How To Cope With Insecurity & Food Crisis

• Sheikh DHIKRULLAH SHAFII Gives Spiritual Reasons

• At TVC Ramadan Lecture

Sheikh Dhikrullah Shafii is a highly-respected Islamic scholar in Nigeria. The well-vast Sheikh sits as the Grand Mufti of a noble group called Conference of Islamic Organisations (CIO). He is an outstanding personality who is highly sought-after by conscious muslims who genuinely want to learn and understand more about their Deen.

The Muslim Community of the popular Television station, TVC caught a big fish in Sheikh Shafii as he was invited as one of the guest lecturers at their Ramadan Lecture for the year 2024. The Sheikh did well by taking time to x-ray the situation of the country with focus on insecurity and food crisis. Having looked at the different dimensions to it, the renowned Islamic scholars therefore advised the government and the masses on how best to approach the situation from the Islamic religious point of view.

City People Reporter, JAMIU ABUBAKAR (08085185886) brings to you the details of the lecture. Below are the excerpts.

“My lecture this morning would serve as advice to our leaders. It will be for the citizens. And it will address 2 themes: insecurity and food crisis. People are now crying and chanting that they are hungry”.

“As Muslims, we should believe that nothing can happen both in heaven and on earth without God’s knowledge and approval. And we should know that there’s nothing new on the surface of the earth.

“What we are facing in Nigeria right now is indeed very tough but we should know that ours is not the worst. Some countries are facing more hardship than we  currently are facing.

“The world has been battling with serious security issues and food crises since the last century. The United Nations in their periodic meetings have been deliberating on how to address insecurity, poverty, climate change and so on. Their major talking points are directed to about 10 matters. This means every part of the world is facing one crisis or the other. The one we are facing right now in Nigeria is our own quota of the crisis bedevilling the entire world. We need to try to understand the situation and learn how to cope with it.

“Allah usually tests human beings with trials to know if he will think and retrace his steps. God has been so merciful to us. We have committed lots of atrocities. He is just merciful to us. May His Mercy never leave us!

“In the Suratul Rum; Quran 30:41, Allah says; Corruption has spread all over the land. They have even extended the evil to water ways. When you sail on big ships, they have built club houses, bars and hotels there. All these evils we are talking about are committed by human beings. It is me and you. Allah refers to all bad deeds as corruption in the holy Quran. For example, consuming Alcoholic drinks, stealing, fornication and adultery, idolatry, fraud, committing abortion, unlawful killings, bribery and corruption among many others. Corruption is not limited to embezzlement of funds. It encompasses all that God forbids. God now says, He has brought on us a bit of the rewards of our corrupt practices for us to taste. Lack of security is an offshoot of our corrupt practices. Poverty and hunger in the land are also the results of our evil doings.  We are only witnessing a tip of what we have brought up on ourselves. This is just to make us think and retrace our steps from our evil dealings. We all contributed to the present situation of the country.

“Some of our leaders came to power via corrupt means. They rigged their way in during the election. This is also corruption. The corruption in the religious circle that we can’t appoint religious leaders based on merit. This is one instance. The second instance could be seen in Suratul Shura verse 30. When trial befalls you, it is as a result of what you brought upon yourself. God says it was out of his mercy that the trial wasn’t that much. But if God decides to punish you based on the gravity of your sin, it would be very severe. This will let us know that what we are facing right now concerns all of us. We shouldn’t blame anyone any longer. We should know that there’s no government capable of solving it for us. The government will only try but the solution lies with God. The citizens can also try. We should know that the present crisis in the country can only be eradicated by God. We should rely on Him. It is only God that can do it.

“I don’t need to waste my time defining insecurity. We have all heard it from the news. I have someone close to me who was kidnapped along with his wife in Lagos. They were returning from their office, they were kidnapped leaving their children in the vehicle. This happened not up to 3 months from now. They demanded a ransom of 10 million naira. We begged them with 5 million naira for their release. I have also contributed to paying ransom to free captives by kidnappers. There is no limit to the amount you can spend when this kind of thing happens. At a point when we began negotiating with them, we begged them to accept 2 million and they said by the time they kill both of them, we should use the money to bury their corpse. So I need not define insecurity anymore.

“On the exorbitant prices of food items, there’s also no need to dwell on defining it. What you buy in the morning at a price can’t be gotten at the same price in the afternoon. A few months ago, I priced a battery for my vehicle at 25 thousand naira. When I went to buy it last week, I was told it’s now 90 thousand naira. Then I became seriously disturbed. What traders keep saying is that the dollar is on the rise. They use that as an excuse. Even a landlord who had built his house for decades now hangs on naira as reasons for increasing rent to a new tenant. Pepper sellers and fruit vendors use increase in dollar rate as an excuse for selling their ware expensively. Everything is now on dollars. This shows how cruel we are. We are defiant to God’s commandments.

“Then I ask, what is responsible for the insecurity in our land. We should know it’s a global crisis which has been discussed at the UN for a long time. At the point when poverty under which we have a food crisis, the UN had serious deliberations. Then they came up with the millennium development goals which they planned to achieve by the year 2000. They tried their best possible to achieve it but the world was still ravaged in poverty. They estimated the numbers of people killed as a result of hunger. The kind of hunger seen in some countries has reduced human beings to nothing less than a skeleton. You even animals like cows and goats die of hunger. We should thank God that we didn’t witness that in Nigeria.

