The Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) has criticised authorities of the International School, Ibadan (ISI), situated on the campus of the University of Ibadan, over its handling of the recent hijab crisis in the school.
The body in a statement said it is appalled by the “odious stench of religious bigotry and intolerance oozing out from the academic precincts of the premier University of Ibadan”, with regard to the “needless acrimony and vendetta, hatred and hubris being brought to the fore on the plight of the young Muslim girls of the International School, Ibadan (ISI).”
The statement signed by Salisu Shehu, Deputy Secretary-General of the NSCIA, said it is highly deplorable and condemnable that the leadership of the foremost academic community where freedom of religion and expression should be held sacrosanct, apart from other freedoms guaranteed by the Nigerian Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Rights document, would allow such development to happen in the school.
“What has been going on for years at ISI is an affront to refinement and civilisation, which education should impart,” the statement said. “The denial of the Muslim girls of the right to use their hijab is just a ring in a long chain of institutionalised religious discrimination against Muslims in the school, which should ordinarily be a centre of excellence where learning, probity, excellence and character are respected.
“Does ISI belong to a cantankerous Islamophobic religious Association? What hatred and wickedness would make a school management descend so low as to condemn innocent school girls to the blaze of the sun just because of hijab? Where is integrity? Indeed, where is service in a school that makes a claim to “integrity and service” as its motto?
“It is ludicrous that the anti-Islamic management of ISI, as available evidence shows, has been violating the rights of the Muslim students for several years through various acts of infraction. This is why Muslim students, who are boarders, had been compelled to attend Sunday church services for years and had been denied the knowledge of their faith while the school employed Christian Studies teachers before the school was challenged. That is also why the school management under the watchful eyes of the University of Ibadan engaged in other unbecoming conducts, only reminiscent of the colonial past when Christianity was forced down the throats of unwilling students.”
The NSCIA said in its statement that the management of ISI is dragging itself into the muddle, adding that even in military and paramilitary organisations as well as professions in many countries across the Western world, the religious rights of Muslim ladies are granted through the use of hijab.
“Why is Nigeria still tied to apron strings of its inglorious colonial past in virtually every stratum, especially education?” it said.
“The lesson learnt by conscionable individuals and institutions from the victory of Barrister Firdaos Amosa in being called to the Nigerian bar in July this year, after a resolved misunderstanding caused by the infringement on her right to use hijab in December 2017, is that only those who are living in darkness can deprive willing Muslim girls and women of the use of hijab in schools and work places.
“That this execrable height of intolerance and abuse is made to happen actually shows the type of person the principal is, an uninformed and megalomaniac religious bigot whose intent is to provoke religious crisis in the ancient city and the hallowed academic community of the University of Ibadan.
“We strongly condemn the management of ISI and warn the principal that she will be held responsible for whatever her administrative incompetence and religious intolerance precipitate in this matter. Muslims in Nigeria can no longer fold their arms and watch their rights being unabashedly trampled upon by minions and tin-gods who find themselves in some positions of authority. Others like her anywhere they are will be named and shamed as agents provocateurs who want to destroy this country by fanning the embers of religious discord.
“The prevarications of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academics) of the University of Ibadan, Prof. Yinka Aderinto, on the matter are rather disappointing. If he is a refined academic that he ought to be, he would have been on the right side of history, instead of pontificating on the private ownership of the school, as if private ownership confers religious abuse on the proprietors. Suggesting ISI is even a private school is shamelessly mendacious. Let Prof. Aderinto name one private investor in the school. ISI is owned 100 per cent by an agency of the government and funded by the public. We challenge him to prove to the contrary.
“Now, NSCIA demands that the principal of ISI be sanctioned for dragging the name of the school in the mire and trampling on the rights of her students, against whom the school gate was shut as if they were stray animals. The Council demands that the University of Ibadan wade into the matter immediately by working together with the Muslim Students Society of Nigeria and the ISI Muslim Parents Forum to grant the students their full rights of wearing hijab, which in anyway does not impede their learning. Any code, by-law, rule or regulation that conflicts with the Nigerian Constitution is null and void. Therefore, the argument of some school rules and regulations by apologists in the matter is shallow and diversionary.”
UI International School has in recent time been in the news over moves by the school authorities on Hijab wearing by the management of the school.
The development caused some of the students to be shut out of school which triggered protests among Muslim parents.
