I NSTITUT D ’É TUDES P OLITIQUES DE P ARIS
PARIS SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
M ASTER IN I NTERNATIONAL S ECURITY
DIFFUSION OF ISLAMIC DISCOURSE: SAUDI AND
IRANIAN INFLUENCE IN LAGOS AND CAPE TOWN
T ORE R EFSLUND H AMMING
Thesis directed by Stéphane Lacroix, Associate Professor at Paris
School of International Affairs (PSIA)and Researcher atCentre
d’Études de Relations Internationales (CERI)
M ARCH 2014
Jury:
M. Stéphane Lacroix, Associate Professor
M. Andreas Roessner, Academic Advisor
Mme Laurence Louër, Chargée de Recherche CERI
The copyright of this Master's thesis remains the property of its author. No part of the content may be reproduced, published,
distributed, copied or stored for public or private use without written permission of the author. All authorisation requests
should be sent to [email protected]
TABLE OF CONTENT
Abstract
Preface
Acknowledgements
Glossary
i
iii
v
vi
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Research prism and clarification
Outline
Clarification of terminology
Theoretical Framework and Methodology
Research design
1
3
6
6
8
13
CHAPTER 2
SAUDI – IRAN RELATIONS:A SOFT POWER SUPREMACY DILEMMA
A political and historical perspective
A sectarian perspective
Soft power dilemma: Diffusing religion for regional supremacy
16
17
18
20
CHAPTER 3
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
Challenging existing structures:Newcomers to a monopolised field
The emergence of Salafi doctrine
Saudi inspiration and interference
The role of Shiism and the relation to Iran
Transformation of the Islamic field:The importance of education
Conclusive remarks:The transformative power of the educated youth
23
25
29
33
35
38
40
CHAPTER 4
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
Religion turning increasingly public and pluralistic
The emergence of Shiism in Cape Town
The emergence of Salafism:Literalism in a tolerant community
A Sunni-Shia sectarian struggle
The transnational character of Shiism and Salafism
Conclusive remarks:Field transformation and limitations
43
44
46
48
53
55
57
CHAPTER 5
EXPLAINING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION:
THE APPLICABILITY OF THE ISLAMIC COLD WAR PRISM
Assessing religious diffusion
Limits of the Islamic Cold War prism
What does it indicate for the future?
60
61
64
64
CHAPTER 6
CONCLUSION
67
Annex: Maps
Lagos
Cape Town
70
70
71
Bibliography
72
ABSTRACT
From the context of the Islamic Cold War between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the
Islamic Republic of Iran, this thesis examines the diffusion of Salafi and Shia doctrines to SubSaharan Africa through case studies of Lagos and Cape Town. It is my hypothesis that the
Islamic Cold War and the Saudi-Iranian struggle for regional hegemony – a dynamic I define
as a soft power supremacy dilemma – can partly explain the diffusion of religious doctrine and
the emergence of Salafism and Shiism south of Sahara. To assess the explanatory prowess of
this hypothesis and to understand the development of Islamic doctrine in Sub-Saharan
African, I seek to provide answers for three interrelated questions: (1) to what extent are the
religious discourses of Saudi Arabia and Iran diffused to Lagos and Cape Town and how can
such diffusion be interpreted in the context of an Islamic Cold War and their struggle for
regional power?, (2) at what level of interaction and through which types of actors is religious
diffusion occurring?, and (3) what is the reciprocal influence of Salafi and Shia doctrines in the
local environments of Lagos and Cape Town? To answer these questions, I apply a
methodological framework, which takes it inspiration from French sociologist Pierre
Bourdieu’s conceptualisation of social fields as an interpretative grid open for analysis. This
framework helps identify intra-field contestation for religious authority and thus enables
analysis of field dynamics and transformation. The main foundation of empirical data in
constituted by first-hand interviews and observations conducted during two months of
fieldwork in Lagos and Cape Town, respectively.
Having studied and interacted with Islamic culture and having held several meetings with
Salafis and Shias in Lagos and Cape Town, the thesis presents three broad conclusions; first,
since the 1960s-70s, both Lagos and Cape Town have experienced increased pluralism within
the Islamic field affecting the structures of the field. Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa has
traditionally been equated with prominent Sufi brotherhoods and moderate and tolerant
religious interpretation, but the emergence of several new doctrines is challenging Sufism’s
monopolisation of Islamic discourse. New actors – Salafis in particular – have to a great extent
succeeded in transforming both doctrine and discourse by emphasising the importance of
religious knowledge. Second, the emergence of new doctrines has led to a radicalisation of
Islamic discourse with the dual objective of consolidation and condemnation. The debate
focuses on issues such as ‘what constitutes religious knowledge’ and ‘what true Islam is’
resulting in reciprocal accusations of heresy and bid’a and leading to what could be defined an
Islamic revivalism. Third, the emergence of Salafism and Shiism in Lagos and Cape Town is a
result of interaction with Saudi and Iranian actors and institutions. Primarily occurring
through educational institutions, this diffusion can be attributed to the Islamic Cold War and
i
its inherent logic. I argue that Saudi and Iranian diffusion has been paramount to the
emergence of new doctrines, but that it is inadequate to understand the further development
of Salafi and Shia doctrine within the local environments of Lagos and Cape Town.
