Readers of SFW may notice that we have devoted several posts in recent weeks to Nigeria. The chief of the central bank in Nigeria, Mallam Sanusi, is an unapologetic financial jihadist and describes himself as a “shariah scholar.” He has been pushing hard for Shariah banking and finance in Nigeria, so hard in fact, that he has managed to figure out a way of easing reserve requirements on “Islamic banks” through regulatory changes, without going through the west African nation’s national assembly.
Readers who are not familiar with this activity in Nigeria can quickly get up to speed by viewing our past few posts on the subject:
https://shariahfinancewatch.org/category/nigeria/
Why should we care about Nigeria?
First of all, Nigeria is NOT a Muslim majority country and the fact that someone in a position of power would be exercising what amounts to Islamic missionary work to force Shariah finance on the people of Nigeria is worrisome on many levels, not the least of which is the fact that it could serve as a model for other nations where the financial jihadists seek to use Shariah compliant finance as a trojan horse to ease Shariah into a host nation’s culture, society and legal system.
But there is another reason why we should be concerned about Nigeria: Nigeria has been wracked in recent years by violence committed by Jihadist terrorists determined to impose Shariah law in at least part of the nation. Their brutality and barbarism has resulted in massacres of non-Muslim villages and violence aimed at disrupting Nigeria’s energy industry, which is its economic lifeline.
Here we have yet another example of the global Islamic insurgency that the free world faces.
The latest development in the violence in Nigeria should catch the attention of SFW readers: now the violent Jihadists are targeting banks in Nigeria because they do not comply with Shariah law.
In other words, using violent methods, the jihadist terrorists are working toward the same basic goals as the financial jihadists, in this case the chief of the country’s central bank who, by hook or by crook, is determined to see Shariah banking and finance gain a stronghold in Nigeria.
Maybe the fact that the terrorists are targeting banks is just a coincidence, but we reckon that’s probably not the case. In our estimation, at the very least, these attacks could have been inspired by Sanusi’s campaign to force Shariah finance and banking on the people of Nigeria.
Jama’atu Ahlis-Sunnah Lidda’awati Wal Jihad, popularly known as Boko Haram sect, yesterday claimed responsibility for attacking some banks in Borno, Bauchi and other places where they took away unspecified amounts of money, stressing that the modus operandi of the banks contravenes the Sharia legal system.
Spokesman of the group, Abu Zaid said: “Let me confirm to you that our warriors had actually attacked three banks, namely Bank PHB, First Bank of Nigeria and Unity Bank where they carted away huge sums of money.
“We took the measure because the mode of operations of the banks was not based on Islamic tenets”, Abu Zaid declared.
“If the banks continued to operate contrary to Islamic code, monies snatched from them remain legitimate. We are out to eliminate all aspects of ills in socio-economic affairs of the people which go contrary to the Sharia legal system,” he said.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201107140416.html
