In a letter addressed to the office of the Senate President on Thursday, October 31, 2024, Nigerian lawyer Kola Alapinni stated that any attempt to sneak more Islamic laws into the Nigerian 1999 constitution will fail.

This comes after intense arguments in the House of Representatives over a bill sponsored by Aliyu Bappa Misau (PDP, Bauchi) aimed at expanding the application of Islamic Law from personal matters to other civil issues.

Alapinni, who has acted as counsel in numerous blasphemy trials in Northern Nigeria, argued that the application of Islamic law is a breach of the 1999 constitution and a violation of fundamental human rights. He mentioned that one of the cases he handled, involving Mr. Yahaya Sharif-Aminu (a.k.a The Kano Singer), is now at the Supreme Court, challenging the constitutionality of the Sharia/Islamic Penal Code as currently being practiced in fourteen states of Northern Nigeria.

The lawyer emphasized that while the constitution allows component states of the Federation to enact laws through their state assemblies, those laws must be in consonance with the Constitution, which remains the grundnorm.

He described the attempt to amend the Constitution through the bill sponsored by Hon. Aliyu Bappa Misau as a “feeble attempt to expand the Sharia/Islamic Law, which is limited in the Constitution to Islamic Law ONLY, through the back door.”

Alapinni expressed his satisfaction that the National Assembly stood the bill down for further discussion, noting that the details of the bill were not even presented to the members of the National Assembly to study. He concluded by stating that if the Sharia Law/Islamic Law as being practiced by fourteen Northern states of Nigeria is constitutional, there would be no need to seek an expansion through this bill.

The proposed law has generated significant controversy, with a large number of lawmakers from the Southern region opposing it and urging the house to drop it, while many Northern lawmakers supported the bill.

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