PREFACE
The initial idea for this thesis came about in my first semester at Sciences Po during a casual
talk with my academic tutor on the topic of preparing for a future Ph.D. application.
Discussing my interests in the Middle East and Africa, she made a remark on the struggle
between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran for Islamic
domination in Sub-Saharan Africa. As I was really interested in applying a transcontinental or
transregional research focus, I started to get interested in the topic and conducted some basic
iii
research to attain more knowledge. However, the absence of information was striking –
particularly when researching the transregional religious influence, which was my greatest
interest. Academics gaps of knowledge are found in abundance, but my fascination for the
study of radical Islamic doctrines like Salafism and Shiism and the evident volatility of
religious affiliation in Sub-Saharan communities triggered my curiosity. In the following
months, ideas and assumptions were discussed with my supervisor, which helped me only
understand the substance but also in guiding me in critical choices regarding research design
and methodology.
As it was a clear ambition from the start to provide information and analysis to a topic lacking
sufficient academic research, it was paramount to me that the main sources underlying the
analysis were attained through first-hand empirical data. This led me two months to first
Lagos and then Cape Town, where I got to conduct interviews, observe, and reflect. The
results are presented through the following 100 pages. A few months of field work and a
master thesis however, is not sufficient to fill the gap of knowledge and thus more studies are
necessary to truly understand how Islamic doctrine is developing in Sub-Saharan Africa and
how this development to some extent in influenced by external actors including Saudi Arabia
and Iran. If nothing more, I consider the findings of this thesis relevant to better understand
these dynamics and hope that it will not only add to the scholarly perception of Islam in SubSaharan Africa and the dynamics of the Islamic Cold War, but also that my findings will be
used in future examinations related to Islam in Africa.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
As I regard this thesis an integral part of my master degree at Sciences Po, I would like to
thank the Paris School of International Affairs for letting me engage on the thrilling and
v
highly challenging task it has been to conduct the research resulting in this master thesis and
not least for allowing me to travel to Nigeria amid high instability. Furthermore, I would like
to thank my supervisor Stéphane Lacroix for our talks and his guidance, which not only
helped as clarification for also as an incredible source of inspiration.
From my time in the field, much appreciation goes to my research assistant Usman
Abdulmalik Aliyu, whose assistance in introducing me to local Muslims and in translating
interviews was immense. A further thanks needs to be extended to all the persons I
interviewed in Lagos and Cape Town. Their general openness and generosity not only made
my job feasible, but also provided me with incredibly interesting perspectives on how Muslim
communities are developing in the two Sub-Saharan metropolises.
Lastly, I would like to thank the Kuwait Program at Sciences Po for awarding me the mobility
grant, which made my fieldwork in Lagos and Cape Town possible. As first-hand interviews
have been critical to understand and examine the research topic and to obtain knowledge
absent in existing academic literature, their financial assistance has been essential to the quality
and final result of the thesis.
GLOSSARY
Ahl al-Sunnah wal-Jama’a
Literally, ‘the people of the tradition and the group’.
AhlulBayt or Ahl al-Bayt
Literally, ‘the people of the house’ referring to the
members of the family of the Prophet Muhammad.
‘aqida
The creed. The dominant conception in the Sunni world is
the Ash’arite creed, which gives a limited role to reason in
theological speculation. This conception is fiercely
challenged by Salafis.
Ash’ari
A Sunni school of Islam after Imam Abu al-Hasan alAsh’ari. See above.
ashura
Celebration that takes place on the tenth day of the
Muslim month of Muharram to commemorate the
martyrdom of Imam Hussein. It is marked by processions
of men dressed in black, who flagellate themselves as a
sign of penitence.
bid’a
Religious innovation.
da'wa
The preaching of Islam. Designates the action of
preaching or proselytising.
fiqh
Law or jurisprudence.
Jama’atuIzalat al-Bid’a waIqamat
al-Sunna
Literally, the Society for the Removal of Innovation and
Reinstatement of Tradition. A Nigerian group established
in 1978 in the city of Jos, who adheres to a Salafi-inspired
vi
creed.
Madhhab, pl. madhahib
Generic term for school of jurisprudence. Within Sunni
Islam there are four recognised madahib named after the
founding imam. In Sub-Saharan Africa the Maliki
madhhab is dominant. In theory, Salafis do not follow any
madhhab, but in Saudi Arabia it is tradition to follow the
Hanbali madhhab.
marabout
Literally, ‘one who is garrisoned’. Used in western and
northern Africa to designate the religious leader of a Sufi
brotherhood. Followers of a brotherhood are referred to
as murid.
marja’ al-taqlid
Literally, ‘source of emulation’. It is the highest religious
authority in Shiism to whom Shias should refer in matters
of religious doctrine.
mawlud
Celebration of the birthday of Prophet Muhammad.
Normally practiced by Sufis but considered shirk by
Salafis.
salafi
Faithful to the practice of the first generations of Muslims,
the ‘pious ancestors’ (al-salaf al-salih).
shirk
Association of God with other entities.
sunna
The Prophetic tradition.
tafsir
Exegesis of the Qur’an.
tariqa, pl. turuq
Literally, ‘path’. Description for Sufi brotherhoods.
taqiyya
A Shia term that means concealing or denying one’s
religious identity. This is deemed legal if an individual is at
risk of serious prosecution.
tawhid
The oneness of God. For Salafis it is the most important
theological concept.
