Let The Sleeping Dogs Lie For Peace, Harmony And Tranquillity To Reign -By Ayobami Raheem

In the past two weeks, a series of events have happened that begin to expose the fragility of Nigerians and the Nigerian state to peace, harmony and tranquility.  The first is the story of a dog named after President Muhammadu Buhari by Joe Fortemose Chinakwe, an Ogun State local.

Mr. Chinakwe was said to have inscribed the name “Buhari” on the body of his dog, put chain on it and was seen walking the dog in a Hausa community in his area. This attracted the attention of some Hausa-Fulani in the neighborhood who made a complaint to the nearest police station, after which Mr. Chinakwe was arrested and detained by the police for some days. The offender subsequently asked his kinsmen to kill the dog and had been charged to court on Monday.

It is the responsibility of the police to maintain law and order and prevent all possible events/actions capable of causing public unrest. The arrest and charging of Mr. Chinakwe to court by the Nigeria police falls under this jurisdiction. A learned gentleman of the robe, Inibehe Effiong, wrote the article titled, “Naming A Dog ‘Buhari,’ Police Impunity And The Law” on SaharaReporters on August 19, 2016 with a view to condemn the actions of the Nigeria Police over the arrest of Mr. Chinakwe. The barrister based his opinion on the fact that the law has no regards for people’s views or feelings on an act in as much as such an act does not in itself contravene any law of the land.

He cited many sections of the Nigerian constitutions and bamboozled us (as laymen in law) with many legal terms that beg for understanding: ‘contra bonos mores’, ‘contra pacem,’ etc. Coincidentally, I am a veterinary doctor of almost two decades standing. During my training in veterinary school and practice post-qualification, I could confidently say I have seen more than two thousands dogs at home and abroad. However, I have never once seen a dog whose name is inscribed on its body. Not even in dogs’ shows where the identity of the dogs is very crucial. The dogs are given number tags or nametags for the purpose of identify during the competition and these IDs are discarded
immediately then after. The action of the man inscribing the name on the dog is not consistent with dog’s keeping anywhere in the world. I doubt if anyone has seen such even in Holywood, Nollywood or Bollywod.

As a veterinarian and a small animal practitioner, I cannot stand people making the dog a scapegoat and an item of fictitious and gruesome drama. Dogs are one of the primitive companion animals to be domesticated by man. Their domestication dates as far back as 8,000 BC. In Nigeria, dogs remain the most useful kept domestic mammals. They are kept for different reasons, including security, hunting, as a source of meat, recreation, biomedical research and for companionship. Unconfirmed statistics speculated a population between 2 to 5 million dogs in Nigeria. Considering the estimated dog population density of 1:13 dog per household in Ilorin alone using aerial photographs (Aiyedun and Olugasa, 2010), it is reasonable to believe that that the number of dogs in Nigeria is far more than 10 million.

In Nigeria, one of the most common reasons for keeping dogs is for security. The Nigeria Police, Nigeria Army, Nigeria Customs and Nigeria Immigration Service have dogs’ units to assist in performing their statutory roles of safeguarding the lives and properties of citizenry, as well as in maintaining peaceful and legal passage of citizens and goods across the borders.

In this context, I wonder for what reason is Mr. Chinakwe keeping his own dog. I doubt if it falls into any of the above categories. If it does, he would not have ordered the killing of the dog immediately he was arrested. He does not understand that this action alone is tantamount to destroying the evidence and further complicates the case. It shows that Mr. Chinakwe’s latent intention is not that he has a need for the dog in the first instance, but for the purpose of ridiculing the person of Mr. Buhari and fomenting troubles and possibly causing ethnic clashes between Igbo and Hausa indigenes in the area and beyond. That aim had been momentarily achieved and so the dog was killed on his instruction. He is guilty of another offense called spoliation of evidence.

To counter the action of the police, many pictures of a goat wearing a label that reads ‘My name is Jonathan’ have surfaced on the Internet. Every reasonable person knows that this was a postscript to create a similar scenario with Mr. Chinakwe’s case. The argument of people calling the former President Goodluck Jonathan names such as “clueless,” “weak,” “incompetent,” “hippopotamus” and so on as was proposed by another lawyer, Femi Fani-Fakayode, in Vanguard yesterday does not hold water and is not the same as inscribing the name on the body of a dog. I am sure, if not for this case already, if a Hausa man does the same with Goodluck’s name in the city of Bayelsia or a community of Ijaw indigenes, it is not unlikely that he is going to be attacked. The Police will mete out the same
treatment for the offender. It is not about anyone, it is about preventing and averting public unrest and violence.

Are feelings of people never taken into account in law? The case of an American pastor, Terry Jones, who was arrested because he wanted to burn copies of the Quran, readily comes to mind. Terry Jones first gained attention in 2010 when he planned to burn a Quran on the anniversary of 9/11, although he eventually discarded the idea. Report had it that his congregation did burn some Qurans in March 2011 and he promoted an anti-Muslim film. All three incidents ignited violence in the Middle East and Afghanistan. Burning the Quran, specifically, is not a criminal act in United States. Such an act by the same man had caused violence in Middle East and Afghanistan, leading to death of some innocent foreigners (seven) in a United Nations office in northern Afghanistan in the past (2010). That was the r’aison d’etre for arresting him in 2013 when he planned to do the same, because by experience, the US police were aware that such an act was likely to cause violence against US citizens in foreign lands. The US is a liberal society home to only a small fragment of the Muslim population. The UK is not a Muslim country either, yet Terry Jones was denied entry there simply because he was seen as a violent risk to the country.

