Senegal's Islamic Schools

Many are sent by parents in Senegal to Islamic schools, called daaras, where they are expected to receive food, shelter and teachings from the Koran. But tens of thousands of children in daaras across the West African nation are forced to beg in the streets to make money for their teachers, called marabouts, said rights groups such as Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Anti-Slavery International.

President Macky Sall in June ordered the removal of children from the streets and said those who force them to beg would be imprisoned in a drive to end a practice estimated by the United Nations to generate $8 million a year for Koranic teachers in the capital.

Yet fewer than 1,000 talibe [street-kids] of more than 30,000 in Dakar have been swept off the streets to date, with marabouts hiding them away or dressing them smartly to evade detection, said the state's national director of child protection Niokhobaye Diouf. "Many disappeared after Sall's announcement ... hidden by the crooked people who profit from their begging," Diouf said.

Sall vowed to close unsafe daaras after nine children died in 2013 in a fire, yet few have been shut down, while an anti-trafficking law passed in 2005 to stop the abuse of talibe has since led to only a dozen prosecutions of marabouts, HRW said. A draft law to regulate and modernise the daaras has stalled amid concerns from marabouts about the integration of the schools into Senegal's education system, activists said.

Many activists said prosecuting marabouts is key to ending abuses. "With the regulatory law in limbo and daaras not part of the education system, how else can Senegal ensure talibe are not subjected to begging and abuse?" said Lauren Seibert of HRW.

Yet few prosecutors choose to take on cases against marabouts, according to a spokesman for the justice ministry's anti-trafficking task force (CNLTP). Only a handful of marabouts have been jailed in cases of extreme abuse and deaths of talibe in recent years, activists said, while Senegal has only made two convictions for forced begging since 2014, found the U.S. TIP report.

"It may be harder to change the mindset of prosecutors than that of marabouts," said Laetitia Bazzi of the U.N. children's agency (UNICEF).

Islamic child exploitation in Sengal

In Senegal, thousands of children are exploited by their teachers in the name of Koranic education. Called talibes, the Arabic word for students, some 50,000 boys are forced into child labor, according to Human Rights Watch.

“Families do not have money to pay for the religious education of their children,” Miranda said, “so for them it is logical that the child himself be the one to finance their own education.” Housed in deplorable conditions in daaras, or schools, teachers demand talibes deliver daily begging quotas or be beaten, starved, or left out in the street.

http://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2016/03/talibes-senegal/475320/

Africa's anti-atheism

Botswana

The constitution and other laws mandate a secular state and protect freedom of religion or belief. However, there are widespread state privileges for Christianity and routine bias against the nonreligious. Government meetings often begin with a Christian prayer. Even though the constitution prohibits forced religious instruction, forced participation in religious ceremonies, or taking oaths that run counter to an individual's religious beliefs, religious education is part of the curriculum in public schools. This public education emphasizes Christianity but also addresses other religious groups in the country, while excluding humanists and other non-theists. Additionally, the constitution provides that every religious community may establish places for religious instruction at the community's expense.

Cameroon

The constitution mandates a secular state, and the constitution and other laws and policies protect freedom of religion or belief. However, there are widespread government privileges for religion, especially Christianity and Islam, and routine bias against the nonreligious. The government gives an annual subsidy to all private primary and secondary education institutions, including those operated by religious denominations. State-sponsored television station and radio stations broadcast Christian and Islamic religious services on a regular basis, as well as religious ceremonies on national holidays and during national events.

Chad

The constitution provides that the country shall be a secular state. However, some policies favor Islam in practice. A committee composed of members of the High Council for Islamic Affairs (HCIA) and the Directorate of Religious and Traditional Affairs in the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) organized trips to Mecca for the Hajj (pilgrimage during the 12th month of the Islamic calendar) and Umrah (pilgrimage). The Director of Religious and Traditional Affairs oversees religious matters. The HCIA oversees Islamic religious activities, including the supervision of some Arabic-language schools and higher institutions of learning, and the representation of the country in international Islamic meetings. The HCIA, in coordination with the president, appoints the grand imam, a spiritual leader for Muslims, who oversees each region's high imam and serves as head of the council. In principle, although not consistently in practice, the grand imam has the authority to restrict proselytizing by Islamic groups, regulate the content of mosque sermons, and exert control over activities of Islamic charities. Religious leaders are involved in managing the country's wealth. A representative of the religious community sits on the Revenue Management College, the body that oversees use of Chad’s oil revenues. The seat rotates between Muslim and Christian leaders every four years. While the government is legally obligated to treat all religious groups or denominations equally, some non-Muslims allege that Muslims receive preferential status, particularly concerning use of public lands for building places of worship.

