Islam frowns at sexual harassment, says Onike

The Chief Missioner, Nasrullahi-l Fatih Society (NASFAT), Imam Abdul-Azeez Morufu Onike, has said that religious and faith leaders have a vital role to play in ending the scourge of rape and sexual harassment, and must also be above board. He spoke at an event organised by the Office of the British Deputy High Commission in […]

The Chief Missioner, Nasrullahi-l Fatih Society (NASFAT), Imam Abdul-Azeez Morufu Onike, has said that religious and faith leaders have a vital role to play in ending the scourge of rape and sexual harassment, and must also be above board.

He spoke at an event organised by the Office of the British Deputy High Commission in Lagos tagged “#Mee too, What next”.

He stressed the need for Nigerians to be educated on the red signals to look out for which could lead to rape as well as the position of the religion on sexual harrasment, gender-based violence.

Onike emphasized that parts of what have been found out by researchers to be pre-rape warning are unwanted attention, touching, persistence and verbal threats among others.

He lauded the courage of a victim, who was also one of the panelists, who was bold to speak out by ignoring the cultural inhibitions.

He said that Islam frowns at sexual harassment and that one of the Islamic legal maxims is “harm must be eliminated” in line with the saying of Prophet Muhammad.

He added that protection of honour and dignity are key objectives of Islam and Shariah.

He therefore suggested models used in Liberia and India to fight the scourge of sexual harassment, which are the co-option of religious and faith leaders in the advocacy, as employed in Liberia and the use of virtual reality (VR) technology to create a film which is shown at train stations as used in India.