Sultan condemns forcible conversion of Chibok girls

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Saad Muhammed Abubakar, yesterday deplored the forcible conversion to Islam of the Christian contingent of the over 200 students of Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok by their Boko Haram abductors.


The Sultan, who is also the President-General, Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs and leader of the Nigerian Muslim community, said in Ibadan, Oyo State, that Islam is not in favour of forcible conversion, adding that the action of the Boko Haram sect is in utter contravention of Islamic principles.

He spoke at the commissioning of the Bodija Estate and Environs Muslim Community Islamic Centre.

The Sultan described the abduction of the girls as ungodly, un-Islamic and a negation of the teachings of Prophet Mohammed on peaceful co-existence.

He charged the Muslim community to let the generality of Nigerians understand that Boko Haram members are not genuine Muslims but criminals.

Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State shared the Sultan’s views, saying there is absolutely no connection between Islam and Boko Haram’s activities.

Governor Ajimobi described Islam as a religion of peace and urged Muslims to always play active roles in Islamic activities for the development of the religion.

The Chairman of the Islamic community, Alhaji Tiamiyu Giwa, also condemned Boko Harams’ continued abductions and killings in the North, while the guest lecturer at the event, Prof. Abdul-Ganiyu Oladosu, berated the insurgent group for converting the abducted girls to Muslims.

“This is not an Islamic injunction, but an aberration,” he said.

The Sultan will tomorrow in Abuja lead Muslims at a special prayer session as part of the effort to check the security challenge caused by Boko Haram in the country.

He has invited prominent Muslim leaders and clerics to the prayers slated for the National Mosque in Abuja.

The National Muslims Prayers for Peace and Security in Nigeria is aimed at helping the country in “overcoming the current security challenges facing the country.”

The prayers are coming on the heels of an open letter to the Sultan by a prominent Northern rights activist and author, Mallam Shehu Sani, who has been part of several past efforts to end Boko Haram’s five-year deadly uprising through dialogue.

Sani said Nigeria’s top clerics should do more to help secure the release of more than 200 school girls held hostage by Boko Haram, whose mass abduction from a school in Chibok in the northeast on April 14 has drawn worldwide condemnation.

“Religious clerics, particularly in the north, should move beyond prayers and independently move further to reach out to the insurgents and amicably retrieve these girls via means that will guarantee their safe return,” Sani wrote during the week.

“The Chibok girls have guns on their heads and chains on their hands and we have a dangling sword of posterity hanging over our heads,” he added.