Prostitution: What Ekweremadu forgot to add

Reactions and comments from the Nigerian public, by and large negative, have continued to trail Senator Edweremadu’s proposal seeking the senate to legalize prostitution in Nigeria. We express disappointment over Senator Ekweremadu’s strange cure for tackling the seemingly intractable challenge of man’s oldest trade. Nigerians are surprised that the unethical proposal, which is not only […]

Reactions and comments from the Nigerian public, by and large negative, have continued to trail Senator Edweremadu’s proposal seeking the senate to legalize prostitution in Nigeria. We express disappointment over Senator Ekweremadu’s strange cure for tackling the seemingly intractable challenge of man’s oldest trade. Nigerians are surprised that the unethical proposal, which is not only immoral but also puts the health of those involved at risk, came from the Deputy Senate President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria; a highly placed public officer who makes laws for the country. The moral responsibility placed upon Senator Ekweremadu by his respectable office makes him a personality from whom such a position is least expected.

Prostitution in our view is equal in effect to humiliation of womanhood, which a lawmaker like Senator Ekweremadu should strive to discourage. Any attempt to legalize prostitution would amount to undermining our moral and spiritual values. While we recognize and appreciate the fact that factors which compel some of those who profess this trade are largely socio-economic, prostitution should be the last thing a responsible leader would wish a citizen to do for a living. Our leaders ought to realize that abandoning our values, as wrongly suggested by Senator Ekweremadu, cannot provide any workable solution to the evils bedeviling the Nigerian society. It may only complicate them further.

Elected public officers in Nigeria tend to forget their background after getting into office. Senator Ike Ekweremadu comes from a Christian background in Anambra State.  It would be appropriate therefore to remind him (if he has forgotten) of what the holy Bible says about prostitution and prostitutes. As part of the Ten Commandments, Exodus 20:14 prohibits adultery, fornication and prostitution. In the Bible, there is the story of an adulterous woman that was caught in the act and was about to be stoned to death for her sins. But Jesus intervened and said to her: “sin no more”. If prostitution were anything virtuous, that woman would not have been instructed by Jesus to repent and forsake her sin. Proverbs 5:3 describes a prostitute as a woman whose lips drip honey and her speech smoother than oil; and adds in Proverbs 5:5 that “her feet go down to death”. We are not sure if Senator Ekweremadu would be happy to see the feet of Nigerian women go down to death.

It would be recalled that the FCT Minister, Senator Bala Mohammed, in June 2010 banned prostitution in Abuja. The ban followed the sharp increase in the activities of commercial sex workers in the Federal Capital Territory. The claim by Senator David Mark that the FCT administration has been facing stiff resistance in the attempt to stop prostitution in Abuja is not a reasonable argument for defending Senator Ekweremadu’s proposal. If the only reason for this argument is that prostitution has remained intractable, why then have the lawmakers not enacted laws to legalize corruption, smuggling, robbery, rape, murder, drug trafficking, and the almajiri syndrome since each of these is no less awkward than prostitution in Nigeria?

We are prompted to believe that the Deputy Senate President forgot to add to his proposed bill on prostitution other motions seeking also to legalize abortion, kidnapping, oil bunkering, militancy, certificate forgery,  examination malpractice, cultism, thuggery, elections rigging, ballot box stuffing and snatching, money laundering and indeed other intractable socio-economic challenges. In any case, it is pertinent to remind Senator Ekweremadu and the entire Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria that the evils of managing prostitution as a social phenomenon is certainly less than the challenges that would arise from the consequences of legalizing it. May Allah (SWT) guide our legislators against treading the path of unrighteousness in the course of making laws, amin.

“Pilgrimaging” with public funds:

We sadly lament the failure by leaders in contemporary Nigeria to see leadership in the light of a trust placed upon them by the revealed laws of the Creator of the heavens and earth. In the last one month, it has been a season of hajj-seats sharing by some states in the country. We are attracted to comment on this modern phenomenon because Islam is opposed to the use of public funds for a matter that is practically personal. It has over time become a fashion among political leaders in Nigeria to sponsor selected individuals on pilgrimage to the holy lands of Makkah and Jerusalem.

Those who desire to sponsor people to perform pilgrimage should do so with their personal income and not with state resources which ultimately are public funds. In Islam, pilgrimage to Makkah is a religious duty with requisite conditions to be fulfilled before it becomes compulsory on a Muslim. Part of these conditions is that which requires the intending pilgrim to leave behind enough money for the feeding, healthcare, welfare and other domestic but necessary needs of the family while he is away on pilgrimage.

It is public knowledge that many of those sponsored by government to perform pilgrimage are persons who rarely have in their houses such quantity of food that could last their families for a week; let alone have enough to cater for Medicare and other essential demands of their family members. If government which has a social responsibility towards improving the living conditions of her people fails to provide drugs in hospitals, learning facilities in schools, clean drinking water, good roads and fertilizer to enhance farming; what justification thus has the same government to use public funds meant for these basic facilities to sponsor people who have more needs for the amenities than going on pilgrimage?

The irony of the subject-matter under discussion lies in the new dimension added to it. Some scholars have become so materialistic and mean as to quarrel over the sharing of hajj-seats among themselves, which as recently reported in one of the northern states, resulted in the arrest of a scholar. It is indeed regrettable that those who, by virtue of their knowledge and moral responsibility, should advise leaders (as governors and local government chairmen) against using public funds to sponsor people to perform  pilgrimage are unfortunately the same people fighting over what is ordinarily a personal matter as if it were a right. This obviously suggests how corrupt and irreverent some scholars have become in modern times.

No wonder, only few scholars today have the moral deportment to warn political leaders against corruption, indiscipline, hypocrisy, betrayal and several other vices because they too have become as depraved as those who spiritually look up to them for guidance. This perhaps explains why we find some scholars on top of their voices only when they are not invited for a handshake at the Government House of their respective states. That is also the time you would hear them delivering spicy sermons and preaching on television and radio programmes.

However, when such scholars secure hajj-seats or are appointed into state committees; they remain tongue-tied and blindfolded to all the corrupt tendencies of their employers. The Prophet (SAW) said, “My ummah will be guided as long as leaders and scholars remain righteous”. May Allah (SWT) give our scholars the ability to suppress greed and self-centeredness; give them the courage to stand out as men of God who would speak the truth as ordained in the holy Qur’an and sunnah of the Prophet (SAW), act by it, and call leaders to the path of righteousness, amin.