By Ibrahim Ado-Kurawa

Abduljabar Nasiru Kabara has confirmed that he is a Shiite. But there is need to examine the trajectory of Shiism in Nigeria and their strategies since they first manifested as internationalist propagandists.

Sunni Islam is predominant in Nigeria since the arrival of Islam in the Sudan. Shehu Usman Danfodio and his successors reinforced this position.

In 1979 Ayatullah Khomenei led the Shiite Revolution in Iran, which he called Islamic Revolution. He gained the sympathy of many Muslims across the world because of American antagonism towards his Shiite State.

In Nigeria many students sympathized with the Iranian cause. One of such students was Ibrahim Yakubu (aka ElZakzaki). He recruited many followers in the university not in the name of Shiism because at that time he did not profess to be Shiite. He was more inclined to Muslim Brothers (Ikhwan of Egypt and Syria) and he used their books for preaching and propagation of his ideas.

Even Khomenei at that time did not insist all Muslims should become Shiites. In fact the Iranians even pledged to edit and translate the literature of the Sokoto leaders.

This was in the formative stage. It was a deliberate action that enticed innocent people who thought Khomenei was genuine. I visited Iran in 1983 and since then I realized that their aim was not Islam but Shiite propagation and recruitment for Iranian imperialist expansionism.

All the rhetoric against the USA is only a deceitful deviance. After all Iran is now a major financier of terrorism and other high stake crimes such as drug dealings and laundering of counterfeit currency. These are not Islamic actions.

Many student activists visited Iran but ElZakzaki became the focal person. Abdulkarim Kaura Namoda met Khomenei who promised and directed that Nigerian version of Hizbollah terrorist organization should be founded under his command. This did not materialize because of his rivalry with ElZakzaki.

Gradually ElZakzaki transmuted and became a full Shiite. The Islamist political activists deserted him and his Shiism became public knowledge.

Others who went to Iran to study returned as Shiites some were trained as theologians while others in the natural sciences.

Shiites were recruited from the rural areas and from the urban vulnerable. They established their cells in many states of Northern Nigeria. The Shiite Republic of Iran and its clients supported Shiite groups across the country. They established schools in many parts of Northern Nigeria. They commenced the recruitment drive.

The first targets were Islamists in educational institutions where they recruited as much as they could. The next targets were followers of Sufi brotherhoods (Darikas).

The reason for targeting them was political as most of them were against Saudi religious propaganda. This was the soft point of people like Abduljabar and some of them were eventually converted.

Meanwhile Ibrahim ElZakzaki became the de-facto leader of Shiites in Nigeria even though some who were trained in Iran resisted because of his intellectual deficiency. They even claimed that they are apolitical and that they have nothing to do with ElZakzaky’s confrontation with the State.

The incapacitation of ElZakzaki has created a vacuum up for the grabs. Abduljabar is about to fill that vacuum. He has requested Iran to support him. This is a clear manifestation of his agenda. He uses misrepresentation of Islam propagated by orientalists, out right lies and virulent narratives to entice the many ignorant and unemployed youths.

This was the same strategy used by Maitatsine earlier and ElZakzaki, who subsequently eliminated Abdulkarim Kaura, the Zamfara prince who eventually became a psychiatric case.

Abduljabar’s agenda is to recruit as many gullible people into Shiism as possible. This could be achieved through the mass media by exploiting the intellectual and material weaknesses of the society and the secularist contradictions of the Nigerian State.

He falsely claims, through his postures that he wants to purge Islam of adulteration according to him as a result of the lies fabricated against the Prophet (SAW), which have remained in the books of Ahl Sunna. He claims that all the Ahl Sunnah are misguided and by extension Shaykh Nasiru Kabara his father who lived as a scholar of the Ahl Sunna doctrine and never challenged the books of Hadith, Fiqh or even the Ash’ari School of Theology.

All these according to the claims of Abduljabar must be discarded. And he has nothing to offer apart from disjointed quotations since he is not even grounded in Fiqh.

Sometimes when it suits him, he condemns the great Muslim Jurists who espoused the rules of Fiqh. His aim is to confuse the listeners and eventually recruit them into deviant Shiite doctrine since most of them are ignorant.

Abduljabar is not a scholar but a propagandist so he assumes everyone is ignorant. There is nothing original or scholarly in his ranting.

Every student not even scholar knows that Christianity, Islam, Shiism have their epistemology. They have the rules upon which they establish their beliefs. So if anyone wants to reform any practices of any people that claim to be adherents of these faiths he must follow the established rules.

For example when Martin Luther decided to reform the Church he did not challenge Trinity or the fundamental practices approved by the early Church.

Those engaged in polemics against Christianity can bring so many phrases that contradict each other in the Bible. Such polemics can even prove that the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD was a later contrivance presided by unbaptized Christian and it made Trinity the Final Doctrine of Christianity.

