The
anti-Islam film produced by Egypt’s Coptic Nakoula Basseley Nakoula well over
two weeks ago has continued to stir an anti-American and Israeli reaction
across the globe, the calculated killing of the US ambassador to Libya being
one about the most-striking. The questions at hand would start from; why would
anybody want to tickle a people at their most sensitive part? What is the real
purpose of such a video and its writer/producer? How is the world going to
arrest the situation before it snow balls into an untamable wildfire? And very
importantly, how good is the situation for Nigeria (considering our
heterogeneous composition and our antecedent of religious instability)?
After
the September 2011 al-Qaeda attack on the world trade centre in New York, there
had occasionally been counter-attacks on the Muslim world by persons who felt
and (obviously) still feel aggrieved by the ideology of extreme Islamists, and
this is further aggravated by the incessant crises in the middle-east, the
multi-decade Sudan war, and of course, periodical mayhem and destruction of
innocent lives in northern and central Nigeria. What exactly is the isolated bone
of contention between religions of the world one may never know, but what we
know for sure is that some elements within humanity play on these religious
differences to enhance their nefarious socio-political and economic interests.
Such is the case with the movie that has caused a global outrage and others
before it.
Painfully,
the international community has not and cannot do enough to curb this kind of
occurrences mainly because one end of the action is unrepentantly violent while
the other end is been championed by citizens and inhabitants of countries that
(for now) will not bow to international consensus law because of a “world
power” status with which they intimidate the rest of the world. Funny enough,
Pakistani minister of railway has announced a bounty of$100,000 on the
film-maker, “I announce today that this blasphemer who has abused the holy
prophet, if somebody will kill him, I will give that person a prize of $100,000”
he said(AL JAZEERA English Network, 22nd September,2012) . Now, if
there is no compromise between two warring factions, how can they reach an
agreement and how can peace reign? But with the existing state of affairs where
the back-ground troubleshooters are right at the helm of affairs, the common is
very willing to be a tool and nobody wants to change grounds, it looks like the
world religious harmony is really a long way off our grasp.
I must
note that I am particularly impressed with Nigeria at this point in time,
although there had been an anti-American and anti-Israeli protest by a
pro-Iranian Shiite group in Kano, but that was a very significant break from
the past. If we would go down memory lane to 2006 after a cartoon that was
claimed to insult the prophet of Islam was released in Denmark, it was greeted
by violent reactions which claimed many lives in Katsina, Bauchi and Zamfara
states. For Nigeria, there are presently two
not-so-good situations, the first, a resonating global religious crisis,
the second, the presence of people within the country who always seek to take
advantage of disunity for their own selfish gain. I personally will be glad if
Nigeria for once separates herself from a global chaos and not be dragged into
this particular season feud.
Abiodun Omonijo
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