Adoption of Sharia Law in Northern Nigeria
Zamfara state introduced Islamic criminal law in January 2000 and eleven more northern Nigerian states followed within two years. The constitutional position was ambiguous and remains so. Sharia courts had operated in the north since colonial times in matters of personal status — marriage, inheritance, family — and the 1999 constitution permitted states to establish them; what was new was extending them to criminal matters with hudud punishments including amputation, flogging and stoning. The context was the return to civilian rule in 1999 after sixteen years of military government, and the election of a southern Christian president after a long period of northern dominance. Governors who adopted sharia were responding to a genuine popular demand and also to a political opportunity. Amputations were carried out in a handful of cases and stoning sentences were passed and overturned on appeal — the cases of Safiya Hussaini in 2001 and Amina Lawal in 2002 attracted international campaigns and were quashed on procedural grounds by sharia appeal courts themselves. The intercommunal consequences were the serious ones. Riots in Kaduna in February 2000 killed some 2,000 people, and violence between Muslim and Christian communities in the middle belt has recurred ever since. Enforcement varies enormously by state and has largely lapsed for hudud offences, while sharia courts handle a large volume of ordinary civil business. Boko Haram emerged in Borno in the following decade arguing that none of it went far enough. The federal government under Obasanjo declined to challenge any of it in court, calling it political sharia that would fade. The states have kept the laws and the courts, the amputations stopped, and the argument about what the constitution actually permits has never been resolved.
- Year: 2000 CE
- Category: Political
