Imam Sharafudeen AbdulSalam Aliagan holds four strategic positions in the leading Islamic organisation in Nigeria, Nasirul-Lai-l-Fatihi Society of Nigeria (NASFAT). He is a member of the National Mission Board, the FCT Zonal and Abuja Branch Missioner as well as Chief Imam of NASFAT in Abuja. In an encounter with Time Nigeria, Aliagan speaks extensively on what makes a just society and the role of faith-based organisations in promoting peace, unity and tranquility in Nigeria. Excerpts.
Time Nigeria is meeting you for the first time. Who is Imam AbdulSalam Aliagan?
I am Alhaji Imam Sharafudeen Abdulsalam Aliagan, the Branch Missioner, FCT Zonal Missioner and Chief Imam of NASFAT Abuja. I have had primary school and secondary school education. At the same time, in between the primary and secondary education, I attended an Islamic school, a local one in Ilorin where we learnt the Quran. Later we graduated into learning the meaning and the interpretation of the Holy Quran. Immediately after secondary education, I taught in some Islamic schools for almost ten years, teaching the Quran. After that, I attended Federal College of Education, Zaria, where I obtained my NCE certificate. I later on obtained B.A in Arabic at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. Later, I had my Masters in International Affairs and Diplomacy. God willing, we want to proceed in that line.
Talking about a just society, what are those things we are looking at?
A just society is a society that believes in justice. Whatever that has to do with justice has to be divine. You cannot do without divinity when it comes to justice. Justice means doing things in the right way, equality before the law and giving whatever anyone deserves to him or her. In an Islamic way, a just society is one that believes in the principles of Islam and the teaching of the Holy Quran as ordained by Almighty God. Therefore, a just society will be a society with great discipline, that believes in all virtues that will enhance their lives, where laws, especially, Islamic law, will be a kind of rule that every member of the society will follow strictly.
On that note, a just society will be a society of peace, harmony and tranquility where no one will be free to do and undo and it is only the law that will prevail in the day-to-day activities of every one. A just society will be free of corruption, a just society will be free of crime and all evils that will bring about uprising.
When you are talking about justness, Almighty God enjoined us that we should deal with ourselves justly, that it is being close to God-consciousness. If we believe in these values, every one of us will live in peace and harmony.
Given your definition of a just society, can it be said that Nigeria is a just society?
That is the clear truth. If really you want me to say the truth and nothing but the truth, Nigeria cannot be seen as a just society presently. Before, it was close to a just society but now it is not. And you can all see what is happening around us that will not make us to say Nigeria is a just society. Most of our leaders, the rulers, do not believe in justice. And injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, according to political scientists.
Nigeria today is a haven of corruption. If you cannot beat them, you join them. Law is not really allowed to prevail on our activities and dealings in Nigeria.
The judiciary arm of government has not been given total independence, it is not as if it is the divine law that is guiding us in Nigeria. We have Muslims, Christians and traditionalists and the rest. We do not have a particular supreme rule that is guiding us. Even if we want to believe in the civil laws, that we believe is part of our constitution, we are not even law abiding. We are neither abiding by the law of man nor by the law of God. There are lots of crimes, a lot of people have done a lot of bad things and have gone scot free. How many corrupt people have been punished? Today, everyone in the country is free to do anything and get away with it scot free without anybody batting an eyelid.
Therefore Nigeria has become almost a lawless country. I am not saying it is a completely lawless country but as it is going, I am afraid because where the law, the judge and judgment of courts are not given due respect, anarchy looms. Whatever they say in the court today people do not follow it. They have other ways of doing it to overrule the court’s judgment. So in this regard, Nigeria cannot be said as it is today as a just society.
Faith-based institutions have serious role to play in shaping and reshaping society. What are these things that are expected of these institution in intervening to bring the country back on track?
Number one, every Nigerian needs to have what is called sense of belonging. You are either a Muslim or a Christian. The traditional aspect of it may not be too well recognized now. But the two major religions that I believe have the larger population of Nigeria is Islam and Christianity. Islam as an institution is a very solid factor that can bring about justice in Nigeria but this must come from the religious leaders themselves.
Who are the religious leaders? What is the requirement of a religious leader? When you say someone is a religious leader for instance, Islam as a religion, a leader in Islam is commonly known as an Imam. That is the leader of a particular mosque where prayer is being observed. So the leader of that particular place is an Imam. Imam is a religious leader. A missioner of any Islamic organisation is also a leader. You may not be an Imam, you may not be a missioner but you could be an Islamic preacher, you are also a religious leader.
