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 السعوديه نقيض للاسلام -المشروع الاسلامى فى افريقيا- لقاء صحفى بنيجيريا مع بروفسير ع. النعيم
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القراء الاعزاء
ارتايت اشراككم لتعم الفائده فى هذا القاء الصحفى مع البروفسر عبدالله النعيم فى نيجيريا والذى تعرض فيه لقضايا الدستور فى افريقيا والاسلام السياسى ومحاولة تطبيق الشريعه فى شمال نيجيريا
الفاضل الهاشمي
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An interview with Prof. Abdullahi An-Na’im in Nigeria
Saudi lifestyle contracdicts Islam – Prof. An-Na’im
By Uthman Abubakar
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im, who hails from Sudan, is currently a Professor of Law at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. He was, at various times, Associate Professor of Law (Head of Department of Public Law), University of Khartoum, Sudan; visiting Professor of Law, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, U.S.A; Scholar-In-Residence, the Ford Foundation, Office for the Middle East and North Africa, Cairo, Egypt; and Executive Director, Human Rights Watch/Africa, Washington DC, U.S.A, among others. He was in Nigeria recently to deliver a lecture on African Constitutionalism and the Role of Islam in Politics and the Society at a seminar organized by Centre for Democracy and Development. He answered some questions from Uthman Abubakar after the seminar.
A prevailing belief among most observers of Nigerian affairs is that the problem of the implementation of some of the vital aspects of the country’s constitution borders on corruption, especially the monetization of the voting process during elections. What do you think is the way out of this?
If I have malaria, at the beginning, I know the symptoms. I have fever, I have this, and I have that and so on and so forth. So, I will go and have a diagnosis from a doctor. I will then have a prescription, which I will apply. Then, overtime, I get treated. The point is this. The Nigerian experience with regard to corruption is not unique. There are many societies with corruption against which they have their own separate strategies. The problem with corruption is that it infects the people with whom you have to work. It is very insidious, very secretive and very difficult to detect. The United States, which is now seen as the topmost superpower, had a very serious problem with corruption in the 1920s and the 1930s. For example, mafia organized crimes bribed judges, juries and mayors. The former mayor of Atlanta was convicted recently on corruption charges, accepting bribes and evading taxes. The tax charge was proved by the prosecution, and he is going to prison. So, anywhere – Japan, China, Russia or anywhere, as we speak there are corrupt officials; as we speak, there are people who are trying to subvert the democratic process; but also as we speak, there are people who are struggling to create institutions to fight corruption, and they succeed. It is relative. Italy has the problem; Latin America has it, and every other country.
Most of these countries have been able to implement their constitutions with varying degrees of success, in spite of the prevailing corruption, but Nigeria does not seem to have been successful in that regard…
Those countries were successful overtime, although no country sits back and waits for anything to happen. It took the United States three to four decades to tackle organized crimes, bribing officials and other forms of corruption, but they did not sit back and wait for it to happen. What I am saying is that with regard to fighting corruption, we should not be impatient, but we should not be complacent. I say it to every single Nigerian, and to me as an African, that we know what is wrong, we know how to correct it, but we lack the will to act. Nigeria is one of the most prominent African societies, a highly educated and sophisticated society. Nigerians know and Nigerians have the capacity to do it, but they lack the will to do it. This is where my point is focusing. Let us acknowledge that it is our failure of will, not our lack of ability to implement our constitution to eradicate corruption, to eradicate poverty.
Zamfara state adopted the Islamic legal system, Sharia. It was attacked for, among many others, implementing a religious constitution within a broader Nigerian society which operates a secular constitution. How do you see a nation operating two conflicting constitutional systems and prospering?