Djibouti

Although the constitution and other laws and policies protect freedom of religion or belief, Islam is the state religion and the president and other government employees, including magistrates, are required to take religious oaths. More than 99% of the population identifies as Sunni Muslim. Citizens officially are considered Muslims if they do not specifically identify with a faith; there are no figures available on the number of atheists in the country. Muslims are required to marry in an Islamic ceremony. Non-Muslims—who are known to include Roman Catholics, Protestants, Copts, and Bahá'ís—must marry in accordance with the rites of the religion with which they are registered. The government allows civil marriage only for non-Muslim foreign residents; so if there were atheist Djibouti who wanted to marry, they would not be able to do so (unless they hid their atheism and registered with a religion). A non-Muslim man may marry a Muslim woman only after converting to Islam. According to the family code, "impediment to a marriage occurs when a Muslim woman marries a non-Muslim." The president is required to take a religious oath at inauguration; other government employees are also required to do so, such as magistrates, the presidents of Constitutional Court, Supreme Court, Chamber of Accounts, and the inspector general of state. While there is no penalty established by law, it remains an official custom written in the Constitution for the president of the country and required by law for others. No legal provision exists for opposite practice.

Equatorial Guinea

While the constitution and other laws and policies protect freedom of religion or belief, a 1992 presidential decree regulates the exercise of freedom of religion or belief. This decree provides official preference for the Roman Catholic Church and the Reformed Church of Equatorial Guinea. While the decree does not hinder the practice of other religions or beliefs, its preferential effects can be observed in some circumstances; for example, Catholic masses are a normal part of any major ceremonial function, such as the October 12 National Day and June 5 President’s Birthday. In addition, Catholic and Reform church officials are exempt from airport entry and exit taxes.

Eritrea

The 1997 constitution protects freedom of religion or belief. However, the government has yet to implement the constitution, and in practice it does not respect freedom of belief. In the past few years, there has been an increase in serious government violations of religious freedom, including mass arrests, torture and death for members of minority belief groups. In 2002 the government decreed that all religious groups must either register or cease all religious activities. Four religious groups are now registered: the Eritrean Orthodox Church, the Evangelical (Lutheran) Church of Eritrea, Islam, and the Roman Catholic Church. Religious facilities that did not belong to the four officially recognized religious groups were forced to close. The government retains significant control over the four registered religious groups, in most cases controlling their leadership and finances. Many places of worship have closed because of government intimidation and the mass conscription of religious workers and parishioners. The government routinely harasses and detains members of registered and unregistered religious groups, some of whom reportedly died as a result of torture and lack of medical treatment while in detention. By the end of 2011, many estimated that the population of religious prisoners remained at 2,000 to 3,000. Some arrestees reported that they were only released after they signed statements recanting their religious beliefs and agreeing to join an officially registered religion as a condition of their release. The application for an exit visa requires a designation of religious affiliation, and members of unregistered religions or no religion require additional permission from the Office of Religious Affairs, which has been reported to grant permission, deny permission, or arrest applicants on the spot for practicing an unrecognized faith or being non-religious.

Ethiopia
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The constitution requires the separation of state and religion; however, under a 2008 law it is a crime to defame religious groups.

The Gambia

Article 25 of the Constitution protects the rights of citizens to follow any religion or belief that they choose. The government has not established a state religion, although the constitution establishes Qadi (Muslim judge trained in the Islamic legal tradition) courts in such places as the chief justice determines. Their jurisdiction applies only to marriage, divorce, and inheritance questions for Muslims where they apply traditional Islamic law. The Supreme Islamic Council (SIC) is an independent body that advises the government on religious issues. Although the government does not have representation on the council, it provided the council with substantial funding. The minister of religious affairs maintains a formal relationship with the council. Government meetings and events typically commenced with two prayers, one Islamic and one Christian. The government funds religious instruction in schools. Public and private schools throughout the country provide Biblical and Qur'anic studies with government support.

