Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Saad Abubakar III and other Muslim leaders were at the Presidential Villa on Wednesday to protest to President Goodluck Jonathan to express their displeasure with the religious composition of the ongoing National Conference.
The sultan refrained from interacting with journalists after the closed-door meeting with the president, but Secretary General of Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede revealed the president’s assurance that Muslims were not being marginalized.
“We came to consult with Mr. President. We are happy we consulted with him, he has given us reasons to reassure us that Muslims in Nigeria were not deliberately marginalised, and he has asked us to convey the feelings of the government, the genuineness of the government, the fairness of the government to the entire populace”, he said.
“He assured us that if there are issues that are not as they ought to be, they were not deliberate; and we want to believe that Mr. President told us his mind. But we also want to believe that while it is proper to protest, it is also proper to assume that a leader will always be just even if there are mistakes thereafter”.
He added that the Muslims thought they should convey their ill-feelings to the president, and they were happy that the president proved himself to be a genuine and committed Christian who will not be unjust to others.
Asides from the two, others who were in the delegation are Shehu of Borno, Abubakar Ibn Garbai; former Head of Service of the Federation, Yayale Ahmed; and former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mohammad Uwais.
Earlier last week, the Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI) opposed the composition of the national conference, claiming that Muslims were being marginalised as they were outnumbered by the Christian delegates at the conference.
“Although democracy is a game of numbers, this has not been respected. For instance, While Muslims constitute the majority in the country, Christians, who by all acceptable records are not more than 40 per cent of the country’s population, ironically constitute 62 per cent of the total delegates”, Secretary General of JNI, Dr. Khalid Abubakar Aliyu said at press conference in Kaduna.
“We find it as disrespect to the conscience of the Muslims that of the 20 delegates of the federal government, only six are Muslims. No Muslim is deemed fit to make the list of delegates from the Nigerian Economic summit. In fact, in the representation of the security agencies Muslims have been so unimaginably short-changed with only one Muslim out of the six retired military and security personnel, one out of six retired security and NIA officers, and two out of delegates of the Association of Retired Police Officers”.