I will recall what Sayyidina Aliy Ibn Abi Talib said. As a Muslim, I am bound by Sharia, and I can never escape my responsibility for my obligation under Sharia. But Sharia can not be enforced by the state, because the state’s institution of bureaucracy, in fact, leads to corruption of Sharia itself. I believe that the realm of Sharia is in the community and in the individual Muslim’s conscience and practice. We know that there is no religious action which is valid without Niyyah (intention), the intention to comply. State institutions cannot have Niyyah because it is a person, it is not an entity. It is an institution. The second point is that, whether we like it or not, the reality is that there are many differences among Muslims as well as between Muslims and non-Muslims. If we talk of Nigeria as a country where 50 percent are Muslims and 50 percent are Christians, even if there is a country with only two or three percent who are Christians or who are pagans, still you will have the problem of uniformity in the applicability of different laws. The country belongs to all of them, whereas my belief as a Muslim, my obligation to implement and to observe Sharia is my religious obligation. So, my point is that we should not use state institutions to claim that we are imposing religious obligations. This is false. And I think the point is that as a Muslim, and someone who is a Christian in any state in Northern Nigeria or in the east or south can promote our religious values. The fact that we can observe our religious obligations as a matter of Sharia is beyond questioning. That is already accepted and granted. For example, if the state permits Ribah (usury) does not mean that I as a Muslim can engage in Ribah. I observe my religious obligation by not engaging in Ribah. I establish an authentic banking system, that is a private institution in which I can use resources to create wealth and so on. So, we can do this without the state enforcing it. If the state tries to enforce it, it is bound to create a very strong backlash. In Nigeria, and I say this very bluntly, if Muslims insist, and it is not all Muslims, it is some Muslims who are trying to impose their own understanding of Sharia on everyone else at the expense of the unity and stability of the country. We have had six years of Sharia in the 12 Northern states now. Let us honestly look and see what difference that initiative made. The problem with initiatives like Zamfara state which is trying to impose the Sharia code is clear. It is a lie by the way. I don’t believe that you can impose the Sharia code. Once you enact a statute like the penal code, it is no longer a Sharia principle. It becomes a political will of the state, not the religious law of Muslims. As a Muslim I have a choice among competing opinions of scholars. We know that the Fuqaha’ have tremendous disagreements and respective difference of opinions. Throughout Muslim history, people have had a choice. I can go to a Maliki judge or a Hanafi judge according to my view of what is a valid view. But when the state imposes a particular view of a Maliki doctrine as a matter of state will, it is denying Muslims freedom of choice. So, my point is that Muslims can promote religious values in the communities; they can even have them adopted as a state policy, but through a process of consensus building with the idea of what I call public reason.
That means we have to give room for certain compromises. Even among the various sects of Muslims themselves and between the Muslims and the non-Muslims, when it comes to consensus building on how to run the affairs of the state according to individual inclinations, there will be compromises. Some Muslims, even among themselves, may not accept that. Muslims and non-Muslims may also not agree on that. Each will insist on having his way, no room for compromises …
Then you will have civil war. The point is that, do you realize the full consequences? Any Muslim, who says ‘I will not compromise,’ should go and live somewhere else on his own. But if you want to live in the same place with other people, you have to compromise. The point is that the person who says I will not compromise, I will say to him, imagine how you will feel if the other person says the same thing. That is if a Christian wants to impose Christian values on the state, would you accept? If not, why would you expect a Christian to accept you imposing your own values on him? So, compromise is a vital social need. We cannot live in the society without compromise. We cannot live even in a single family without it. Husband and wife have to compromise to live together. A child and its parents have to compromise to live together. If Muslims say we will not compromise, they should know that what they are saying is that we will go to civil war, because the other side will not accept your imposing it on them.
A major topic of debate and misunderstanding in the implementation of Sharia is Hudud (corporal punishments). How do you see the chopping off of the hand of the Muslim convict for stealing?
The Hudud (corporal punishments) are not a vital principle. It is in fact a very human interpretation. There are 55 members of the International Conference of Islamic countries. Muslims constitute about 1.3 billion people of the world population. That is, one fifth of the total population of the world is Muslims. Where among all these Muslims is the Hudud being implemented? How are they being implemented even when they are claimed to be implemented? My point is that the Hudud issue is really a lie and a way of distracting people from the real issues. In Saudi Arabia, in Iran, in Nigeria, in Sudan the Hudud are not implemented. They are not implemented against the powerful; they are not implemented against corruption. People should look around them and see, how did the Hudud apply in the Northern states which claim to have imposed Hudud since 2000? How many people with influence or power have been brought to account? How can you cut the hand of a thief who steals N20 or N100 and allow someone who steals billions of naira to get away with it? If you look at Islamic history, it is not true that Hudud have been a vital part of Sharia throughout the history. The definition of every Hadd is a human interpretation. The idea that you can impose the Hadd punishment by some sort of state power is also a very corrupting influence. I believe that from the Sharia point of view, if we are to implement Hudud at all, it should be the last thing we do. We should, first, build social justice, education, enable people to know what their obligations are, and then come to Hudud at a very later stage. What we see, and I say it very bluntly, in all the 12 states of Northern Nigeria, the Hudud was the first thing to do, and remains in the books to intimidate and also to create this aura that we are an Islamic state. But the corruption continues unabated. There is underdevelopment, poverty and lack of services. What is Sharia’s view on corruption? What is Sharia’s view on lack of education or lack of health facilities? I charge that the people who claim that they are implementing Sharia are saying what they are not doing. Sharia is total. Why is Sharia only on Hudud, and even the Hudud, only against the weak and the marginal?