Vilayat-e faqih or Wilayat alFaqih
Guardianship of the jurist. Doctrine developed by
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, which argues that during
the period in which the twelfth Imam has gone in
occultation, the governance of the state is in the hands of
religious scholars.
vii
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
On February 1st1979, as many as five million Iranians took to the streets in Teheran to
celebrate the return of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and the ensuing establishment of the
Islamic Republic of Iran. The popular protests and Khomeini’s institutionalisation of Vilayat-e
faqih (governance of the jurist) in Iran symbolises the commencement of a formalised Islamic
Cold War between Iran and its religious archenemy, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the
initiation of what I refer to as asoft power supremacy dilemma between the two states.In a regional
climate characterised by fierce contention for power, both states perceive themselves as
entitled to a hegemony status.This struggle became formalised with the 1979 Iranian
Revolutionas the emergence of an Islamic Shia republic produced a competition between two
formal political entities, despite the rivalry’s foundation well entrenched in religious animosity
being much older.1With the revolutionary Shia clergyregime in Iran and the Sunni Al Saud
monarchy in Saudi Arabia, religious differences have consistently been at the centre of the two
states’ relationship and are central in explaining historical events. As states with strong
religious affiliation, 2 religion has occupied an essential legitimising role for both regimes in
1
Scholars disagree on the source of the animosity between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Anoushiravan Ehteshami argues
tensions are of contemporary character, Fred Halliday believes it is a consequence of the state-building process and the
rise of nationalism, while ShabramChubin and Charles Tripp stress more structural factors like geopolitical differences,
see Simon Mabon, Saudi Arabia and Iran: soft power rivalry in the Middle East (London: I.B. Taurus, 2013), p. 41. My
argument is not that sectarian difference is the main source for the rivalry, but rather that such difference has become a
central issue in the relation as a product of the tension.
2
Despite strong religious affiliation, some scholars argue against Iran and Saudi Arabia being religious states as political
concerns are their main focus. For such argument on Iran see Sami Zubeida, ‘Is Iran an Islamic State?’, in Political
Islam: Essays from Middle East Report, eds. Joel Beinin and Joe Stork (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997)
and for Saudi Arabia see Madawi Al Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi state: Islamic voices from a new generation
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
1
INTRODUCTION
their claims for political authority. It is in the context of this Islamic Cold War and the
legitimising role of religious discourse this thesis positions itself.
With their domestic and regional political authority partially dependent on the legitimacy of
their religious doctrine, exportation or diffusion of their respective religious discourse hasbeen
integral in the foreign policy toolbox of consecutive Iranian and Saudi leaders. Conducted
through varying but often indirect processes, such transnational diffusion of religious
discourse caught regional scholars’ interest, particularly in the immediate aftermath of the
Iranian Revolution and almost exclusively with a research focus on regional neighbours in the
Gulf. However, in light of Laurence Louër’s description ofa ‘Shia revival’3 after the fall of
Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Bernard Haykel’s contention that Salafism, the dominant Sunni
doctrine in Saudi Arabia, has ‘lately become attractive to many Muslims’4, a deeper exploration
of Saudi and Iranianefforts to diffuse their religious discourse is indeed pertinent. In contrast
to most prior studies on the subject, I apply a transregional perspective focusing on SubSaharan Africa instead of the closer neighbours of Iran and Saudi Arabia, in order to expose
the lacuna of literature on radical Islam south of Sahara and to illustrate the presence of such
radical doctrines ashighlighted by Gilles Kepel.5 This transregional focus is mainly due to three
factors. First is a critical deficiency of transregional academic studies on Islamic discourses and
movementsbetween the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa. Second, due to Islam’s rapid
proliferation inSub-Saharan Africa, 6 and third, because of the challenge these more radical
Islamic interpretations pose to the so-called African Islam, traditionally characterised by Sufism,
moderation and tolerance.7In the aftermath of the 2011 al-Qaida attacks on New York and
Pentagon, the last point has become increasingly important from a security perspective, as the
Salafi doctrine has been intimately associated to globalisedjihadism, 8 thus stressing the
security-related imperatives of studying the spread of such radical doctrines. Salafis’newfound
electoral success in post-Mubarak Egypt, increasing visibility in Tunisia, and prominence in
the Syrian Civil Warhave only bolstered this analytical tendency. In response to this rigid
understanding and fear of especially Salafism, this paper also seeks to provide nuance to the
prevalent popular misinterpretation of the Salafi doctrine as being equal to jihadism.
Although my primary objective is to analyse the diffusion of Salafi and revolutionary Shia
discourses and assess to what degree the soft power supremacy dilemma characterising SaudiIran relations can explain such diffusion, the socialimplications in Lagos and Cape Town of
this diffusion are similarly important. This is because an increasing prominence of Salafism
and revolutionary Shiism in Sub-Saharan metropolises like Lagos and Cape Town not only will
be at the expense of more tolerant Islamic doctrines, but also because the existence of
competing religious discourses in a society potentially has a destabilising effect as stated by
3
Laurence Louër, Shiism and politics in the Middle East (London: Hurst & Company, 2012), p. 1.
Bernard Haykel, ‘On the Nature of Salafi Thought and Action’ in Global Salafism: Islam’s New Religious Movement,
ed. Roel Meijer (London: Hurst, 2009), p. 35.