Mauritania

The constitution and other laws and policies restrict freedom of religion or belief and the 1991 constitution defines the country as an Islamic republic and recognizes Islam as the sole religion of its citizens and the state. Due to this stance, all non-Muslims are restricted from being citizens of the country, and Mauritanians who leave Islam for another religion or no religion lose their citizenship. In addition, Article 306 of the penal code outlaws apostasy: anyone found guilty of converting from Islam will be given the opportunity to repent within three days and if the person does not repent, the individual will be sentenced to death and the person’s property will be confiscated by the Treasury. Sharia (Islamic law) provides legal principles upon which the law and legal procedures are based. The government and citizenry consider Islam to be the essential cohesive element unifying the country's various ethnic groups. There is a cabinet-level Ministry of Islamic Affairs and Traditional Education. The High Council of Islam, consisting of six imams, advised the government on conformance of legislation to Islamic precepts. The judiciary consists of a single system of courts that uses principles of Sharia in matters concerning the family and modern legal principles in all other matters. The government requires members of the Constitutional Council and the High Council of Magistrates to take an oath of office that includes a promise to God to uphold the law of the land in conformity with Islamic precepts. Both public schools and private Islamic schools include classes on Islam, and attendance at these religious classes is required.

Nigeria

The constitution and other laws and policies protect freedom of religion or belief. The constitution mandates that local, state and federal government “shall not adopt any religion as State Religion.” However, some state governments have a record of abusing freedom of religion or belief. There is significant hostility and violence between religious communities, especially Christians and Muslims, in many parts of the country. Some outbreaks of communal violence have resulted in hundreds of deaths. Yet, a climate of impunity exists, as authorities rarely prosecute and punish those responsible for violent attacks. The constitution provides that states may establish courts based on the common law or customary law systems. Twelve northern states Sokoto, Kebbi, Niger, Kano, Katsina, Kaduna, Jigawa, Yobe, Bauchi, Borno, Zamfara, and Gombe—maintained Sharia courts, which adjudicated both criminal and civil matters, along with common law and customary law courts. Non-Muslims had the option to try their cases in the Sharia courts if involved in disputes with Muslims. If non-Muslims did not agree to go to Sharia courts, common law courts would hear their cases. Although the constitution does not explicitly allow Sharia courts to hear criminal cases, they have done so in the past. In Zamfara State, the first state to adopt Sharia, a Sharia court must hear all criminal cases involving Muslims. No laws barred women or any groups from testifying in common law courts or gave less weight to their testimony; however, Sharia courts usually accorded less weight to the testimony of women and non-Muslims. Both federal and state governments regulate mandatory religious instruction in public schools; however, the constitution mandates that students do not receive religious instruction in any religion other than their own. In theory students can request a teacher of their own beliefs to provide alternative instruction, but in practice many schools lack teachers capable of doing so. Although the jurisdiction of Sharia technically does not apply to non-Muslims in civil and criminal proceedings, certain social mores inspired by Sharia, such as the separation of the sexes, affected non- Muslim minorities in the north. Many non-Muslims perceive that they lived under the rule of a Muslim government and often feared reprisals for their religious affiliation. The Hisbah—Sharia enforcement
groups funded by state governments in Bauchi, Zamfara, Niger, Kaduna, and Kano—enforce, sometimes violently, some Sharia statutes.

Sudan

The interim constitution and other laws and policies provide for some freedom of religion or belief. However, there are Islamic prohibitions against apostasy, blasphemy, and interfaith marriages. The Interim National Constitution enshrines Islamic law as a source of legislation in the country, and theofficial laws and policies of the government and the ruling National Congress Party favour Islam. Although there is no legal penalty for converting from another religion to Islam, converting from Islam to another religion or belief is punishable by imprisonment or death. Persons convicted of conversion are given the opportunity to recant their conversion before execution. A Muslim man may marry a Christian
or Jewish women, but a Muslim woman cannot marry a non-Muslim unless he converts to Islam. The penalty for blasphemy and “defamation” of Islam is up to six months in prison, whipping, and/or a fine.

Zambia

The constitution and other laws and policies protect freedom of religion or belief. However, the government requires Christian instruction in public schools. The classes are conducted in both the Catholic and Protestant traditions and are mandatory for all students through grade seven.

Nigeria's bombings - How the UK created, fostered and empowered Nigeria's terrorists

In Nigeria the news headlines are of the Islamic organisation Boko Haram's bombing campaign. A MediaLens contributer reminds us the historic role of British divide and rule in Nigeria's past.

Nigeria was the creation of British imperialism and marked the limits of its aims, arms and ambition around Africa's third longest river - the mighty Niger, which gave the country its name. Originally the invaders were only interested in the southern parts of the territory now called Nigeria, especialy its rich forests and their plentiful produce of raw materials in heavy demnd in the west, particularly its palm oil, then required to grease the humming wheels of English industry. The natural deep harbours of Calabar and Lagos with its protective lagoon, were also coveted by the British crown.

