MPAC: Appeal Court’s Ruling Against Hijab Assault on Religious Freedom

The Muslim Public Affairs Centre (MPAC) has condemned the ruling of the Court of Appeal, Ibadan, setting aside an earlier court judgement recognising the right of female Muslim students to wear hijab. The judgement, delivered on Friday by a three-member panel of the Ibadan Court of Appeal set aside the May 22, 2024 judgement of […]

The Muslim Public Affairs Centre (MPAC) has condemned the ruling of the Court of Appeal, Ibadan, setting aside an earlier court judgement recognising the right of female Muslim students to wear hijab.

The judgement, delivered on Friday by a three-member panel of the Ibadan Court of Appeal set aside the May 22, 2024 judgement of the Oyo State High Court, which upheld the right of 11 Muslim female students of the International School, University of Ibadan (ISI), to wear hijab as part of their uniform.

The Court of Appeal held that ISI is a private school because it does not receive government subventions and ruled that the Supreme Court’s earlier judgment recognising the right of Muslim students to wear the hijab applies only to publicly funded schools.

It also ruled that the students had voluntarily waived their right to wear hijab by accepting the school’s code of conduct during their admission.

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In a statement signed by its Executive Chairman, Disu Kamor, MPAC described the judgement as being biased and lacking in fairness needed to resolve the dress-code dispute.

“We state without equivocation that this judgment is not a neutral resolution of a dress-code dispute.

“It is a direct assault on the constitutionally guaranteed right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion of Muslim children, and a troubling retreat from the settled trajectory of Nigerian jurisprudence on this question.” it said.

MPAC also rejected the court’s reasoning, insisting that constitutional rights cannot be determined by the funding status of an institution.

“MPAC holds that the majority decision is legally unsound, socially dangerous, and fundamentally incompatible with the letter and spirit of Section 38 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended), which guarantees every citizen the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including the freedom to manifest and practise that religion.

“This right does not diminish because a citizen is a minor, and it does not evaporate at the gates of a school, whether public or private.

“The majority’s finding that ISI is a private school turns on the narrow fact that it does not receive government subventions. MPAC rejects this as a bookkeeping test masquerading as constitutional analysis.

“Section 38 of the Constitution does not qualify its protection by an institution’s funding structure, and a child’s right to religious freedom cannot rationally depend on whether a subvention cheque changes hands.

“ISI is, in every material respect, a school established and administered under the auspices of the University of Ibadan, a Federal Government-owned institution, operating on public land under public academic supervision. To hinge the entirety of these students’ constitutional protection on a subvention technicality is to let form triumph over substance, and it hands every private and faith-affiliated school in Nigeria a ready-made template for discriminating against Muslim students with impunity.

“Also, the judgment contradicts itself: The same panel that found no infringement of the students’ religious rights nonetheless upheld the trial court’s finding that confining these students to a library for three to four hours was a violation of their rights, merely reducing the damages awarded from one million naira to two hundred thousand naira.

“MPAC finds it impossible to reconcile a judgment that recognises the wrongfulness of punitively detaining Muslim students over their hijab, while simultaneously ruling that stripping them of the right to wear that same hijab is no violation at all. This internal contradiction exposes the fragility of the majority’s reasoning and strengthens the case for appellate review by the Supreme Court.” it said.

MPAC maintained that the ruling departed from the Supreme Court’s decision in Lagos State Government & Ors v. Asiyat AbdulKareem & Ors, which affirmed the right of Muslim female students to wear the hijab as an aspect of their constitutionally protected religious practice.

“The Nigerian judiciary has already spoken decisively on this question. In Lagos State Government & Ors v. Asiyat AbdulKareem & Ors (SC/910/2016), the Supreme Court of Nigeria affirmed the right of Muslim female students to wear the hijab as an inseparable component of their constitutionally protected religious practice.

“That judgment was a landmark vindication of the rights of the Muslim child in the Nigerian education system. To now construct an artificial fence around that precedent, confining it only to state-owned schools, is to hollow out its protective force and invite a proliferation of discriminatory dress codes across private and mission-affiliated schools nationwide.”

The organisation commended Justice Fadawu Umar for his dissenting judgment, saying he “correctly recognised that the appeal lacked merit and that the constitutional rights of the affected students remained intact.”

MPAC urged the Court of Appeal to grant the application for a stay of execution pending the determination of the appeal at the Supreme Court.

“We urge the Court of Appeal to expeditiously hear and grant MURIC’s Motion for Stay of Execution/Injunction, so that, consistent with its legal effect, ISI remains barred from preventing Muslim students from wearing the hijab pending the final determination of the appeal. We advise all affected students and parents to remain calm and steadfast while this process runs its course.

“We pledge MPAC’s full advocacy, strategic communications and mobilisation support to ISIMPF, MURIC and the eleven affected students as this matter proceeds to the Supreme Court of Nigeria for final and just resolution.”

It also called on the National Assembly to enact legislation affirming that the constitutional right to religious freedom, including the right to religious dress, applies equally in both public and private schools.

The group urged the Federal Ministry of Education and state education authorities to issue regulations preventing schools from adopting dress code policies that discriminate on the basis of religion.