But no Christian will ever accept this as a reason to discard Trinity or even shake his faith in it. This is because Christ said to Simon the fisherman: “And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16: 18).

According to Christian teaching the Holy Spirit guided the institution of the Church after Christ and it has final authority on Faith hence it promulgated all the important creeds especially that of Chalcedon in AD 451.

It was the Church not Christ that decided what should even be in the Bible. Thus “St. Paul in writing letters to the congregations of disciples in Rome and other centers had no idea that he was helping to construct a New Testament” of the Bible (Wilfred Cantwell Smith The Meaning and End of Religion Fortress Press Minneapolis 1991 p. 94). In this respect Shiism is closer to Christianity than Islam because it was created after the Prophet (SAW).

In Islam not Shiism, there is no clergy or Church as in the case of Christianity. There are certain principles outlined which all scholars know and they use them to discern any issue hence it is possible reach consensus without any meeting.

This was how every issue was resolved since the time of the companions. As it is clear now on the blasphemy of Abduljabar, when he equated himself with the Prophet (SAW) in widely circulated video.

Shiism, on the other hand is different as it was invented after the Prophet (SAW) because of politics. Everything revolves around their Imams who are infallible and they came after our beloved Prophet (SAW). Anything that does not elevate them must be interpreted to have that meaning.

Some Shiites do not even pray the Juma’a because the Imam of the time is hidden until Khomenei elevated his own status to that of Velayat-e Faqih, a new concept in Shiism, which he introduced to assume the role of the representative of the Imam and he directed them to pray.

His authority to his followers is similar to that of the Pope hence he made decrees in absence of the Imam who is the supreme Shiite authority.

So the positions of Ahl Sunnah on the Qur’an and Hadith are different from those of the Shiites but Abduljabar will never say this. Because his aim is to use his fraud to hoodwink the ignorant and disconnect them from the Sunnah and then introduce them to his Shiite false doctrine that was invented after the Prophet (SAW).

The Qur’an is the Word of Allah and is recited by Muslims as revealed, to our beloved Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). Qur’an is unadulterated and has remained as revealed ever since and it shall forever remain because the Muslims have the Qur’an in their memory. Not all Shiites believe this. This is because of their hatred for Sayyiduna Usman and the fact that their false doctrines cannot stand if they accept the Finality and Divinity of the Qur’an (Word of ALLAH).

Anyone who doubts the authenticity of the Qur’an is not a Muslim. Some Shiites, who did not reach the level of kufr (unbelief) do not out rightly reject the Qur’an but misinterpret its meanings whenever it does not satisfy their desires.

But this is more difficult for them to openly declare hence the only strategy is to attack the Hadith literature and generate confusion in the minds of the ignorant and the gullible. If Abduljabar succeeds in this adventure he will begin to openly attack the Qur’an.

Sunnah is the sum total of the “divinely guided” life style of the Prophet (SAW) as transmitted through an impeccable chain of narrators in authentic Hadith.  It includes all his statements and actions “as well as the statements and actions of others done in his presence which did not meet his disapproval. Hadith is the record of actions and sayings of the Prophet (SAW).”

Hadith, is also the record of sayings and actions of his companions done in his presence” (Philips, A. A. B.  1995 The Evolution of Fiqh: Islamic Law and the Madh-habs Riyadh p. 29), which he approved.  Hadith therefore is the record of the Sunnah.

Scholars of Ahl Sunnah have categorized Hadiths and the majority of the Muslims accept these categorizations. There are scholarly disagreements on Hadiths and also critiques of all Hadith collections. Analyses were done before using them for any Shari’ah rulings, which are accepted based on the principles outlined over one thousand years ago.

One of the most important differences between Ahl Sunnah and deviant Shiites is in the principles accepted for authentication, rejection of Hadith and using them to make legal judgments.

Yet Shiites with evil intention such as Abduljabar quote Hadith authenticated or rejected by Ahl Sunnah, make additions, misinterpret them and even translate the Arabic wrongly where possible since it is all about polemics not principles of knowledge.

This is because they have no Hadith collections to use in authenticating their heretic interpretations or engage in polemics but only have the fabricated sayings of their Imams and fabricated or misinterpreted Hadiths of the Ahl Sunnah.

The Shiites are able to engage in these evil actions because the Ahl Sunnah revere all the companions and most of the Shiite Imams therefore it is easy to find traditions in the collections of Ahl Sunnah that are attributed to these pious leaders.

It is a similar case with Christians it is an article of Faith of Ahl Sunnah to believe in the Prophets mentioned in the Bible even though Christians do not believe in our beloved Prophet SAW.