5
Gilles Kepel, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam (London: Tauris, 2004), pp. 130-132 and pp. 193-194.
6
The development is stated by the vast majority of international scholars in the field, however Marc-Antoine Pérouse de
Montclos claims there is ’ no scientific measurement of the progression of Islam’; de Montclos, Conversion to Islam and
Modernity in Nigeria: A View from the Underworld, Africa Today 54(4) 2008, p. 73.
7
David Westerlund and Eva Evers Rosander eds.,African Islam and Islam in Africa: Encounters between Sufis and
Islamists (London: Hurst, 1997), p. 1.
8
Thomas Hegghammer, Jihad in Saudi Arabia: violence and pan-Islamism since 1979 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2010).
4
2
CHAPTER 1
Thomas Banchoff. He defines identity movements – a grouping where both Salafis and Shias
can be included – as the most ‘powerful global religious forces’.9 Hence, with this in mind,
thethesis will consider the impact of such potential diffusion strategiesinthe context of both
the Gulf region and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Whilethis thesis seeks to write itself into the academic tradition of the Islamic Cold War
literature, it also aims to expand this perspective by investigating the existence of Salafi and
Shia doctrines in Lagos and Cape Town. In this context, I explore and analyse the following
research questions in order to reveal their inherent complexities and potential influences:
To
what extent are the religious discourses of Saudi Arabia (Salafism) and the Islamic
Republic of Iran (revolutionary Shiism) sought exported or diffused to Lagos and Cape
Town, respectively, and how can such diffusion be interpreted in the context of an Islamic
Cold War and their struggle for regional power?
At
what level of interaction and through which types of actors is religious diffusion occurring?
What
is the reciprocal influence of Salafi and Shia doctrines in the local environments of Lagos
and Cape Town?
RESEARCH PRISM AND CLARIFICATION
Due to the complex nature of the research focus, additional clarification and explanation is
necessary to foster proper understanding.This research takes place against a backdrop of the
Islamic Cold War between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which serves as a framework for
understanding the logic of Salafi and Shia communities in Lagos and Cape Town.10By doing
this, I am not staunchly arguing that the Islamic Cold War can explain everything regarding
the development of local Salafi and Shia communities or even constitutes the logic for all
transregional relations, but rather that it works as a prism to forward a hypothesis, whose
explanatory validity I intend to test throughout the analyses and finally assess in the final
chapter.
It should be mentioned that this is not a historical study, but an attempt to understand and
explain the contemporary situation. To accomplish this however, and as I have a strong belief
in the explanatory importance of history, the introduction of historical events and aspects is
imperative and will thus be included.As mentioned, the choice of studying the transregional
dynamics with a focus on Sub-Saharan Africa is due to the critical absence of academic studies
focusing on either Islamic relations between the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa or
9
R. Scott Appleby, Building Sustainable Peace: The Roles of Local and Transnational Religious Actors, in Religious
pluralism, globalization, and world politics, ed. Thomas F. Banchoff (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 129.
10
See Justin J. Gengler, ’Understanding Sectarianism in the Persian Gulf’, in Sectarian Politics in the Persian Gulf, ed.
Lawrence G. Potter, pp. 31-66 (London: Hurst & Company, 2013) for a recent analysis of the contemporary ‘warm’
character of the Islamic Cold War.
3
INTRODUCTION
simply on radical Islamic doctrines south of Sahara.11 In the specific contexts of Lagos and
Cape Town such lack of studies is vivid. Although several scholars of history, religion,
andpolitics have studied the role of Islam in Nigeria including radical Islamic interpretations,
these studies have exclusively focused on the northern Hausa-dominated part of the country.12
In the context of Cape Town, hitherto studies have been conducted by Abdulkhader Tayob
and Yunus Dumbe butdespite fascinatingly describing Islamist movements and the emergence
of Salafi doctrine in a glocalised form 13 it is inadequate to understand the nuances of more
radical interpretations of Islam. Besides this research, studies of Salafism or Shiism are close to
absent. Hence, based on existing literature one could easily get the impression that Salafis and
Shias are close to non-existence not only in Lagos or Cape Townbut in Sub-Saharan Africa in
general. To problematise such perceived absence Mara Leichtman, a long-time researcher of
Shiism in Senegal and its transregional relations to Shia centres in the Middle East, points out
that minimal information on Shia presence does not necessarily imply they do not exist, but
more likely indicate an absence of scholarly research.14 This seems to be the case regarding
both Salafism and Shiism particularly in Lagos and to some extent in Cape Town.
Nigeria and South Africa’s distinctive contextual trajectories make both countries useful case
studies.With a Muslim population in the range of 90 million, Nigeria is by far the state in SubSaharan Africa with the largest Muslim population. Historical events have greatly influenced
the lives and development of Nigerian Muslims, as the establishment of the Sokoto caliphate,
colonial rule, and the history of Islamic radicalisation are clear examples of. With
approximately the same number of Muslims as in Egypt and with Lagos’ Muslim population
of approximately 10 million, the sheer numbers emphasise Nigeria’s importance to Islamic
centres in the Gulf. This importance is enhanced by Nigeria’s role as a regional powerhouse
that attracts people from all over western Africa. Islam’s historical centrality in Nigeria is in
stark contrast to the situation in South Africa, where religion’s role – Islam in particular – has
been heavily influenced by the context ofApartheid during the 20thcentury. Despite its much
more recent origin than in Nigeria, South African Islam presents an example of an
empowered Muslim population in Sub-Saharan Africa, which has implied great regional
prominence of Islamic scholars if the small number of Muslims is taken into consideration.
