Erasing the footprints of Premarital engagements in our MSSN community -By Kareem Itunu Azeez

Religion is one of the most controversial and most complicated issue to interfere or even contribute to. This is because of the tenets of one religion against the other, and the further different interpretations ascribe to it by different people, scholars, pastors and imams, atleast for the two most dominant as far as this part of the world is concern.

However the larger perception isn’t what I have come to disclose, but some issues worth pondering about. The youths dominate almost all spheres of one form of belief or the other so is the complications that comes with life.
Now streamlining this story to the Islamic fate, and Christianity, and the acts in tertiary institutions, I believe in the knowledgeable words that say, “A religion is perfect in its own ways but the mistake is those practicing it” this is where I am going, and this is where this article is headed. There are vices and errors by humans on a daily basis, and I do not believe in the general syncretic ideology that says, one religion is this or that, tagging humanity as destructor of peace.

The Muslim Student Society of Nigeria, is a body has been created to cater for many things among brothers and sisters in Islam, especially in tertiary institutions. It is therefore of utmost gratitude been a Muslim, and to further tackle some issues creeping in to the grassroot of our association, either as a body, or as a group. Hopefully this should prompt concerned individuals to reason and act in accordance to the motive of the Creation of the MSSN in the first place.

Having spent some days in Sokoto, to observe some certain lifestyles among student of different climates and weather, I think I left with a bigger story than I had bargain for, and it was in the Muslim Student Association of Nigeria. (MSSN) of that particular school, to quickly shrink this, in the most suitable way of interpretation, it said, “The group was willing to help pay dowries for brothers and sisters who are willing to get married, ” For the sake of Allah”, but are unable to fund it. And positively, this is expected to curb many immoral acts portrayed by today’s youth, such as rape, formication, homosexuality, lesbianism and a whole lot.

While I subscribe to this idea, I do not agree to the system of helping brothers to pay their dowry, for a woman or lady they hope to spend their many days with. So I ask the question on the comment session on the Facebook page of the school, I ask if the school help the students to pay their dowry, would they continuously help to feed them also, and perhaps send their prospective kids to school also. Furthermore, if this is encouraged, don’t they think this will promote unprepared for relationships among the so call students, hiding under the cloak of “For the sake of Allah” to commit foreseeable atrocities, there are so many questions without any answers.

For the first time using my participant observation method of research, from my days at the Yaba College of Technology, I have seen Amir picked up another wife, just having recently dump one, for disloyalty, but instead of pondering on the wrongs that happen, which such marriage has failed to work, it was much more easier a choice to pick another, why because, most of the sisters in the mosque have been wired to understand the only place to get a good husband is in the mosque, they have been made to believe the physical qualities of a good man are his praying traits, his ability to keep his beards his strength when it comes to reciting the Qur’an, but unfortunately, this are still qualities any man can purposely get to know, when he wants anything desperately. However that doesn’t under shadow the good brothers the Islamic fate has produced, or successful marriage that has been borne within the MSSN community.

Although some even go as far to back up their claims using the Qur’an in such a way that you likely will forget to use your initiative, especially in a world when men are everywhere but husband scarce to find, when women are everywhere, but wives tough to see, little wonder everyone is a victim of everyone, and this has led to broken homes, strained relationships, and domestic violence, between both parties. Let me quickly borrow the narrations of Huda; about relationship, he exclaims that, “Dating” as it is currently practiced in much of the world does not exist among Muslims . Young Islamic men and women (or boys and girls) do not enter into one-on-one intimate relationships, spending time alone together and “getting to know one another” in a very deep way as a precursor to selecting a marital partner. Rather, in Islamic culture, pre-marital relationships of any kind between members of the opposite sex are forbidden. But this isn’t the state of affairs in today’s word, and in the citadel of lightAndWe have seen brothers and sisters who live together while not legally married but because their parents eyes can’t see them, and yet the eyes of the brothers in mosque in high esteem is blind to it, while some sisters envy the way they live because to them they seen to match.
We have seen well kitted sisters, and brothers parade the dark nights, at school campuses, when responsible ward are home, in the name of relationship, and not too much have the MSSN raised issues like this, and unconsciously, this student may not even know they are doing something wrong, but because they have often his under the cloak of Allah, then its Continuous error.
Someone may argue hat just because some are doing it doesn’t mean the rest are doing it, therefore why do I have to generalise, my answer is, if we practice love and unity with the slogan an injury to one, is an injury to all, why can’t we accept a dirt from one is a dirt to all, by that approach we will learn to clean the dirt.

So my point is, as far as I encourage possession of good qualities as a Muslim, I do hope the sentiments that come with living a godly life would be interwoven with understanding the difference between what is good and what is not, and not just because some MSSN brothers or sisters says it, even at your own detriment. The reality is that, today’s Nigeria economy doesn’t recognized whether you are doing one thing for the sake of God or not, so why not focus on the main reason of been in school and let your character be the speaker of your religion. I therefore discourage the charade of what our community occupiers are posting to the world, secretly or publicly. And if this isn’t tackled, quickly we may just be promoting fornication in disguise at the helm of truth.