So why is Abduljabar different? He claims that he wants to purge Islam of contradictions according to him people are leaving the Faith because of such contradictions. Therefore he has appointed himself as a reformer, committed to refining all the corpus of knowledge of the Ahl Sunnah.

This is deliberate to deceive the gullible. In his rhetoric he does not adhere to any principles. And he is not able to outline his own new principles since he does not even have the capacity to do that.

For example Al-Sayid Sabiq decided to write Fiqh Sunnah because he was not satisfied with the principles of the Schools of Islamic Law (Madhahib) and Shaykh Nasirudeen Albani wrote Sifat Salat Nabi because he was not satisfied with the description of many scholars.

Abduljabar on the other hand is only interested in creating confusion not even the critique of the Hadith collections. He claimed that he studied Bukhari with his father Shaykh Nasir Kabara but was that how he taught him?

Abduljabar is totally disrespectful to our beloved Prophet SAW because he does not adhere to the principles outlined in Ash-Shifa of Qadi that has been in Kano and continuously used for over 500 years.

His father Shaykh Nasiru Kabara was very proud of Ash-Shifa and lived by its teachings. Based on the rulings in Ash-Shifa part four the chapter on ‘The Legal Judgment As Regards the One Who Characterizes Oneself with the Prophets’ Qualities”, Abduljabar should be indicted and punished for committing this blasphemy.

Some people are claiming that Abduljabar should be allowed to continue with his heresy because Nigeria is a democracy. But every democracy has certain values.

For example nobody dares to deny that there was Holocaust or even criticize Jews or the Lesbians and Gays (LGBT) in the Western countries. This support to LGBT is unchristian but it is strong in the West.

This is because “the Europe once coterminous with Christendom is now post-Christian and neo-pagan” (Roberts J. M. 1996 A History of Europe Oxford p.583) hence they elevated their desires above God’s prohibitions.

Muslims can never accept elevating man above Allah’s Law. Therefore in Kano, according to the position of Ahl Sunnah it is a crime to denigrate the Prophet (SAW) his family and companions. Those who oppose this position are either Shiites who want to damage the reputation of the Sunnah or ignorant people.

Some of the Shiites, including the terrorist organization IMN and their sympathizers are angry that all Ahl Sunnah are united against Abduljabar so they invoke polemics against Ibn Taimiyah and Saudi-Iran rhetoric to seek support.

The IMN Shiite agents of Iranian imperialism in their naivety think they can gain the sympathy of the Tijaniyya followers they mentioned in their release. They will never because the Prophet (SAW) is too important to Ahl Sunnah.

But to these Iranian imperialist agents their politics is more important than the integrity of the Prophet (SAW) because politics invented theology in Shiism. They use the Prophet (SAW) only for political gain as Khomenei did.

They claim that Abduljabar has denied his insults against the Prophet (SAW), that this reason why he should be tried before a competent court, not to be exonerated by terrorists like, the IMN. All Ahl Sunnah are united including those they mentioned in their press statement this is the position of the truth because our beloved Prophet (SAW), his family and companions are more important than any sect or affiliation.

Is there any need to engage Abduljabar in a debate? All the issues concerning critique of Hadith have been discussed and understood by Ahl Sunna for over 1200 years culminating in the magisterial work of Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani (1372-1449).

Abduljabar’s positions are very clear. He is Shiite. So there is no need to debate with him. The only thing that needs to be done is for him to face trial for blasphemy nothing more. If he is found guilty he should be punished according to the Shari’a Penal Law of Kano State.

There is need for decisive action against him. This is not an infringement on his religious freedom. There is difference between religious freedom and criminality.

He can be Shiite or an atheist but if denigrates our beloved Prophet SAW he is a criminal as far as the Law of this land is concerned. He should not be allowed to use public platform to propagate Shiism using out of context quotations and outright lies.

The Americans stopped Trump’s hate propaganda in the social media so those who look up to the West for guidance even there, they have red line. The red line in Muslim societies is the integrity of our beloved Prophet SAW. There is no place for that blasphemy in Kano State the choice was made over 1000 years ago just as one cannot go to Iran and propagate anti-Shiism of any kind.

The strategy of Abduljabar is to use rabble-rousing, creating confusion and finally offering Shiism to his audience. Most of his listeners are unaware that Shiism was invented after the Prophet (SAW) because of politics.

Their politics created a new theology for them based on the supremacy of their Imams and belief in them is an article of faith in Shiism.

Therefore the Iranian imperialist agenda is to confuse innocent people through this propaganda of people like Abduljabar who misinterpret, wrongly translate Hadiths and interpolate with outright lies.

Through this, they hope to recruit as many as possible and a gain foothold for imperialist Iran in the largest concentration of African Muslims. This must be stopped.

Kurawa is a public commentator in Kano.