Small brush with Shi’ites

The sad events in Zaria ten days ago, the clash between soldiers and members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria that led to the loss of many lives, reminded me of a small brush I had ten years ago with members of this Muslim sect, more popularly known as Shi’ites. I was editor of the […]

The sad events in Zaria ten days ago, the clash between soldiers and members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria that led to the loss of many lives, reminded me of a small brush I had ten years ago with members of this Muslim sect, more popularly known as Shi’ites. I was editor of the New Nigerian in 2005 when a sect member who was a former colleague of mine came to see me in Kaduna. He said Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky, the movement’s leader, was personally inviting me to attend their Maulud celebration at Arewa House. I gulped hard when I saw the invitation card. In Kaduna in those days, Shi’ites was another name for trouble.
I first heard of Malam Ibrahim El-Zakzaky in the late 1970s when he was still an Economics student at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. Student radicalism in those days was mostly of the anti-imperialist, anti-apartheid and Marxist-Leninist type. Influenced by the Iranian revolution of 1978-99, El-Zakzaky pioneered Islamist radicalism in Nigerian campuses. He came to Sokoto and delivered a lecture in 1978. I did not attend the lecture but those who did told me that he used the word “Kufr” generously. He railed against the military regime, clerics, traditional rulers and almost all the new social phenomena spawned by the oil boom, describing them all as Kufr. It was the first time we heard that word, which soon became very popular among Islamist student groups known in those days as The Brothers.
Around the same time, a pretty young unmarried lady called Sister Zeenat also went to Sokoto and delivered a sermon to female students of the Federal Government College. Soon after she finished, female Muslim students poured out of the FGC and headed straight for the town, saying they were going to carry out an Islamic revolution. The police rounded them up and said each girl’s father must come and bail her. The story then was that when a notable Muslim cleric went to bail his daughter, she said she would not be bailed by Kufr. Sister Zeenat later married El-Zakzaky.
Throughout the 1980s and especially during the Abacha era in the 1990s, El-Zakzaky was becoming better known in the country for his radical Islamist message. He was frequently in prison too. One day in 1983, our group of youth corpers passed by the Enugu Prison on our way to the NYSC transit camp at Awkunanaw. One corper reminded us that El-Zakzaky was in there. Out of sheer adventure, he said we should go in and greet him. We stood across the road from the prison and debated the idea. I dissuaded my friends from the venture by pointing out that, clad as we were in NYSC uniforms, El-Zakzaky could describe us as Kufr.
During the 1990s when Abacha jailed El-Zakzaky for long periods, his followers often spread leaflets on Kaduna streets saying their leader had sent a message from prison which will be read at the Friday prayers. Whenever such leaflets were found, turn out for the Friday prayers dropped sharply at Sultan Bello Mosque. In 1998 when I was editor of New Nigerian Weekly, my resourceful features editor Ali Alkali proposed to do a story on the embattled Shi’ites. Ali managed to trace the house of one sect leader at Kabala West. The man was in hiding, so Ali sat and waited for him until he emerged at 2am. He made Ali to swear by the Qur’an that he was not an SSS agent. They then had an interview which we published lavishly in New Nigerian Weekly. For a brief period after that the Shi’ites regarded Ali and I as friends. One day they told us in advance that they were going to stage riots at various Friday mosques because government reneged on a promise to free their leader. I quietly dodged Friday prayers that week.
When El-Zakzaky was freed during General Abdulsalami’s rule, I saw him on local television visiting the Military Administrator of Kaduna State. He also spoke to reporters in conciliatory tones. In December 2003 I met El-Zakzaky at the funeral of INEC national commissioner Dr. Shehu Lawal in Zaria. I was surprised to see him at an event also attended by Governor Ahmed Makarfi and most Kaduna State commissioners. It occurred to me that the Shi’ite leader was mellowing down from his fiery self. It soon transpired that El-Zakzaky softened on rhetoric and stepped up on organisation. 
I also recall a brief encounter I had with El-Zakzaky’s deputy Malam Mohammed Turi, who died in the Zaria tragedy. One day in 1991 I was hiding in the conference room, writing Citizen magazine’s cover story when he suddenly opened the door. He was in haste, and said I should follow him to a Shi’ite event which was about to start. As a weekly magazine Citizen was not really interested in small events but Malam Mohamed persisted. Since his father Malam Turi Muhammadu was the chairman of Citizen, I told him that I will soon come but when he left, I returned to writing my cover story.
Back to the Maulud invitation. The Shi’ite emissary was very persistent so I accepted the invitation. When I got to Arewa House, my view of the Shi’ites momentarily improved. They were well organised and courteous and they served meat pies and soft drinks to all the guests. It was the first time that I heard El-Zakzaky speak in public. He was very eloquent and gave a captivating talk about the Holy Prophet. He however came down heavily on Northern Muslim royal fathers whom he accused them of selling out to President Obasanjo’s national political conference idea. There were no other reporters around so I took copious notes and wrote a story out of what El-Zakzaky said. It appeared in New Nigerian the next day.
The Shi’ites were happy with the story, which even had my by-line. Things however changed the next day when the then Emir of Gwandu Alhaji Mustapha Jokolo summoned our reporter in Birnin Kebbi and gave a heated response to El-Zakzaky. As soon as we published Jokolo’s response, all hell broke loose. I received twelve specific death threats. They variously called me Kufr, Zionist and CIA agent and said it was lawful to spill my blood. I called the emissary who took me to the Maulud. He apologised profusely and told me that El-Zakzaky would rectify the problem right away. I heard that he spoke on it that night and the death threats ceased. I however made a mental note from that day to give the Shi’ites a wide berth. When I was invited to attend Sheikh El-Zakzaky’s 60th birthday walimah, I lied that I was in Port Harcourt!
Still, the episode in Zaria ten days ago, leading to the loss of so many lives, was a case of killing a mosquito with a sledge hammer. Certainly, the widespread feeling among Zaria city residents and Northerners generally was that the Shi’ites are a disaster waiting to happen, given their aversion to law and order and their open contempt for security agents. It was the heavy casualties recorded by the sect members that silenced most voices. 
Sultan Muhammadu Sa’ad, Northern Governors Forum and many other prominent persons and groups have called for a probe of this episode and the Kaduna State Government has pledged to set up a judicial commission of inquiry. My only worry is that the “background information” that the Governor of Kaduna State provided in his broadcast last Thursday, as well as his insistence that El-Zakzaky must be prosecuted, have kind of pre-empted the judicial commission’s work.