends Mohammed and many Muslims. My view is that allegations that Muslim leaders contributed to the context in which groups like Boko Haram developed will hurt Muslims less if leading Muslim intellectuals and clerics themselves have undertaken deep and strong analyses of the state of Islam in the North and Nigeria beyond internet groups and seminars. It is quite possibly the case that Muslims leaders have subverted their faith and weakened it by default, thus providing the context for the emergence of fringe groups and opportunities for people like Bishop Kukah to pontificate on their faith.

They have failed to rise to the challenges of influencing a Nigerian state which has increasingly distanced itself from the faith of majority of its citizens, hiding behind a weakness imposed by foreign, secular values. When they dangled attempts to make Muslims live under values and systems that are more appropriate for Muslims, it was largely for secular political reasons. They have failed to address poor governance, to secure a firm position for Islamic and western education, to address crippling social problems arising from massive expansion of the population and unacceptable levels of poverty among Muslims. They have failed to effectively police the boundries between Islam and other religions, and even more significantly, to police the faith in a manner that will protect simple Muslims from the types of crises that are almost endemically a feature of the state of their faith. There is not one element of governance at any level today that bears the imprint of a Muslim political leader or Muslim voters.

Boko Haram is primarily an affront to Muslim unity,integrity and strength in Nigeria. Its challenge to the Nigerian state was built on the weakness of the Muslim community. Muslim leaders and the community who make the case that they could not have prevented the growth and development of Boko haram and Shiism, should realize that they are  conceeding defeat in protecting their faith. Even if they were powerless in the past to stop Boko Haram developing into the monster it became, or that they could do nothing to stop the expansion of El-Zakzaky’s Shiite empire, they cannot do than now that they see how much damage has been done to the faith and the nation.

It hurts Muslims that leading Christian clergy like Bishop Kukah speak in disagreeable terms about Muslims and Islam, as if Christian clergy are expected to sing praises of Muslims and Islam to the high heavens. The solutions to this irritant lie in a re-discovery of the foundations of Muslim unity and the creation of a solid momentum that will shield the faith from opportunistic attacks. Muslim leaders in all spheres must lead and improve the welfare, knowledge and unity of Muslims. They should work to reduce the distance between the state and faith, to reduce intra-Muslim tensions which create avenues for emergence of weakening tendencies, and improve access and quality of Islamic knowledge. Muslim leaders need to become more actively involved in social engineering and local-level governance. When Muslims can effectively critique and improve the state of their religion, people like Bishop Kukah will find less room to fish in troubled waters.