However to protect the source of the Niger from the encroachments of its French rivals then enfiltrating southwards from their North African holdings, Britain's colonial army, fresh from subduing the southern tribes east and west of the Niger, marched north and bursting through the forest found the northern Savannah domianted by one of Africa's oldest, most educated and cultivated ruling classes - the Hausa Fulani islamic aristocracy whose relatively spohisticated state structure, monotheism and powerful calavary gave them unchallenged writ across the vast northern grass lands. After subduing their initial resistance, the sultans and emirs were integrated into the coloinal structure as its willing tools, keeping their thrones and faith in exchange for fidelity and subservience to the new conquerors. Kneeling to the west for their power, if still facing the east in prayer.

Unlike the lawless and rebellious tribes to the south, with their weak states and fractious people the universal and unquestioned authority of the northern princes was attarctive to the colnial rulers as it fitted in with British colonial poilcy of occupation lite, ruling in the main through local puppets, an approach they had mastered in india. Hence the new masters favoured the aristocracy in recruitment to the new civil service army and police. Development, as would be expected from a low base proceeded rapildy in the south, while to maintain the power of its islamic allies in the North, education, industrialisation and liberal social policies were restricted in northern nigeria by the British colonial administration.

The quicker urbanisation in the south created an increasingly radicalised working class and restive intelligentsia there who from the 1920's began organising against the colonial regime. By the end of the second world war, strikes, demonstrations and increasingly assertive agitation against coloinal rule was taking place across the sotuhern regions, with its nationalist leaders demanding ever more forcefully and confidently full independence from a severely weakened post war Britain.

To counterbalance the agitation centred in the big southern cities like Lagos, the British bolstered the power of the islamic aristocracy in the North, expanding its regional base and powers and placing the scions of its ruling houses in key positions in the army and emerging civil service. The country's census was also rigged giving the north a fraudulent edge over the far more populous southern regions, at a stroke re-writing the rules of geography by increasing the population of a land the closer it got to the desert.

"... islamic terror in Nigeria first burst on the scene in the same city, Kano, it has returned to with such venom. This was in 1956, when the British colonial Government and its allies amongst the conservative islamic aristocracy in the north reacted to a motion of independence by radical nationalists, by instigating a murderous rampage of islamic mobs in the ancient city of Kano, slaugtering agitators for independence and southern Nigerians, where demands for independence were most vociferous..."

"...another far bloodier episode of apocalyptic Islamic terror in Northern Nigeria, far bloodier in scale and serious in consequence than the 1956 riots which were used to intimidate the country into handing over power at independence in 1960 to the west's prefered faction - the subservient emirs and sultans in the North , the most retrograde and reactionary social layer on the continent, who as in Pakistan, now also disintegrating at the onslaught of right wing islamic terror, the departing British imposed on the country to ensure this potential regional giant remained forever prostrate and subservient to the west.

This second major incident of right wing islamic terror in Nigeria occurred in 1966 when in response to a radical coup by a group of young leftist officers in the Nigerian army, MI6 station oficers and British diplomats in the north brazenly broke cover and together with its conservative allies helped mobilise and unleash crazed islamic mobs across the north against southern Nigerians and suspected supporters of the coup. Men women and children across the north were dragged out of their homes and hacked to death in the streets by frenzied fundamentalist mobs with pregnant women having their foetus ripped out from their wombs before the mothers themselves were butchered.

While this was going on British and American diplomats sipped tea and brandy with right wing military officers, sons and scions of the northern ruling houses, in Lagos's main cantonment, plotting a military domination of the country that would last another 3 decades and bring the country to the brink of ruin.

Almost 30,000 mostly ibo southerners were killed in the massacres of 1966 which led to the Biafran war where a milion more died. The dead were so many in Kano, yes the same Kano, that excavators had to be hired from Julius Berger and other construction firms to pile the heaps of corpses into mass graves hastily dug outside the ancient city's walls..."

"...Boko Haram the Nigerian fundamentalist group behind the Kano Bombings is not the Nigerian wing of Al-Quaeda as the western media suggest, sharing its global apocalyptic vision, although there are undoubtedly links. However like the Pakistani Taliban the groups agenda is largely local.
In reality It is the armed wing of the country's powerful conservative Northern establishment who were edged out of power after 40 years of totally dominating it by the pro-democracy uprisings and struggles of the mid to late 1990's. The current wave of bombings and indiscriminate attacks are the arrow head of a counter offensive by the Northern elite and its conservative alies across the country to regain what they beleieve to be their birth right - the right to rule the cuntry without challenge or even the most rudimentary democratic accountability. The right the British gave them at independence in 1960....As in Pakistan there are clear links between the terrorists and senior memebrs of the countries security establishment, many of whom have now gone rogue."

