CHAPTER ONE:

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

 1.0 Introduction

Many will attest to it that the Jos crisis vividly exemplifies or by locus classicus describes a rancorous experience against religious intolerance. In a nation bound with vast geographic and vast ethnic and religious differences, these religious differences aid conflict which is a basis for showing religious biases and prejudices with the adherents being too fundamentalistic and extremistic in nature.

Naturally, the psycho-social description of man shows him as genetically selfish, fighting for his own interest alone. However, this does not necessarily explain or construe the religious nature of man. With various descriptions of the religious nature of man especially Africans, Mbiti have described him as ‘notoriously religious’.1 Maybe this can adequately give a hypothesis for action that is behind religious conflict in Nigeria. But how rational or how plausible is it for two notable religions to fight against each other, killing and giving a psychological aftermath or psycho-negative effect since God can neither be described as a Christian nor a Muslim?

However, the underlying principle for religious conflict is not purely religious but also political as we have seen in the last six years with the encounter with the Islamic fundamentalist known as Boko Haram. The episodes of mass killing structured or engineered by this extremism is enormous. However, all written above has not defined what religious conflict is but has only given us an introduction to what the researcher tends to discuss.

1.1 Background to the study

The quest to understand what religious conflict is starts from the breaking down of the two separately from the basis for a rational clarification. But we must understand that the basis for a religious conflict is one to different ideologies, beliefs, values etc. The social network coordinated by belief system is so strong that as it can make heal, so it can be used to champion a cause of war or struggle. This was what Dawkins tried to explain when he elucidated that,

Imagine … a world with no religion. Imagine no suicide bomber, no 9/11, no 7/7, no crusades, no witch-hunts, no gunpowder plot, no Indian partition, no Israeli/Palestinian wars, no serb/croat/muslim massacres, no persecution of Jews as Christ-killers’…2

In defining religion, Dawkins noted that it is a false, a delusion similar to scotosis or insanity. He said, ‘when one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity, when many suffer from a delusion it is called religion’.3 But is religion truly a delusion? If it is, then what do we mean by delusion? ‘It is a persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence, especially as a symptom of psychiatric disorder’.4 However, what is important to note here, is that it is the belief in religion that serves as the mechanism engineering the prominent attacks against the other religion. But is belief the only thing embedded in religion? According to Wood,

For a group or philosophy to be protected as a religion under current human right legislation in the United Kingdom, it must be able to demonstrate a combination of (a) belief and/or conviction, (b) practice and/or ethics, and (c) a sense of belonging or community. Belief and practice are separated in this definition, and the element of belonging in interesting because it recognizes the role of social relationship is religion.5

But what we call sense of belonging must be as a result of the belief which has been binding on the individual which make him react to another since they both belong to a particular religion. So ‘Belief’ is fundamental and exerts great strength and psychological strength upon the individual in question. Religion as a word is used as something relating to religion. Religion therefore pertains to God and belief, it is derived from;

The term “religio” refers to four latin verbs, relegere, religare, reeligere, relinguere. … Religion could be defined as a reading over of things or phenomena, which pertain to the worship of God (relegere). It could be define as a bond, which binds the visible, and the invisible worlds (religare). It could be taken as a repeated choice of what has been neither lost nor neglected. Being created (first election), man is chosen again to enter into relationship with the creator (reeligere). Religion is also considered as an act of leaving certain things in order to be submitted to others, maybe to a supreme being (relinquere).6

But all these etymological sayings are not enough to explain the divers religion of the present with the atheistic, Godless philosophical religions and the pantheistic religions, therefore, “…all these ways are nominal and etymological definitions; they are important but not sufficient”7. And even the etymological definitions were words of various individuals and therefore can be criticized as ‘subjective views’ which is in negative to the objective word called religion. In a nutshell, it should be noted that religion is multi-dimensional and therefore, cannot be pinned down into a definition.

Looking to the other side of the coin, we see conflict as a disagreement, between two or more parties that can either be physical or psychological. In other words, ‘conflict may be defined as a struggle or contest between people with opposing needs, ideas, beliefs, values, or goals’.8 The words conflict was gotten from the latin word ‘conflictus’, past participle of confligere which means “to strike together, be in conflict”, from com- “together” fligere “to strike”.9 We therefore can see religious conflict as a disagreement drown out through religion. However in Nigeria, religious conflict does not only carry religious motive but also politically inclined such that according to Marshall, recently, the president of Nigeria was forceful in saying the Nigerian conflict has nothing to do intrinsically with religion, that is used as an excuse by politicians’10. Nigeria, in view, is a country blessed with vast geographical landmarks, a nation with vast ethnic groups and many dialects with major languages, English, Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa. It has three major religions which are Islam, Christianity, and African traditional religion. But specifically, the first two are notable while the last is not notable. In a journal entitled, curbing violence in Nigeria (11): the boko haram insurgency, it is noted that;

Nigeria is a fractured state’. It is rich but Nigerians are poor, many extremely so,… its members are from different ethnic, political and religious communities; when they agree on how to share the spoils, all is well, but when they disagree , they politicize, manipulate and instrumentalize ethno-religious and regional differences. With the failure of governance and development, an ever increasing number of ethnic militias, separatist groups and millenarian religious movements are being mobilized, both for self-defense and for pressing ideological and practical goals…11

In plateau one of the states in Nigeria, precisely, the capital of Jos. There have been series of rivalry between different groups, therefore changing their license plate as “Home of peace and tourism”12 to home of crises and religious conflict, this was what Campbell and Harwood meant when they maintained that;

But Jos is no longer a West African paradise. Bloody “religious” riots, ostensibly between Christians and Muslim in 2001, 2008, and 2010, split the community. The latest round, starting in 2011, continues. According to the council on foreign relations’ Nigeria security tracker (NST), there have been 785 sectarian related deaths in plateau state alone between May 29, 2011, and June 30, 2013. Between January and June 2013, 481 people were killed; 61% of the total since May 2011…13