Anti-Boko Haram Protest In Ekiti

Simon Ateba, Nkrumah Bankong-Obi & Gbenro Adesina/Ado-Ekiti

BringBackOurGirls protests spread to Nigeria’s southwestern State of Ekiti on Tuesday with hundreds of Muslims taking to the streets to demand the unconditional release of more than 200 schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram Islamist sect on 14 April.

The girls were abducted in the dead of the night as they slept in their dormitories in a government secondary school in Chibok, a rural area about 130 kilometres from Maiduguri, the capital of Nigeria’s north-eastern state of Borno.

The government believes the girls were loaded into trucks and taken to the Sambisa forest, a vast forest of 60,000 square kilometres,17 times the size of Lagos, twice the size of Rwanda and as big as New England.

The protesters on Tuesday, led by the Ekiti State branch of the Nigerian Supreme Council For Islamic Affairs, described Boko Haram as anti-Islam and agents of satan who are tarnishing a religion that preaches peace.

They carried placards that read: ‘Boko Haram Satanic sect,’ ‘Islam means peace’, Bring back our girls’, ‘bring back our children’, ‘bring back our friends’, ‘bring back our sisters’, ‘bring back our future’.

The protesters included children, students, boys and girls, scholars, religious leaders and Imams. They marched from Fajuyi junction in Ado, the Ekiti State capital, to their mosque for prayers.

“The Muslim community in Ekiti State condemns the abduction of the innocent school girls in Chibok by Boko Haram and describes the act as satanic, evil, callous and alien to the pristine teachings of Islam,” said Alhaji Yakubu Oladoro Sanni, President Ekiti State Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs.

“We also condemn terrorism in Nigeria and all over the world in its entirety. We demand the safe release of the abducted girls,” he added, reading from a pre-written statement co-signed by him and Sheikh Jamiu Kewulre, President of the Ekiti League of Imams and Alfas, as well as Alhaji Tajudeen Adejumo, General Secretary of the Islamic council in the state.

The protesters said the Muslim community in Ekiti regards the abduction of the Chibok girls as a national tragedy, which calls for sober reflection by all Nigerians.

“Ekiti Muslims advise that Boko Haram should not be called or referred to as an Islamic group,” the council said.