"...At independence with the power of the British state behind them, power unsurprisingly went to the northern leaders who now in full control of state apparatus, reeaced out to allies across the country creating a pan regional conservative alliance cutting across tribes and regional lines and based upon the direct access to and theft of public resources at the centre and repression of the masses across the country. The discovery of oil and the concentration of its revenues in federal hands increased the powers of patronage of the Northern emirs and further cemented the pan regional alliance of the newly enriched national elite, who fearing the potential power of the millions of dispossessed but increasingly organised and educated masses in the heaving southern cities particularly the teeming megapolis of Lagos were happy to keep real power in the far islamic north from whence it could crush any uprising in the perpetually seething southern cities as it had crushed the Biafran rebellion.

The military dominated by the northern ruling houses was the prefered tool of power and its most powerful arms, the armoured brigades and bomber squadrons were all based in the north. After its crushing victory over the Biafran rebellion in the oil rich south east, it would rule almost unchallenged for 3 decades - from 1970 to 1998.

The north far poorer than the south was frozen in time with a stupendously rich and powerful elite enjoying the most modern amenities and luxuries money could buy while ruling with the help of imams and islamic scholars over a populace whose standard of living had seen almsot no change from the conditions their forefathers had endured over 6 centuries before. In Northern Nigeria the rich live in splendour, the poor in their millions beg in the street, a lumpenised class whose dehumanisation is without equal anywhere on the continent and from wherein the fanatics recruit their foot soldires.

The northern Oligarchy and the ruling class it dominates have devastated Nigeria in 4 ruinous decades of staggering corruption, mismanagement misrule while surbodinating the country in the most servile manner to the most rapacious exploitation of western imperialism - a period in whch the country has earned the equivalent of a quarter of a trillion pounds in oil revene without one of its towns or city's boasting a working electricity, transport, sewage or water supply system.

The combination of miliatry dictatorship and the use of auxillary islamic mobs served to maintain the power of the elite backed at the hieght of the cold war for decades by western imperialism whose policies were then to support the most vile and reactionary right wing regimes in the thrid world regardless of their brutality in an attempt to prevent the rise of popular movements in these countries.

However this changed in the early 1990's due to two reasons; the rise of pro-democracy movements on the African continent, partly inspired by the succes of the struggle in South Africa and secondly the collapse of the Soviet Union and rise of islamic fundamentalism which replaced communism as the West's main bogey man.

In 1993, the Nigerian military backed by the oligarchs cancelled an electrion, the country's freest ever, won by a popular centre left Business man Moshood Abiola, sparking a civilian uprising without precedent in the country's history and plunging Nigeria into its biggest political crisis since the Biafran war. However this time around their western patrons, already distancing themselves from their most brutal cold war allies across the third world, and fearful of creating more hot beds of rising islamic militancy, the chancelries of the west were far cooler and more ambivalent to their old allies in the north.

Isolated internationally and weakened domestically by civil unrest and regional tensions, the millitary dictatorship collapsed in 1998.

The resultant civilian regime was a compromise one which to pacify the people edged out the northern oligarchs and their most corrupt and hated alies from direct control of the state. In 2011, to pacify the oil producing Niger Delta and its long brutalised people who had risen in arms against their oppressioin, under intense western pressure, desperate to calm the Niger Delta, an indigene of the area, Goodluck Johnatahn, was sponsored for and won the presidency.

While slavishly folowing the neo liberal agenda of all his predecessors, his victory has been a step too far for the conservative oilgarchy whose powers are directly linked to the control of the state, its oil and the immense powers of patronage it provides.

In the past the Oligarchy and conservatives would have regained power through a coup detat using the army which they've always controlled. But things have changed - military rule is no longer fashionable internationally and the growth of civil society and labour and environmental militancy particualry in the south and oil producing parts of the country makes this a fraught option - a recent general strike over fuel prices brought millions on to the streets

Any coup now would in all likelihood lead to a break up of the country and possibly a war which the Northern elite facing a changed and less favourable international climate than during the Biafran war, cannot be sure of wining. Hence the use of an armed islamic auxillary force, Boko Haram, backed by shadowy figures within the state to intimidate a civil society they now see slipping away from their autocratic control, forcing the west to re-think and hand them back their 'right to rule' or face the country being made ungovernable..."

