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The Shari’a Debate and the Construction of a “Muslim” Identity in Northern Nigeria: A Critical Perspective
Abstract
With the election of civilian administrations at federal, state and local government levels in Nigeria in 1999 came an intensification of ethnic and religious identity politics in the country. In each part of the nation political elite appropriated the local identity as an important element in the struggle to for political relevance and the opportunity to share the spoils of public office. In northern Nigeria, a number of states started the “implementation” of shari’ah, invariably limited to amendments to a long existing penal code by reintroducing the fixed, hudud, punishments like amputation for theft and stoning to death for adultery, which
had been removed from the statutes by the colonial powers. The
symbolism of these amendments has reawakened a sense of
religious identity and added to the various tensions undermining
the unity and stability of the Nigerian state. The present paper argues that the manufacture of religious difference divides the Nigerian people and diverts attention from the pressing need for radical political and economic reform, and a struggle against official corruption, political reaction, great economic inequalities and intensifying poverty and
alienation. The reforms made to shari’ah have been such as to
reduce Islam to a body of harsh laws aimed largely at poor
people who steal and women who commit adultery. The
amputation of hands of goat thieves and the sensational
sentencing of pregnant divorcees to death by stoning based
on pregnancy as proof have revealed the lack of depth of understanding of shari’ah by its proponents and implementers. They also reveal an underlying ideological position that is being entrenched and legitimated through the mediation of overtly religious discourses.
It is this ideological construction of identity, this manipulation
of the sense of self and other, that the paper aims to expose.
had been removed from the statutes by the colonial powers. The
symbolism of these amendments has reawakened a sense of
religious identity and added to the various tensions undermining
the unity and stability of the Nigerian state. The present paper argues that the manufacture of religious difference divides the Nigerian people and diverts attention from the pressing need for radical political and economic reform, and a struggle against official corruption, political reaction, great economic inequalities and intensifying poverty and
alienation. The reforms made to shari’ah have been such as to
reduce Islam to a body of harsh laws aimed largely at poor
people who steal and women who commit adultery. The
amputation of hands of goat thieves and the sensational
sentencing of pregnant divorcees to death by stoning based
on pregnancy as proof have revealed the lack of depth of understanding of shari’ah by its proponents and implementers. They also reveal an underlying ideological position that is being entrenched and legitimated through the mediation of overtly religious discourses.
It is this ideological construction of identity, this manipulation
of the sense of self and other, that the paper aims to expose.
