Aregbesola and the jabs about hijabs

Fola Ojo

Don’t let his skinny appearance deceive you; Governor Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State is not a wimp. He is a master politician and a tough cookie who has his fingers on the buttons of his assignment as governor. His good deeds are bold prints buried in many crevices and fissures of the state, and he knows how to score a goal in the football field of what he does.Lately, the governor’s toughness has been put to the test following pockets of confusions that have erupted in some schools in the state. And the rattlers keep coming as some secondary school pupils draped up in masqueraders’ costumes, church choir attire, and Islamic Hijabs, threw decorum to the dogs chanting lyrics toned in hate to one another, and in love to the gods of their religion. That was the ugly scene at the Baptist High School Iwo last week.

The root of the rowdiness has gone far down into surreal dialogue around hijab, a garment and veil worn by Muslim women beyond the age of puberty in the presence of adult males outside of their immediate family. For the women, hijab helps them conform to a certain standard of modesty and decency.   But in Osun State, the fracas and noise it has generated are not in any way modest or decent. And the governor, an avowed Muslim, almost in the category of an Imam, is at the centre of it all. Not even in the heart of the Islamic Northern part of Nigeria, can I recall a sitting governor enmeshed in such a controversy about religion and its infantile trumpeting in schools. But it is happening under the watch of Aregbesola, and it is brewing, with many people, Muslims and Christians alike, justifiably apprehensive and concerned that some cities in the state may soon become hotbeds of unnecessary religious skirmishes and outright violence if the fire is not put out now.

What we hear is that the body language and gestures of the governor in public events are misinterpreted as a tacit approval that Osun is now an Islamic state. Christians, who have lived together in harmony with others in this environment until now, don’t want to hear that. A few days ago,the governor with a team of dousers visited the battle field where the fire first started, and where the boiling effusion may now be simmering. “We are a product of the rule of law and this has guided all our actions…we have not approved the use of hijab in any school. Let me repeat this for the hearing of mischief makers who have been working tirelessly to bring religious war to our state…those sowing the seed of discord in our schools and community and inciting one religion against another… government did not at any time approve the use of hijab in any school…”, the governor reportedly said in an address to the pupils and teachers.

I do not agree with those who claim that the governor intends to Islamise Osun and force all of us to worship Allah because he hates Christians and Christianity. This is a preposterous babbling.The governor is a product of the tutelage parents in this part of the country handed over to their children about religious harmony.There are close people in his household and a good number of his cabinet members who are committed Christians, and he has not converted them. He taught in the secondary school in my home town of Imesi-Ile in the early 70s, and he did not attempt to convert his pupils. Why then this much inferno of religious ruckus and hubbub? Is it just an election year politics or a good government policy misunderstood and misinterpreted? Were the citizens prepared for such a grandiose school merger move with just a stroke of the pen from a governor who is very expressive about his faith? Why are we not having similar incidents in other APC states governed by Muslim persons? Is this an over-reach from an overzealous governor who is engrossed by his mission and absorbed by his vision? These are the questions many people are asking, and only the governor can provide some of the answers.

I have visited Osun State about four times since Aregbesola became governor, and the lofty works he has done are record-breaking, no doubt. The road construction going on, the new face of school structures, the attention he has paid to the elderly, programmes set up to  rejuvenate the minds of the youths, all of these are lofty deeds for which we should salute him. The blotch on the windshield of his achievements, however, may be in the brewing spate of religious fireworks that may dwarf the good works he has done as governor.

This furore is small today, but in this dispensation of global religious skirmishes and battles in Nigeria, in these times where terrorist recruiters are looking for feeble minds to enlist in their armies of havoc, it may grow bigger tomorrow. And when it does and boils over, Aregbesola’s  name may not, undeservedly so, be mentioned in a good light. We know the recruitment tactics of terrorist groups, and the environment that is building up in Osun today is an attraction to them. In a nation where our youths are hungry and angry at governments and the Nigerian political system, an offer of a meagre sum and promises of a better life can lure them to carrying out terrorist acts. These groups have agents in Nigeria, and they are watching what’s going on in Osun State, and it is a good ground for them to explore. Lebanon is a good lesson why any leader should not touch religious battles with a one-thousand-foot pole. Religious battles bring down a nation and its people.

A couple of months ago, a terrorist group allegedly conveyed weapons to Lagos inside some of the numerous fuel tankers that ply major roads to the country’s former capital. Authorities were shocked that the masterminds of the planned terror act could pile up weapons of mass destruction in the state, generally considered the safest haven for investment at the moment in the country.  The organisational capacity of the group shocked government authorities.  Nigerians, not foreigners, were recruited to serve on the gang. Several sleeper cells we now learnt are in Lagos and Ogun states. When people are hungry with no hope of where the next meal will come from, they become easy prey and targets for groups with evil agenda. If they stumble on hungry and angry youths who will propagate their gospel, they will recruit them, and the battle will begin from there. That is my fear.

The law of perception says that in the battle between products, perception is more important than reality. I do not have any doubt about Aregbesola’s good intentions for the state, and I don’t know what his surrogates are telling him. But in a situation where his good deeds are evil spoken of, where conflagration is fuelled frequently at the backdrop of religion, and where there is too much suspicion of religious coercion because of some sporadic public prayer recitals initiated by the governor in open government events and functions, going back to the drawing board of public perception which may be the cause of this trouble will not be an act of cowardice you find in a wimp, it will be a showcase of strength you find in a tough cookie like Aregbesola.