"If Nigeria the biggest and most powerful country on Africa's west coast falls the entire region could be set ablaze with the Northern region developing into a badland of fundamentalism and violence so uncontrollable that it would make Somalia look like a sleepy saturday resort park."

Nigerian royalty

The Emir of Kano strolls regally along the red carpet with a silver-tipped staff and a jeweled turban that looks like a disco ball, as commoners bow and scrape in his wake. Kano's streets are strewn with trash, and schools and clinics are run down. In northern Nigeria, the emirs have no control over mechanisms of the state such as the police, taxation or criminal justice. But they receive five percent of all funds given to local government.
At the same time, the emirs wield considerable power as the top Islamic figures in their regions.The emirs also oversee the Shariah court system, which rules based on Islamic civil law. In northern Nigeria, governors have imposed the Shariah system in a bid to harness their political fortunes to religious sensibilities.

islam and judaism

It hurts too much to lie on his back, so the 7-year-old has spent the past month stretched out on his stomach. His two grandmothers sit on the hospital bed beside him, fanning the pink flesh left exposed by his teacher's whip.

The Quranic teacher who did this to him is behind bars.

But what is most significant is that the boy's father — a poor farmer who sold part of his harvest to pay for the bus fare to the hospital — filed the charges against the teacher himself. In doing so, this man with cracked lips and bloodshot eyes braved the wrath of his entire village, including his own father, who considers all teachers in Senegal's Islamic schools to be holy .Even hospitals have become wary of treating beaten talibe, or Quranic students, for fear of retaliation from the religious community.

In hundreds of these schools in the mostly Muslim West African country, children are made to beg in the streets and are beaten if they don't bring back enough money. One 10-year-old was beaten to death with his hands tied behind his back and his mouth stuffed with rocks. Despite laws passed to protect children, the courts have convicted only a handful of Quranic teachers and quickly cave in the face of powerful clerics. The respect for Islamic schools comes from a centuries-old tradition of families sending their sons to study the Quran and till fields in exchange for food. In the 1970s, as drought devastated West Africa, schools moved to the cities and Islamic teachers sent children out to beg in the streets. These days, boys as young as 3 are beaten not for failing to master the Quran, but for failing to bring back enough money — a change families often are unaware of.

The boy also had to beg for food. Some days all he got was a discarded fish head, or a spoonful of rice.By the second week, he was hungry all the time. On July 2, he begged until dark and got the 50 cents, but spent part of it on biscuits. When the marabout found out, the boy says, he got whipped until the skin on his back fell off. Hospital officials believe the whip was laced with metal.With around 30 children in his care, the marabout was netting $430 a month, three times the salary of an average citizen and as much as a government official.

"Ask yourself, what is this money used for? The kids are not fed, so it's not for food. They wear rags, so it's not for clothes. They don't have mattresses, so it's not for their beds," says Paul Ndiaye, of the Swiss aid group Sentinelles, who has spent the last 10 years trying to get courts to take action against abusive marabouts. "This is a sham on a grand scale under the cover of religion."

In Senegal that the word for "to educate" — "yaar" is the same as the word for the stick to discipline students.

Meanwhile , Israel's Law of Return guarantees citizenship for any Jew in need, and these days the country is especially concerned about boosting its Jewish population to compete with the Arabs. But the Ethiopians have proved the hardest immigrant group to absorb, and the Falash Mura, some critics feel, is pushing the limits. As a whole they are poor, plagued by crime, violence and substance abuse, feeling shut out of a world very different from rural Africa. But despite all the preparations, most Ethiopian immigrants over age 35 go straight onto welfare after reaching Israel, according to the Jewish Agency.

That's no reason for shutting out the Falash Mura, says Mazor Bahyna, an Ethiopian in the 120-member Knesset, or parliament.

"I think Israel has an obligation to prove that it is not a racist state," he says. "If everyone was blond-haired and had blue eyes, they would bring them."

"There is no end to reunification," said the Jewish Agency's Konforti.