This prominence is exactly why the Muslim communities in Cape Town would be of interest
from a Gulf perspective as it has the potential to influence the wider region indirectly.15Such
contextual settings and structural differences have naturally influenced the role and
development of Islamic movements and doctrines in the two countries, thus opening up for
comparative considerations.
11
Ousmane Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria: A study of the Society for the Removal of Innovation and
Reinstatement of Tradition (Boston: Brill, 2003), p. 16.
12
Examples of such studies are Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria; Roman Loimeier, Islamic reform and
political change in northern Nigeria (Evanston, Ill: Northwestern University Press, 1997); John Paden, Ahmadu Bello:
Sardauna of Sokoto (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1986).
13
Glocalisation is an amalgamation of the global and the local and in this context refers to how a global phenomenon like
Salafism adapts to local conditions. See Roland Robertson, ‘Globalisation or Glocalisation?’, In Journal of International
Communication, No. 1 Vol. 1, 1994, pp. 33-52.
14
Mara Leichtman, The Authentication of a Discursive Islam: Shi’a Alternatives to Sufi Orders, in New perspectives on
Islam in Senegal: conversion, migration, wealth, power, and femininity, eds. MamadouDiouf and Mara Leichtman, 1.
Ed., (New Work: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), p. 111.
15
Interestingly, when visiting bookshops in Lagos I regularly found sermons by South African clerics, which simply
illustrates their regional prominence.
4
CHAPTER 1
Although research on transnational Salafism is limited,16 the quality of research in the field is
high. One of these examples is Laurent Bonnefoy’s studySalafism in Yemen: Transnationalism and
Religious Identity, in which he helps frame analytical questions relevant for my research.I build
on his research in order to analyse the Salafi and Shia movements in Lagos and Cape Town
with a specific focus on relations to Saudi Arabia and Iran both as ‘sponsors and as ideological
references’. This triggers helpful questionssuch ashow ‘Saudi’ or ‘Iranian’ is Salafism or Shiism in
Lagos and Cape Town? How important are informal Saudi and Iranian strategies for proselytization in the
development of Salafi and Shia discourses in Lagos and Cape Town both at the level of religious entrepreneurs
and laymen? Do these Salafi and Shia actors give primary loyalty to Saudi Arabia and Iran, respectively, at
the expense of other religious and political authorities?17
As domestic structures and institutional setup have an effective constraining influence on
transnational actors, my argument will not be a complete Saudisationor Iranisationof the Muslim
community in Lagos or Cape Town – realities are not even coming close – but rather to study
to what degree Saudi and Iranian actors have been influential in making the restructuring of
the religious field possible. New technology has undoubtedlycontributedto making foreign
information more readily available. Other sources of this transregional influence involves
relational aspects such as official political, economic and diplomatic relations, experiences of
studying in the Gulf, hajj, funding of religious institutions,18 clerical delegations, distribution of
religious material, and Islamic NGOs,19all of which will be sought considered throughout the
analyses as such interaction has assisted in creating the organisational, institutional, and
ideological base so essential for religious newcomers.
Although I do not intend toclosely examine the relation between Islam and other religions,
Salafism’s and Shiism’s effects on other religions should not be ignored. Two factors
particularly influence this relation, one being an objective of conversion from one religion to
another and the other being a Salafi-specific aim to eradicate any local influences to the
practice of what they define‘true Islam’. The latter is due to a Salafi perception that religious
syncretism is shirk (innovation) and that culture is not consistent with pure Islam. In this
context, Olivier Roy argues that a primary objective of Salafis is a ‘deculturation’ as they seek to
eradicate local customs and culture.20Thus, the introduction of Salafism and Shiism into the
Nigerian and South African religious landscape inevitably causes an increased situation of
competition with non-Islamic belief systems as well as within Islam itself.
16
With an exclusive focus on Salafism, the following studies deserve mentioning: Laurent Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen:
Transnationalism and religious identity (London: Hurst & Co., 2011);TerjeØstebø, Localising Salafism. Religious
Change among Oromo Muslims in Bale, Ethiopia (Leiden: Brill, 2012); AbdulaiIddrisu, Contesting Islam in Africa:
homegrown Wahhabism and Muslim identity in northern Ghana, 1920-2010 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2013).
17
Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, p. 26.
18
For an explanation of general Saudi funding efforts in Sub-Saharan Africa, see Westerlund and Rosander ed., African
Islam and Islam in Africa, p. 10.
19
MaykeKaag, ‘Transnational Islamic NGOs in Chad: Islamic Solidarity in the Age of Neoliberalism’, Africa Today
54(3) 2008, pp. 5-11 provides examples of the transnational influence of Islamic NGOs in Chad and particularly how
Saudi NGOs are trying to diffuse the Salafi doctrine.
20
Quintan Wiktorowicz, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 29:3 2006, p. 210.
However, the practical pursuance of this objective should perhaps not be overstate in this particular context as
accommodation to local environments seem to be critical for many Salafis. Nonetheless, Westerlund and Rosander ed.,
African Islam and Islam in Africa, p. 6 provides a good research example of the attempt to decontextualize Islam in
Sudan. Adding to the complexity, in JoasWagemakers’ study of Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi he concludes that different
‘Salafi-cultures’ exist, making the anti-culture stance of Salafism more important in theory than in practice.