How then can you assess the success or failure of Sharia in these states?
Sharia does not succeed or fail, because it is not an entity. It is people who succeed or fail. I say that Muslims who claim to implement Sharia in Northern Nigeria have failed. It is not that Sharia has failed. It is those people who claim to implement Sharia that have failed in its implementation. My point is that it is always human beings; it is never Sharia that is the problem.
Do you subscribe to the idea that the failure of the implementation of Sharia is substantially attributable to some mischief by advanced countries to ensure that no Islamic endeavour succeeds because it is “terrorism”?
If you want to have a Nigeria united, you cannot have a law that discriminates against non Muslims. We know that the current understanding of Sharia does, in fact, discriminate against non Muslims. Sharia, as in the Qur’an and Sunnah, is the ultimate obligation of Muslims, but every other interpretation of it is only human. I say to the governor of Zamfara, how does he justify choosing among the Sharia principles those which are within the jurisdiction of the state to apply Sharia in, and those which are outside the jurisdiction? If he has an obligation to apply Sharia, then it is total. He cannot say that this is state jurisdiction and this is federal jurisdiction. When he says this is state and this is federal, he is accepting the federal constitution principle. If you want to apply Sharia it should be total. Why is Sharia in Hudud and not in Ribah? How does any state of the North accept income from the federal budget which is not consistent with Sharia? These are the contradictions. So, my point is that this claim is false, and Nigeria will not stand united if Muslims refuse to compromise and, instead, say that we will insist on our way. On the question of foreign powers wanting anything Islamic to fail, let us make a distinction between what they wish and what we do. The fact is this is a wish, why should it be our action? Malik Bin Nabil, the North African Islamic Scholar, said colonialism is a consequence, not a cause. That is, it is colonialism that created our decline; it is our decline that invited colonialism. Our failure to be strong, to be honest, to be united, to be productive and to be competent was the problem. It is the decline of Islamic civilizations that allowed the European powers to come into our regions. So, my point is that let us stop making excuses. What do Britain, France or the United States have to do with the way Muslims behave as rulers in Zamfara state, or Kano or any state. So, if you insist on no compromise, you can go your own way, declare independence and establish a perfect Islamic state. If you want to be part of Nigeria, you have to accept what it means to be part of Nigeria.
You also posited in your recent lecture that there is nothing like the Islamic Ummah (community). You described the Ummah as a fallacy. Are you saying that nations like Saudi Arabia, Iran and others which claim to be Islamic states are not Islamic Ummahs?
No! They are not. In fact Saudi Arabia is one of the least Islamic countries in the world. The behaviour of the Saudis, their life styles, their attitudes, their arrogance, completely undermines the claim that they are an Islamic state. It is a hereditary monarchy. The king of Saudi Arabia is there by virtue of being of the Al Saud family, not by virtue of being a pious Muslim or a learned Muslim or an honest administrator. It is a corrupt monarchy. You see, when we say that the West wants to undermine us, it is because we do the things that enable them undermine us. Our economies, our education, our defense, our foreign policy, all of these things have totally collapsed. The idea of Ummah is a rhetorical idea. We use it in rhetoric. We will say, let us have solidarity, but when it comes to the real test, we do not stand by solidarity. The current colonization of Iraq by the United States and Britain could not have happened or continued for a single day without the complete cooperation, connivance and support of Islamic and Arab countries surrounding Iraq. Without the cooperation of Kuwait, without the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, without the cooperation of Qatar, it could not have happened. Qatar is the largest American base in the Middle East, much more than Israel. So, how do we behave like this and still claim that there is what we call the Islamic Ummah which brings us all united in solidarity? It is a lie. I am not saying it is not possible. I am saying that it is not true now.
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Yasir Elsharif
فيس بوك
تويتر
انستقرام
يوتيوب
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