Barbarism

Here's a story which ought to give all those indulging in hand-wringing over Sharia-based arbitration a little perspective on what the real deal looks like: nothing which could ever happen in the Canadian framework would ever come close to the cruelties meted out wherever unadulterated Sharia "justice" is given free rein.

Nigerian Islamic judges have ordered that a teenager from Niger have his hand cut off after he confessed to stealing a motorbike, court officials said on Monday.

This is thought to be the first time that a foreign national has been sentenced to amputation since northern Nigeria began to reintroduce sharia, the strict Islamic legal code, in 1999.

Lawal Usman (19), from the Niger district of Maradi, was convicted under sharia law in the northern city of Katsina on Friday, court registrar Nasir Darma said.

A presiding judge at the Katsina Upper Sharia Court Three, Mustapha Sani Saulawa, ruled that Usman should have his right hand amputated at the wrist.

You can be sure that the sentence will be carried out, as similar sentences already have been quite a few times in recent years. I look at insanity like this, endorsed by the popular will of the people of those states in which they are occurring, and I am reinforced in my conviction that the country would be better off split into three or at the very least two parts, one bit for these religious lunatics, and the other part for the rest of the populace which likes the 21st century just fine. "Nigeria" is nothing but a meaningless geographical expression.

Comments

[Randy McDonald]

"[N]othing which could ever happen in the Canadian framework would ever come close to the cruelties meted out wherever unadulterated Sharia "justice" is given free rein."

No. Why take the risk of anything being close?

[Chuckles]

[...the country would be better off split into three or at the very least two parts, one bit for these religious lunatics...]

Two wont do. A North/South divide will place mainly Xtian Middle-Belters at the behest of the Sokoto Caliphate. British rule already laid the seeds for this by imposing Amirs on the Middle Belters. Commotion in places like Plateau State in recent time only testify to the insistence of people like the Tiv etc to rid themselves of Caliphate hegemony.
Three wont do. There is absolutely no freaking way that the Ijaw and other South/South peoples will opt for an arrangement in which Igbo Hegemony might occur, ditto for South Easterners like Calabar etc - who were all going to be absorbed under Igbo hegemony anyway, if Ojukwu had had his way.
I am looking at a minimum of 5, perhaps optimally 7 or 8 with significant reductions to the present territories of Cameroon, Benin and Niger.
The very fact that the Jihadists are now raising voices, clamoring for the introducion of Sharia in *Lagos* (of all places) assures me that the inevitable is just around the corner.
It is quite common to see some of these amputees conveyed to places in the South like Ibadan and Lagos where they then have to beg for a living. Call it redistribution of wealth, Koranic style.

[Abiola Lapite]

"Two wont do. A North/South divide will place mainly Xtian Middle-Belters at the behest of the Sokoto Caliphate."

Actually, I was thinking more along the lines originally suggested by Gideon Orkar, with the sharia-loving states set free to merge with their brethren in Niger if they so chose.

[Chuckles]

I see. That makes sense. Isnt it ironic that the same Sharia folks who violently opposed the idea of a unified Nigerian country because they feared that Western influences from the South would corrupt them are now the very ones violently hanging on to the idea of Nigeria so they can export their crazed religious mentalities to the rest of the country? And there's Oil to be had in the bargain...

[Chuckles]

Some good stuff:

http://www.independentng.com/saturday/ppsep170501.htm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/21/AR2005092100360.html

http://www.africasia.com/services/news/newsitem.php?area=africa&item=050921110934.ka7z5f5t.php

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20050921-1633-nigeria-warlord.html

[...I am calling for and working towards the liquidation of the Nigerian state. I am going to the people’s conference organised by PRONACO to canvass and to present demands for the Czechoslovakian type of disintegration. We want peaceful disintegration of the Nigerian state. There are many nationalities in Nigeria. I am an Izon man hoping for a sovereign Ijaw nationality, so also the Yoruba man can demand for an independent Yoruba nation. But if a group of nations like the Urhobos, Itsekiris, decide that they want to come together to form a federation of nations, then they have to agree among themselves. If after we have gone, they say let us subject the condition canvassed by the Ijaws to a plebiscite in Ijaw land and generality of Ijaws say they want to remain with Nigeria under any new arrangement, then so be it.

My own belief is that Nigeria is an evil entity. It has nothing to stand on and I will continue to fight and try to see that Nigeria dissolves and disintegrates. That is my life ambition and that is why I have dedicated my life to the struggle till the day I die to see to the disintegration of Nigeria...]