Israel has struggled for years to figure out which Ethiopians should be allowed in. Each time it has attempted to end the immigration by emptying the Gondar camps and airlifting their inhabitants to Israel, thousands more have flooded into the camps, scrambling to prove their Jewishness.The argument now seems to have come down to numbers: Israel says the last of the Falasha Mura who qualify for immigration arrived in Israel earlier this month, while the American groups say some 8,700 have been left behind.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has upheld the Israeli list, effectively marking the end

Sharia in Nigeria: a class analysis

When, Bill Clinton visited Nigeria, he snubbed the predominantly Muslim north by dropping from his original itinerary a visit there where Sharia Law was in the process of being revived. But the Muslim leaders of the North, already apprehensive about Clinton's visit, had organized a massive protest demonstration, which took place on the very day the US President stepped on to Nigerian soil on 25 August 2000. Clinton visited Nigeria for purely economic reasons. If, therefore, he and the advocates of Sharia harboured a mutual distrust, then one may not be wrong to suggest that behind the Sharia façade lingers an economic motive. To understand this possibility better a brief history of Northern Nigeria is necessary.

Fulani theocracy
Islam was introduced into the area now occupied by Niger, Chad and Northern Nigeria by Arab traders from North Africa and, by the 11th century, many of the rulers there, who were mostly Hausa, had been converted to Islam though, their subjects still mostly adhered to their Africa traditional religions. It was not until the beginning of the 19th century that a Fulani Muslim scholar decided to launch a jihad on the people, accusing them of being "pagans" or, in the case of the rulers, of not practicing Islam in the true sense of the word.

He succeeded in overthrowing the Hausa leaders and placed his tribesmen as leaders of the Hausa city-states. With Sokoto in present day North-Nigeria as headquarters, the Fulani Empire spread its tentacles southwards and by the close of the 19th century had touched Yorubaland down south. Having established themselves as the new rulers in the region, the top brass of the Muslim Fulani naturally controlled commerce, trade routes, agriculture and thus became not only the political leaders but more importantly they held economic power. As commerce and industry flourished, these sultans, emirs and sardaunas set up courts where they tried cases according to the Sharia.

Many writers refer to the action of Dan Fodio and his generals as more of a Fulani revolt against the Hausa rulers than an Islamic Jihad. Whatever the case, the ordinary Fulani, like the ordinary Hausa, still lived in poverty while the new ruling classes enjoyed the same privileges the old Hausa lords had.

Enter Britain
The political and economic dominance of the new Muslim Fulani was, however, interrupted by the coming on to the scene of the British colonialists. The mid-nineteenth century saw the gradual annexation of city-states, not only in the south but also in the north. Several Muslim states had been taken over by the British, partly through the signing of treaties and partly by force. Though the then governor of Nigeria, Lord Lugard, ran the country through the "indirect rule" system, the powers of the Fulani oligarchy were considerably eroded. The taxes and rent they hitherto monopolised were now to be passed on to the colonial administration in Lagos. Their authority also shrank as clerks and other administrative officials were appointed by the governor to assist in running the states. All important decisions were made by the British governor, leaving the sultans and emirs with the less rewarding duty of implementing them. They thus lost considerable authority over their subjects.

With the attainment of independence in 1960 and an increased influx of western lifestyles, ideas and secularism, the importance of these Muslim Leaders further plummeted. A new category of privileged groups emerged, in the form of top civil servants, lawyers and businessman. Some of them even attained, through their economic power, a higher social status than the traditional rulers. Thus, having lost almost all the authority and power vested in them by the Jihad, the Muslim Fulani rulers were getting frustrated at the new disadvantaged economic sidelines they were being relegated to.

Why ‘new’ sharia?
It must be made clear that sharia did exist in Northern Nigeria for a very long time in the "cadi" or "alkali" courts. However, they only handled cases relating to family matters like divorce, inheritance, adoption, etc. The current one has attracted a lot of attention because it seeks to go further to include flogging, stoning, amputation, beheading, etc. So the question now is: who is behind it and why. All reports coming from the ten states involved in the confusion claim that it is the Muslim masses who are clamouring for sharia. Nothing could be further from the truth. The decision-making process in place in Nigeria, and in fact all over the world today, effectively excludes the masses. All decisions are taken by the few in high positions. Every legislative body is peopled with the rich or their representatives who enact laws meant to control the poor.

In the case of sharia in Northern Nigeria, it is heavyweights like Alhaji Shehu Shageri (former president of the federal republic of Nigeria), Alhaji Ahmed Sani Yarima (governor of Zamfara state) Alhaji Ebrahim al Zakzaky (leader of the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood) who make decisions and then call on the people to support them. In fact, when last year President Olusegun Obasanjo called a meeting of the Council of State to discuss sharia, Shagari not only refused to attend but also said the Council had no right to take any decision on sharia.. Alhaji Ahmed Sani Yarima, for his part, said Zamfara would not comply with the Council of State's decision that sharia be suspended. These examples show clearly that the masses do not make any decisions.