“Later on, the UN shifted the goal post to 2015 for ending poverty all over the world. When that could not be achieved. It picked another deadline date to 2030. We are already in 2024, that shows that it can’t be achieved. That’s not the way out. But for Islam, Allah teaches us a lot of lessons. During Prophet Muhammad’s time, there was a similar crisis of food scarcity. Food Items were very expensive. People ran to the prophet to complain about the scarcity. Some of them even suggested he introduced a price control policy that there should be a fixed price for every food item. Prophet Muhammad declined. He said let’s admonish them with the word of God. He said if he forced the price of goods on them, it may affect them and they won’t make a profit. And the day of judgment, they will cause me that I was the one responsible for their loss. Therefore, traders should fear God in their dealings and what they sell. At the end of the day, they will say it’s the government.

“The second part of our problem which I want to talk about is excessive love of the world. We love to make it at all costs. This is also a sin. The excessive search for life and forgetting God is part of our problem. People are so desperate that they kill for money rituals. If we continue like this, we will never find peace. Go and read the Suratul Baqarah Q2 : 275-280. God warned us to beware of excessive love of life. Allah says if we don’t desist, He will engage us in war. The scholars interpret war in this context as any form of hardship such as poverty, fear, and soon.

“Another reason for our present situation is as a result of our lavish lifestyle. When someone is extravagant in spending, God usually punish such a person with hunger. About 30 years ago for those who can recall. When there are social events, we tend to dispose of all leftovers as a result of excessive spending. When you go to parties, we dish food to people lavishly. There was a time when we used a live goat as a souvenir for those who attend an event. They will even give you a bucket load with gift items. But today, we now count those sitting on the chairs before we offer them food. We now share handkerchiefs, jotters and matches as souvenirs. We have been extravagant all these while.

“What are the ways out? Both the government and the citizens should turn to God for repentance over our misdeeds. Second is to keep seeking forgiveness. We should keep saying Astaghfirullah repeatedly. We should do more of it early in the morning before dawn. It is also important to learn how to cope with a period like this. There was a time in Egypt that people were so hungry that they were dogs and dead animals. It was so hard that people sold their houses and used the proceeds to buy food to eat. May God not let our own case be as bad as that.

“It is important we learn to adjust our lifestyle. We should stop being selective about the kind of food we don’t eat. The habit of not being able to eat meat or fish on my food should be stopped. We should also train our children to learn to adapt to the situation.

“Another thing to do is to look for a close substitute for any food that is way too expensive for us to buy. For example, Rice is what we eat most in Nigeria. We won’t die if we don’t eat Rice for the first time. If you find a close substitute to something that is very expensive, in a short while its price would drop when people don’t buy it.

“Another way out is for the rich and the wealthy to show compassion. This is what Islam preaches. There was a time in Medina when there was famine. AbdulRahman BN Aof order for food stuff to be imported into the town. They brought 700 big camels loading food stuff from Syria to Medina. When the food arrived, merchants in the town approached him saying that they would love to buy them. AbdulRahman said I’m not trading it with you. I want to trade it with God. He therefore ordered those who are hungry in Medinah to be given the food for free. Where are the rich in Nigeria? Some are so wealthy that if 5 among them could compassionately spend to help reduce hunger in the land, the food crisis will be over.

“During the reign of Umar (RA) as the leader of the Muslims, when there was economic hardship, the government had the right to take from their wealth. This is in the Shariah of Islam. In Umar’s time which was 18 years after Hijrah, there was hardship in the land. Umar took 5 pragmatic steps to address the situation.

“The first step he took was to deprive himself of good foods available to the president until the hardship is gone. This made his skin complexion totally change. It is not good enough for the masses to be in hunger and the leaders are being extravagant and unconcerned. People brought bread and oil to him to eat, Umar kicked it away that his people are hungry. He can’t afford to eat what was brought to him.

“The second thing he did was that he built a very big camp where those who are hungry could go to collect food. The camp was so organized that there was nothing like people rushing to get food, talk less of having a stampeded situation. Each person has a number tag. Umar himself was among those dishing out the foods. He didn’t delegate to someone. Foods for the sick prepared and distributed specially.

“Another thing that he did was that he sought the assistance of neighboring countries to help them supply food to Medinah. There are some states in Nigeria that have abundant food. It is the responsibility of the government to ensure it goes around. There is a programme done in Sudan years before that started having a political crisis. It is called Diwanu Zakat.  The federal government held a census to know the total numbers of the people in the country. They identified the numbers of poor people in the country and they delivered food stuff at their door steps every week. Census will help our government understand the demographic information of its people and they will be able to identify the rich from the poor and how best to address the needs of each stratum.

“Also Umar legislated that those who are wealthy and due for Zakat should not pay Zakat but give out money to help the poor.

Above all, we should continue praying for God’s intervention. May God Almighty continue to guide the government across all levels. May He assist our households and save us from hardship. May we have the course to use our present situation as a stepping stone to greatness!