The issue has to start with the religious leaders themselves. Who are the religious leaders? What are the qualities expected of religious leaders? It has to start there, because when you have a bad leader definitely nothing good will come out from there. Therefore, today there is quackery in the leadership of religions. The religious leaders have to be sound, one who has proper knowledge of his religion and have qualities of leadership. Not just having the knowledge alone, some really have the knowledge but they cannot put it into practice. We do not really need those kinds of religious leaders. If you want to be a religious leader you have to possess the proper knowledge of that religion, you equally have to posses qualities of good leadership. When we combine the two together, we should be able to move mountains. So in this regards, religious leaders are to be upright and they have to be a qualified.
Secondly, the members of any religion organisation are also very important. We should not be hypocritical. Someone will attend one religion organisation today and attend another tomorrow.
The way a religious organization as an institution can contribute positively to the society also manifest in whether religious leaders carry their members along in all their day-to-day activities. Reading out, explaining and spelling out the supreme rules that guide their duties and responsibilities in that given society would help.
Again, before you fight for your rights you have to know and be well acquainted with your duties and responsibilities. Most of us today are waiting for what the government will do for us. What are we to do for the government? Religions enjoin us that we have our rights and there are certain rights that your society deserves from you. You have to be law abiding. Islam does not want a Muslim to break the law as long as you agree to be a citizen of that society and if there is law, it is expected of a Muslim to be law abiding. In that regard it is now left for an Imam, a Sheik, or a missioner or an Islamic preacher or Ustaz to tell them the right thing.
Secondly, the religious leader must be very conscious of misconception. Whatever information he is rolling out to his followers is very important. Society sometimes is determined by what religious leaders discuss with followers. All the faithful should respect their leaders; the leaders should also respect the led. Each and everyone of them must know their duties and responsibilities because they can ask for their right.
Both the Bible and Quran are embodiment of virtues and values whereby everything we need especially in Nigeria could be found. Both religions frown at corruption, lies, criminal activities injustice and a religious leader is expected to explain all these to his members one after the other.
Anywhere religious leaders are doing the right thing at the right time in the right place then definitely the followers will know what to do, where to do them and how to do it. A religious leader is expected to get married to his Holy book. He must be able to enjoin his followers to get married to their Holy book, meaning that they are always with their Holy books. This will serve as divine guidance. It is good that government encourages people to have sense of belonging. If you are a Christian or a Muslim, if you go to church definitely you have a good religious leader. Definitely no good religious leader will incite his followers to go and destroy. When we have all these in our society, religions will serve as an institution in building a just nation.
The 2015 general elections is fast approaching, what are the attributes that Nigerians should consider in choosing their leaders at all levels?
I want to say that the most important thing to all Nigerian today is the forthcoming general elections and I believe every Nigerian is preparing to make sure we put in place a good government under a good leader. We want to vote. There will be elections this year. What I can say based on Islamic principles is the issue of leaders’ selection, how to elect our leaders.
If I must say, deceit should be out of it completely. Nigerians should make sure they refused to be deceived this time around. The politicians in their manifestoes and their campaign say a lot of things. Both who are to be voted for and the voters have responsibilities. The Quran says, “Why do you say what you cannot do?
It is a sin in the sight of God to say what you know you can never do. In that regard, every politician should be conscious of what to say because people may have to vote for you based on what you tell them. As a Muslim, you cannot tell people what you cannot do. Therefore the voters should also be conscious of what the politicians are saying to them. Tell those who are promising you of that they cannot do, you cannot vote for them. Tell them, they cannot continue to deceive you with money, you cannot vote for money. Anybody who is voting based on money are selling their future.
No matter what, if you sell your votes you are going to suffer for at least another four years before anything could happen. So you are selling your future for at least four years and if you are doing this you are going to have a share of it. There are certain virtues that need to be discovered in any politician before you vote for him or her. At all levels whoever you want to vote for, you have to be sure of the kind of person he is. As a Muslim, well I may have to look at someone as a Muslim and I vote for him but that is not enough. Religion here is not enough. Sometimes, a non-Muslim can perform better than a Muslim. I know most of my people will say what is he trying to say? But at this point in time we should consider religion but there are other things that should be considered as well. If you are voting in an insincere leader, you are insincere as well. We should not allow anyone to cajole us this time around. Whatever it is we have
experiences of different leaders in this country we can talk about them, we can say so many things about them. We can put all these experiences together and with the level of our understanding and our exposure and education, we should be able through prayer to know who will be the best leader for us. So we cannot just choose anyone by voting anyone though his campaign, his manifestoes and his money. We should not sell our future to these people otherwise we will continue to blame ourselves.
Some Islamic countries have stable economy, yet Nigeria as a country has been experiencing instability. Is there any respite the much talked about Islamic financing can do to stabilize Nigeria’s economy?