This Islamic revival sweeping across Northern Nigeria, in the form of sharia, is in reality the determined efforts of the Muslim Fulani overlords to regain their damagingly eroded power and authority and consequently their sources of wealth, coupled with the desire of the Muslim Hausa elite and businessmen to further their economic interests. This unholy alliance of the fendal Fulani and nouveau-rich Haus came to be known as the Muslim Hausa Fulani. Their imposition of the sharia on the people signifies the ongoing class war of the ruling class which, as is always the case, pits the unsuspecting masses against each other. It is, therefore, not surprising that in Zamfara state (the first to go sharia) whereas the two cinema palaces in Gusau (the capital) are closed down, the wealthy few are allowed to keep their satellite dishes and VCRs. Also, since the start of the sharia nonsense in those Northern states, only the poor have fallen victim to the penal code and the various clashes. The originators and their families remain safe whilst the poor masses are used as cannon fodder in a matter that they (the masses) have nothing to gain from—nay, in a matter that is very detrimental to them.

It is not by accident, therefore, that whereas the ordinary Muslims and Christians and Northerners and Easterners and Westerners are busy killing and maiming each other their Muslim, Christian, northern, eastern and western wealthy leaders are hidden away in cosy mansions, jointly forming and owning political parties for the ordinary Muslim Christians northerners, easterners and westerns to vote for come election day. This is real class war.

Another economic dimension which adds some weight to the desire to implement sharia relates to the oil-rich sheikhdoms of the Gulf region. These countries have set up numerous organizations that generously disburse funds to Muslim groups and states all over the poor world. So in order to have access to these cheap "petro-dollars" the leadership of the Northern Nigerian states only need to express their total commitment to Islam and Islamization and the hard cash will start to flow in to further enrich those leaders. It is in this light that one can understand the marathon trip undertaken by governor Ahmed Sani Yarima of Zamfara state to Pakistan, Egypt, Qatar, Sudan and Saudi Arabia at the peak of the international outcry, in 2001, over the poor Saffiatu Husein who is to be stoned to death for adultery, though the man who impregnated her is set free. It is also known that Ibrahim al Zakzaky, the leader of the fanatical Muslim Brotherhood, and a notorious trouble-shooter, is heavily funded by Iran.

Fighting sharia
A lot of noise has been made about the excesses of sharia but little has been put forth worthy of a solution to the anomaly. Nigeria is broadly divided into Hausa Fulani north, the Ibo east, and the Yoruba west. The privileged classes in all these three areas always come up with issues that keep the masses distracted from the exploitation visited upon them by the same privileged classes who consider themselves leaders of their people. In the North today it is Sharia, in the West it is Ooduwa People's Congress (OPC) which is demanding full control of the resources of "their land", and in the East there are the various secessionist movements. The whole aim of fomenting troubles is for the leaders to carve out spheres of economic influence for themselves among their various ethnic groups.

All these sectional and divisionist activities can never solve the real problems of the people—poverty, disease, hunger, illiteracy, insecurity, war, etc. In fact the leaders who instigate the masses to go sharia or to secede, and most of those who are seen to be taking issue with the excesses thereof, are merely seeking to enhance their economic interests. Religion, secessionist movements, nationalism and many so-called human right activists are generally tools used by the ruling classes to perpetrate the status quo. All those involved in the promotion of such ideas are birds of the same feather. They hypocritically shout about freedom of conscience and self-determination, unity of mankind, justice,etc. Such double-standards expose not only their bankruptcy and insincerity but also the reactionary role of religion, secession and nationalism.

The only solution to those issues is to uproot the real cause of the problems—the overthrow of the unjust economic system in operation in today's world. It is this system which makes it possible for the masses to be kept in a state of ignorance, allowing a few individuals to take advantage of this same ignorance. This injustice becomes possible since under the present economic arrangement it is a few who control the world's wealth, whilst the majority own nothing and so remain at the mercy of these few rich individuals. And that explains why religious patronage is a common phenomenon in Northern Nigeria, where the wealthy "alhajis" "own" mosques and the poor in the neighbourhood, who go there to pray and recognize the "owner" as bossman, get petty favours and so can easily be manipulated.

Suhuyini Nbang-ba

First published in Africa:A Marxian Analysis