5
INTRODUCTION
OUTLINE
With the research focus outlined, a brief clarification of the most essential terminology will be
provided in order to minimise confusion throughout the thesis. This will be followed by an
explanation of methodology including the theoretical framework, the method applied, and
reflections on research design. Before proceeding to the actual analyses, chapter two will
briefly elaboratethe relation between Iran and Saudi Arabia from a politico-historical and
sectarian perspective ending with a characterisation of this relationship as a soft power
supremacy dilemma perspective as I consider a specific understanding of this relationship
imperative to justify the continuing analytical perspective.
Following is the analytical part, which is divided into two levels of analysis. In chapters three
and four, the first analytical level focuses on Lagos and Cape Town from a micro-perspective
and is extensively based on my fieldwork in the two cities. Starting in Lagos and proceeding to
Cape Town, this part seeks to analyse the Islamic field in the two cities with a focus on the
presence of Salafi and revolutionary Shia doctrines and their potential relations to the Gulfregion. Although introducing historical aspects, this analysis is intending to illustrate the
contemporary situation and the development within the last decade. Due to the differences in
societal structures and Islamic development in the two cities, the analyses will be adjusted to
their particularities and will thus differ in structure. This part will be the main analytical body
of the thesis.
In chapter five, the second analytical level changes from a micro- to a macro-perspective.
Based on the conclusions from the first level of analysis, I seek to reflect upon and analyse
these findings in the context of the Islamic Cold War and the logic inherent in thesoft power
supremacy dilemma.It is in this part that trans-regional considerations will be particular
present and it will take on both a historical and a predictive character. However, as the first
analytical part constitutes the foundation for the second level, the former will take up most
space and focus. As few have studied radical Islamic doctrines in Lagos and Cape Town, the
first part is also where I will be able to contribute with new knowledge to the research field,
thus emphasising its importance.
CLARIFICATION OF TERMINOLOGY
Due to the centrality of the notions of Salafism and Shiism throughout the thesis and because
of the particular delicateness attached to these terms, a more precise elaboration is paramount.
One always has to be careful and critical when the terms Salafism and Shiism are used as such
articulations and discursive expressions have been used continuously by both friends and foes
with differing meaning. While actors have proudly used the terms as self-identification, it has
also been labels articulated by enemies as strategies of antagonism and securitization21 and as a
mean to discredit the actors in question.
21
A term coined by the Copenhagen School, securitization is a discursive-oriented conception of security, which deals
with how issues are transformed into a matter of security by powerful actors in order to justify the use of extraordinary
means to counter the discursively created threat. See Barry Buzan et al., Security: a new framework for analysis
(Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1998).
6
CHAPTER 1
Starting with Salafism,22 the term has traditionally been closely connected and confused with
Wahhabism and to some degree Ahl al-Sunnawal-Jama'a (the people of the tradition and the group).
Whereas I regard the former asa specific reform movement initiated by Muhammad ibn Abd
al-Wahhab in the mid 18th century in Najd, my understanding of the latter is a broad category
simply referring to followers of the Qur’an and sunna. As explained by David Comminsand
others,23 the Wahhabi movement adhered to a Salafi creed,24 but rather than being equated
with Salafism, Wahhabism should simply be understood as one of several forms of Salafism.25
However, Wahhabism has right from the beginning in the 18th century – and even more so in
the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks – been used in a derogatory sense by its adversaries making
it a delicate term to use for self-identification. Furthermore, as the movement stems from the
Arabian Peninsula, Salafis from other countries have generally not referred to themselves as
Wahhabis. Ahl al-Sunnawal-Jama'a, on the other hand, is a term used globally by Muslims to
identify themselves as true followers of the Qur'an and sunna as the only legitimate sources to
follow. However, how they follow it depends on their creed, meaning the understanding of
interpretation and the validity of reason versus a literalist interpretation. Salafis, among others,
would identify themselves as Ahl al-Sunna wal-Jama'a, but as many Nigerian Muslims with a
more moderate creed 26 likewise identify themselves as Ahl al-Sunnawal-Jama'a, the term
becomes confusing in practice. 27 This is not least the case due to the more positive
connotation surrounding the term. Hence, this broad application of the term necessitates that
one is cautious when analysing, which will be considered carefully throughout the analysis. In
the context of Nigeria, the movement Jama’atuIzalat al-Bid’a waIqamat al-Sunna (the Society for
the Removal of Innovation and Reinstatement of Tradition, henceforth referred to as Izala)
requires a comment too. Like Wahhabism, Izala refers to a specific geographically defined
movement in Northern Nigeria, whose members follow a Salafi-inspired doctrine. Hence,
despite they follow a similar creed Muslims in Lagos rarely use Izala for self-definition as they
regard it strictly as a northern movement.
