Bereft of ideas to drive development, our federal lawmakers have become hyperactive lately, proposing dubious bills with dizzying speed. One such folly is the proposed Ecclesiastical Courts of Appeal Bill that, according to its proponents, will hear appeals from adherents of the Christian faith. The proposal is odious, discriminatory and a recipe for confusion; it should be dropped forthwith.
In a secular state of multiple faiths and an economy in recession, it is amazing that lawmakers cannot envision policies that will promote production and closer social interaction, but are, instead, preoccupied with religion. If the bill is meant to counter the generous lacing of the 1999 Constitution with Islamic religious influences, then the strategy is wrong and ill-thought-out. You do not combat divisiveness and institutionalised discrimination with the same negatives.
The report jolted secular-minded Nigerians. As reported in the press, the bill passed a Second Reading in the House of Representatives and was referred to the Ad hoc Committee on Review of the Constitution. When established, the Ecclesiastical Courts “shall complement the regular courts in adjudicating in matters relating to the tenets of the Christian faith between individuals and groups that yield and submit to its jurisdiction.” Nothing like that in Christianity. One of its sponsors, Gyang Istifanus-Dung, explained that the courts shall, like the Sharia courts of appeal, rule on civil proceedings involving questions of ecclesiastical law and “Christian Personal Law.” Their confusion is evident in citing “Christian law” regarding marriage, family relationship or the guardianship of an infant as part of the court’s mandate.
What “Christian law” is universally applicable to all its denominations? Some approve polygamy, others forbid it: some sects raise children differently from others; some prescribe restrictive dress codes and have separate rules on adultery, divorce and others. To our knowledge, the Common Law is adequate in dealing with matters that affect all segments of the society. It amounts to naked state promotion of a particular faith contrary to the express prohibition of Section 10 of the Constitution, which has been so abused by promoters of criminal aspects of sharia law. But two wrongs don’t make a right. The 1999 Constitution, like its predecessors, has provisions for Islamic family law and customary law.
For identified sponsors of the bill, mainly northern minorities, one could understand their misguided quest for equity. Minorities have had to bear discrimination and domineering tendencies by the majority in the North. The experience of aggressive domination by the majority that has culminated in the adoption of criminal sharia in 12 northern states along with institutionalised marginalisation, may be driving this misbegotten bill. It, however, perpetuates what it seeks to solve: discrimination and divisiveness. There are hundreds of other religions practised in Nigeria. Are we to set up courts for Ifa, Ekpe, Egungun, Ofo and other traditional religions? How about appellate courts for Eckankar, Hare Krishna and Budhism, among others? Their adherents are also Nigerians guaranteed equal rights under the constitution.
The strategic blunder is already playing out as one Abdullahi Salame has also introduced a bill to amend Sections 262 and 277 of the 1999 Constitution to vest in the sharia courts of appeal at the state and federal levels the power to hear criminal cases. This will confer constitutional validity on the criminal aspects of sharia law adopted illegally by 12 states. If past experience is a guide, Salame’s proposal, which has also gone through Second Reading at the House without debate, will be adopted as a trade-off for the Ecclesiastical Bill. Meanwhile, the “Christian Court” is meaningless and is of no value whatsoever to Christians.
The Christian Association of Nigeria should not repeat the mistake it made when it lobbied for a Christian pilgrims agency. By dropping its principled opposition to the increasing splashing of public funds on religious pilgrimage, it has helped to entrench the assault on Nigeria’s secularism that has seen the government grant forex concessions for religious pilgrimages at a time of recession when manufacturers cannot get forex for raw materials and machinery. CAN and its affiliates should be wise and spot the inevitable trap lawmakers are laying. They should stand firmly against this poisoned chalice.
Nigerian governments need desperately to step back from the brink: we need to separate religion and state. The constitution has provided room for religious freedom; it is not the responsibility of government to be spending public funds on religion and creating religious bureaucracies. Both in Nigeria and elsewhere, many states that promote religion at the expense of development experience poverty, instability, extremism and terrorism, illiteracy and other negative Human Development Indices. Playing politics with religion has entrenched poverty and illiteracy for so long. It must be broken. Insecurity is a national problem, but in the North, it often wears a religious garment, has turned many areas to sectarian killing zones, dividing a once harmonious cosmopolitan population and giving birth to extremists like Boko Haram terrorists and other deviant sects. The world’s secular-minded states boast better security and the best HDIs.
Nigeria is in the midst of a recession: we need laws to liberalise and open up the economy to local and foreign investments; repeal obnoxious laws like the Railway Act 1955, pass a realistic Petroleum Industry Bill, strengthen the anti-corruption laws and agencies, decentralise the police and provide jobs for the 42.24 per cent of our youths that the National Bureau of Statistics says are unemployed.
All stakeholders should doggedly continue to push back against the violations of our secularity: constitution amendments should be made to remove the contradictory provisions to Section 10; not to add more to the combustible cauldron of sectarianism that is seething beneath the surface of our national life. Legislators should channel their energies to making laws that unite, promote inclusion and drive economic development. No law in Nigeria should be allo wed to supersede the cherished principles of social justice and equality of status and opportunity.