On critical evaluation, Mr. Effiong was indirectly telling us that the police should have allowed public unrest and violence to occur before arresting the man. Everyone agrees with the proverbs; prevention is better than cure and an ounce of prevention is better that a pound of cure. If violence occurs, sequel to Mr. Chinakwe’s provocative posture with his dog, and some people are killed and maimed for life, no amount of justice can bring back the lost souls or reform the maimed.  Henceforth, the Nigeria Police, rather than being condemned, should be commended for being proactive and nipping in the bud the possible violence Mr. Chinakwe’s action might have precipitated.

The truth remains that the Nigeria policing system by default has not developed to the level that it is capable of identifying perpetrators soon after a crime is committed. If not, those involved with the killing of the Redeemed Pastor woman in Abuja could have been fished out before now. On that premise, it is not the act of naming his dog that is criminal, but his provocative postures and excesses of i) inscribing the name on the dog, which is unacceptable to advocates of animal welfare, ii) walking the dog within a Hausa community in that area, and iii) an action that he has not been known for.

Mr. Chinakwe went the extra mile in fomenting trouble and inciting and provoking people to violence. If the dog stays in his house with the inscription or he walks the dog without the “Buhari” inscription, very few people would know about the dog.

Having said that, two wrongs do not make a right. The threat of killing the man should not arise at all. However, if the police felt that holding Mr. Chinakwe would prevent him from being killed in retaliation, their action is justified. It may be a preventive strategy to avoid crime of murder and prevention is better than cure. Law is no respecter of anyone.

In the same vein, there is a forged message of Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia Sheikh Abdul Aziz going round the Internet with the picture of the Sheikh.

The forged message had it that Sheikh was eulogizing Jesus (peace be upon him) while condemning Muhammad (peace be upon him) for the violent actions of some Muslims. The first questions I asked the lady that posted the forged message were, “Where when and under what circumstances did the Sheikh utter such a statement?” and “How will she feel if the message is a fraud as it is forged even without making any further investigation?” The only answer she could give was that she was in the platform to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ.

What I am saying and what any reasonable person will say here is that nothing wrong in spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, but it must be done with truth and not with deceit, fraud and lies. One should not be dubious in the name of evangelism to be forging things and changing rules and texts. According to Islam, Jesus is a prophet of the truth and will not support falsehood least in the spreading of his gospel. If evangelism is someone’s right, it should be done with decorum without necessarily infringing on other people’s right or religion. Where your own right ends, is where mine and other person’s right just begin.

Further investigation to track the source of the forged message was fruitless as the linked Facebook address on the message showed a Pakistani Ahmadi Muslim but the picture/message could not be accessed on his Facebook page. Either it has been deleted or reserved only for his friends. The bottom line is that the forged message is blasphemous. If the Sheikh is taken out of the message, as the Sheikh could never say such, that portends the originator of the message is saying that. In situation where such an entity (the originator) could not be identified, the people responsible for spreading such messages will be held accountable. I did tell the lady to be careful that such a message is capable of provoking violence if getting to the public domain as some misguided and overzealous Muslims may not take it lightly. And at the end of the day, what does one get from causing troubles at all? Such a mischievous practice is neither portraying Islam in bad image before the Muslims, neither is it promoting Christianity as a message of the truth. That was just last week.

Yesterday, we started hearing of the killing of some people in Talata-Mafara community of Zamfara States over blasphemous message against the Prophet of Islam. The story, according to The Punch Newspaper (23/08/2016), had it that a student of the Abdu Gusau Polytechnic made a defamatory statement against the prophet of Islam. He was beaten to a coma by some angry Muslims. The student was rescued by another Muslim called Tajudeen who drove the student to the hospital for treatment in his personal car. The mob descended on Tajudeen’s house and set it on fire. In the process, 8 people were killed. This sort of behavior sounds barbaric and is tarnishing the image of Islam before people who understand nothing about Islam. Why should people take law into their hands? This is against the peaceful teaching of Islam. Therefore, these criminals must be identified and made to face the full arm of the law. Violence is alien to the practice of pristine Islam and undiluted message of the Prophet.

Muslims and Christians have lived harmoniously in this country for ages. Unfortunately, in both Islam and Christianity, there are some misguided and undesirable elements who really do not understand the main concepts of their religions. These are the ones that will take pleasure in causing troubles and indulging in violence. Islamic clerics have a lot to do in cautioning and teaching against this sort of violence, while the Christian clerics also have to guide their own faithfuls against uttering defamatory statements against the Prophet of Islam since Muslims are not known to be doing such against the personality of Jesus Christ.

Nigeria is a blessed country with diverse tribes and religions. Rather than seeing our diversities as challenge or threat, we should ponder about many opportunities and strength such diversities have given us as a nation. The rivalry between one ethnic group against the other is political and at the peak at the moment. Adding religious crisis to this present ethnic rivalry is like adding salt to an injury, which will do no one any good.

If peace, harmony, and tranquility should reign in our nation, it is the responsibilities of all –  Christians and Muslims, you and I – by letting sleeping dogs lie, to be an advocate of peace at all times and in all places in all circumstances in our hearts, utterances and actions.

God bless Nigeria!

Dr. Ayobami Raheem hails from Ibadan and can be reached at ayoraheem1@yahoo.com.