His Eminence Alhaji Mohammad Sa’ad Abubakar IV, The Sultan of Sokoto, and the charismatic Catholic Priest of Adoration ministries, Rev. Fr. Ejike Mbaka, yesterday, met in Enugu at the reception organized by Enugu state government in honour of Enugu Rangers International Football club for their recent victory in Nigeria Premiership league.
The sultan who first spoke said that Islam does not permit anybody to kill in the name of religion, maintaining that anybody who kills in the name of religion should be held as a criminal and treated as such. He also said that President Muhammadu Buhari is misunderstood to be biased about some sections of the country, noting that his interaction with the President does not portray him as a religious or ethnic bigot. The Sultan said: “If anybody commits any crime, he should be given his real name. It is not possible that Fulani who have lived here for so long can take up arms against their hosts.Branding them terrorists will not solve the problem. If you kill, you will be killed, anybody that kills in the name of religion is a criminal. The solution for us is to come together as one people. Any Fulani that kills will not go free. More Muslims have even died in this cause. In his speech,
commenting later, Fr. Mbaka said that with the Sultan’s speech, he has changed his perceptions of Nigeria and religious differences. He said: “We were biased unnecessarily, we were fighting unnecessarily. Sultan has come to build a bridge. Your coming here has succeeded in quenching a looming war. Your coming represents peace and unity”.