There is nothing that Islam has not really discussed, no stone has been left unturned. When you talk of economy in Islamic perspective and how we can have stability that can even better other developed countries, It is very important that it boils down to our leaders. They need to be honest. Honesty is what can grow an economy. Our leaders have to be wary of extravagance. When you are trying to run away from extravagance that means you have to economize everything. When you are able to do what is expected of you as a leader, sincerely with every sense of honesty, things will improve and we will have a stable economy.
I have to make reference to the life time of Prophet Muhammed, the buying and selling within the Muslim community were controlled. Economy has to be controlled generally. It is Islam that will control commercial transactions generally.. Then we should be able to regulate and at the same time monitor the way we acquire properties. Islam does not want anyone to keep what he does not really need. So acquisition of unnecessary property, having unnecessary possession of cash at hand is against Islam. In some teachings of Islam, a cloth you do not need for instance should not be kept. If you are keeping it for forty days, it is understood in Islam that such a cloth tends to curse you because there are other people who are really in need of such things. All these things put together would grow our economy.
Another thing is that we should seek knowledge of whatever we are doing. We should not really put those who do not know how to go about a particular thing in our economy. We need experts… we have economists, the specialists, the professionals who really have to study this. In Islam, you cannot bring an engineer to run our economy. We should put round pegs in a round holes. That is what Allah wants. That is why he says we should seek for knowledge. Whatever we are doing, if we do not put the right people in the right place, there will be problems. Definitely there is no way we can have a stable economy when those who are behind it are not professionals.
It is not only professionals that we need, we also need sincerity. We need people to be conscious of God, we need honesty, we need trustworthiness; we need straightforwardness. If all these are put together under the teaching of Islam, we will definitely boost our economy, it will stabilize it definitely. There is nothing we could do either political, social or economical that does not need God’s consciousness. We have a lot of things, we are so endowed with in Nigeria. Allah has endowed us beyond oil. We have so many other things that could be useful for us that will boost our economy. But we have relied solely on the oil… whatever Allah has endowed you with, make use of it. We should lay our hands on other things that will boost our economy and stabilize it.
For instance, there is reduction in the price of oil all over the world today. What if we cannot sell oil, what do we do then? We should remain ungrateful to Allah because Nigeria has been endowed with a lot of things beyond oil. Agriculture is there, other minerals resources are there, coal is there, mining alone can sustain this country. Allah want us to appreciate His blessing and favour over Nigeria. So we should explore what we have to be able to develop our economy and have it stable. The stability will definitely come around when we are able to explore what we are endowed with.
But God-consciousness is very important. It is not as if we do not have experts but most of us are not conscious and as long as we continue to live in a corrupt society, even if we have everything that should make our economy develop, nothing will happen miraculously. We have to be God-conscious so that we can put all the machines we have into operation to develop the economy.
Why do we need to be our brother’s keeper?
No one can live in isolation. It is a law of nature to live with somebody, if you decide to live alone that means you are not living, you are only existing. If you must live you must live with somebody. Your neighbour is who ever stays around you be it Muslim or Christian or even an atheist. Islam has enjoined every Islamic monotheist to be nice to his neighbour. Whoever lives close to you is your neighbour. If I have to quote one of the Holy Prophet where he says that, “Your neighbour will be counted among people who live forty houses to your left of your house and forty to the right of your house …. You cannot really choose who should be your neighbour.
“ Whoever Allah has brought to live with you is your neighbour irrespective of his faith. So who ever lives with you remains your neighbour and the prophet says… “Whoever believes Allah and the last day should honour his neighbour “.
Thank God, the Prophet has not really mentioned faith in this regard. Whoever is your neighbour must be honoured as a good Muslim, whatsoever he believes in should not be your problem but the neighbourliness is what you should respect. It is very Islamic that you should have community meeting where you sit together and discuss about the wellbeing of your street and the rest of them. It is binding on you as a Muslim to honour him or her as a Muslim to respect him as a person and such a person must be safe from your evil
Your advice generally to the leaders and the led particularly as the general elections draw closer?
My sincere advice is that we should remain focused. Whatever we believe in, we should stand by it. Whatever we are doing, there is need for sincerity of purpose. We cannot continue to deceive ourselves. Let leaders stop deceiving the led and let the led stop deceiving the leaders. God-consciousness is very important. To me it is ultimate. All religions preach good behaviour, virtues and the rest of them that would promote peace and harmony in any given society. We should be conscious of our creator, we should be sincere to ourselves, we should not deceive ourselves and lastly, we should love one another to remain united. If we remain united, definitely Nigeria will remain one and great.