Of perhaps even greater importance is a terminological clarification of Shiism. Since the start
1980s, the term Shiism has been used to denominate several distinctive groups, with far from
all adhering to the Jaʿfarī doctrine. In the aftermath of the 1979 revolution in Iran many
Nigerian Muslims, particularly the youth, were inspired by Ayatollah Khomeini’s discourse
and the alternative type of government, he implemented. Essentially, it was the revolutionary
philosophy of Ali Shariati and the methods used to carry it out by Khomeini that turned out
22
The complexity of the concept of Salafism and its historical confusion and -development has been described by Henri
Lauzière in ‘The Construction of Salafiyya: Reconsidering Salafism from the Perspective of Conceptual History’,
International Journal of Middle East Studies, 42 (2010), pp. 369–389. My understanding of Salafism is not the modernist
Salafism related to Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, Muhammad ’Abduh and Rashid Rida – although the latter could be placed in
a grey zone as he declared at some point that he had gone from Hanafi to Salafi – but rather an understanding of
Salafiyya as related to a strict following of madhhab al-Salaf (doctrine of the forefathers) and theologians such as ibn
Taymiyyah and ibn Hanbal.
23
Commins, The Wahhabi mission and Saudi Arabia.
24
A theoretical exception is the Wahhabis generally following the Hanbali maddhab, which is in contradiction with
Salafi rejection of any taqlid.
25
Al Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi state, p. 58. Furthermore, Bonnefoy too identifies Wahhabism as a specific reform
movement adhering to Salafi ‘aqida and characterises the movement by its emphasis on tawhid, adherence to the Hanbali
school, and by a desire to purge religious practice from certain bid’a (innovations), Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, pp. 4041.
26
Sunnis who follow the more moderate 'Ashari in 'aqida and Maliki in fiqh often describe themselves as Ahl al-Sunna
wal-Jama'a as is the case with followers of the more strict and literalist 'Athari 'aqida and Hanbali maddhab.
27
Even Shias sometime use the term Ahl al-Sunna as self-identification as was exposed during my interviews.
7
INTRODUCTION
to be the major inspiration, while less so the actual religious Shia doctrine. For want of a
better word this will be termed revolutionary Shiism. Initially, Nigerian Muslims inspired by
Khomeini all became known as Shias within the Nigerian society disregarding their actual
doctrine. This opens up for a distinction between religious and political Shiism, where the
former is adherence to the religious Shia doctrine and a belief that the ahlulbayt (people of the
house) – referring to the infallible descendants of Ali and a specific list of imams28 – were
destined to rule whereas the latter is an inspiration by the revolution itself and its defeat of the
secular Iranian monarchy. Revolutionary Shiism, I will argue, is an amalgamation containing
parts of both with strong emphasis on the revolutionary objective. This division stresses the
need to be careful when applying the Shia denomination as its meaning is rather ambiguous.
These conceptual considerations will be exemplified and elaborated during the analysis.
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND METHODOLOGY
With the research focus outlined, it becomes clear that the thesis positions itself between the
domestic and the international. It aspires not only to investigate local changes and dynamics,
but also to link the findings to international relations in the Gulf regional setting. To succeed
in this pursuance, methodological concerns are central to organise, to focus, and to make
sense of the analyses. Thus, in order to understand dynamics and relations both within a
society and between states, a theoretical amalgamation of sociological and of international
relations (IR) approachesis applied.
The analytical framework for the analysis is based on overlapping ontological fields of
research, which are interrelated in theory as well as in practice as will be shown throughout the
analysis. In the following paragraphs, it is my intention to elaborate on the methodology
applied in order to illustrate such interconnection, while ending with an explanation of the
research design and the method used for the collection of data. Adopting a structural
perspective, my analytical strategy is based on a field ontology, where structures can be identified
and studied. At the same time, I find inspiration in a poststructuralist perspectiveand apply the
concepts of field, capital and habitus as epistemological tools to analyse the fields of research
thus bridging the emphasis on structural power and individual freedom of action.29 The latter
goes hand-in-hand with theconstructivist IR approach put forward by scholars like Michael
Barnett.30
The first level of analysis (chapters three and four) focuses on Lagos and Cape Town and
seeks to unveil and analyse the composition and structure of the religious communities in
28
MoojanMomen, An introduction to Shii Islam: the history and doctrines of Twelver Shiism (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1985), pp. 63-64.
29
Bourdieu tried to bridge the theoretical positions of structuralism and constructivism and thus defined his work as
either ‘constructivist structuralism’ or ‘structuralist constructivism’; see Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Socialt Rum
ogSymbolskMagt’, in Pierre Bourdieu – CentraleTeksterinden for SociologiogKulturteori, eds. StafCallewaert et al.:
(København: AkademiskForlag, 1994 [1990]), p. 52. This amalgamation stresses the existence of structures, but also that
these structures are influenced and transformed by inter-subjective interaction.
30
See Michael Barnett and ShibleyTelhami eds.,Identity and Foreign Policy in the Middle East (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 2002), introduction; and Michael Barnett, Dialogues in Arab politics: negotiations in regional order
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1998), introduction.
8
CHAPTER 1
these two Sub-Saharan cities.31 As it is my ambition to show how the Muslim communities
have transformed in recent decades, I apply the conceptual framework of French sociologist
Pierre Bourdieu, outlined in a religious context in Genesis and Structure of the Religious Field,32 as
his notions of fields, capital, and habitus provide a useful ontological and epistemological
framework to capture the inherent dynamics of such communities. As explained by Stéphane
Lacroix, a field according to Bourdieu is ‘a configuration of relations among hierarchically
arranged positions’ forming an arena governed by its own logic. One could argue it is an
interpretive grid dividing social reality into analytically observable fields. 33 Within these
hierarchical systems capital, a source of either material or symbolic character, defines the ability
of actors to occupy a specific position and exercise power, while habitus, a set of socialized
norms and predispositions, guide their behaviour. The dynamics of capital and habitus are set
within the structural limitations of the field, and are conceptualised by Bourdieu in the term
doxa, which can be translated into the norms and rules governing the field.34 In the first level
of analysis, focus will be on what I definetheIslamic field in Lagos and Cape Town, respectively.
My definition of the Islamic field is rather narrow and exclusively defined by religious
measures thus including Muslims at all levels in the specific societies. By such narrow
definition I intentionally exclude some actors, who in some contexts will be attached to the
Islamic field but without having any direct religious affiliation to Islam.
Applying this theoretical framework enables me to illustrate how Muslim communities in
Lagos and Cape Town have transformed from situations almost characterised by a
monopolisation of the Islamic belief up until the 1960s into a state characterised by pluralism
beginning in the 1970s (figure 1). Through this examination, I intend to clarify how
newcomers have tried to undermine the structure of the Islamic field or restructure the field by
breaking the established doxa with the potential result of constituting a new paradigm. 35
Furthermore, by emphasising the introduction of newcomers to the Islamic field, I wish to
show how the field has been transformed from within, implying a close relation or even an
overlap with particularly the political and educational fields (figure 2).
31
The delineation of Muslim communities to Lagos and Cape Town respectively, is both due to practical concerns and
lacking scholarly research. However when it is of relevance, reflections of a more national-level scale will be included.
32
Pierre Bourdieu, ’Genesis and structure of the religious field’, Comparative Social Research, Vol. 13, 1991, pp. 1-44.
33
Stéphane Lacroix, Awakening Islam: the politics of religious dissent in contemporary Saudi Arabia (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2011) pp. 6-7.
34
See Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977 [1972]) and
Pierre Bourdieu, ‘The Forms of Capital’, in Knowledge Vol. 3, eds. Stehr and Grundmann:, (London: Taylor and Francis,
2005 [1986]).
35
See Abdulkhader Tayob, Islamic resurgence in South Africa: the Muslim youth movement (Cape Town: UCT Press,
1995), chapter one.
9
INTRODUCTION
FIGURE 1
FIGURE 2
dsdsad
How the Islamic field converges with the political field
and the educational field
Transformation of the Islamic field in the 1960s-1970s
Through this approach, I intend to analyse the dynamic and transformative character of field
specific capitals. In the analysis, it becomes clear that newcomers to the Islamic field 36
challenge the constituted situation of power including the hierarchy of capital by introducing
new Islamic discourses. 37 Looking into the transformative character of the field, it
automatically becomes an issue of power; a power to define, to be a source of knowledge, and
to influence, thus making power a very central notion. In a religious context, Abdulkhader
Tayob states that ‘religious knowledge, which is inextricably tied to the notion of power, plays a crucial role
in determining, authorising, admitting and excluding individuals or groups depending upon their perspectives
and interpretation of Islam’38 thus emphasising the central role of religious and sometimes esoteric
knowledge.
To
identify
efforts
to
challenge
existing
power
positions,
QuintanWiktorowicz’sstudy of a framing struggle for sacred authority in the context of al-Qaida
is helpful as it presents polarising strategies to either credit ingroup actors or discredit
outgroup actors. Wiktorowicz outlines four specific strategies (1) vilification; to demonise
competing popular intellectuals, (2) exaltation; to praise ingroup intellectuals, (3) credentialing; to
emphasise the expertise of ingroup intellectuals, and (4) decredentialing; to raise questions about
the expertise of rivals. Such strategies are particularly relevant in what he defines a ‘competitive
identity environment’, which both Lagos and Cape Town are examples of.
In the analysis of the Islamic field, its transformation and contemporary status can be
described through the interaction between the different types of actors within the field. As
‘producers’ and ‘consumers’ of religion constitute the Islamic field at its most fundamental
level, it turns out to be highly relevant to consider the interaction not only between producers
and consumers, but also between the different producers of Islamic doctrine (figure 3).39
36
The religious field has previously been criticised for being dependent on situations with strong hierarchies and great
concentration of power in the hands of the priests, see LeneKühle, ‘Bourdieu omdetreligiøse felt’, PraktiskeGrunde, Nr.
1-2 (2009). However, this should not pose any problems for this research as both preconditions are generally fulfilled in a
Sub-Saharan context.
37
In this struggle for definition, issues such as the definition of legitimate education in order to claim religious authority
and to define correct physical appearance are central.
38
Tayob, Islamic resurgence in South Africa, p. 20.
39
Bourdieu, ’Genesis and structure of the religious field’, p. 17.
10
CHAPTER 1
FIGURE 3
Imam
Imam
The religious field
Laypersons
In a very different context, Bourdieu himself described the structure of the religious field with
the creation of a dominant class of ‘religious experts’, who monopolise the religious capital
and dominate the laity by inducing a religious habitus in them.40 While Bourdieu considers
how the prophet and the sorcerer are challengers to monopolisation of the established class of
experts, I intend to analyse how proponents of non-Sufi doctrines (particularly Salafis and
Shias) are challenging the dominance of Sufi brotherhoods or orders (sing. tariqa, literally
meaning way). When analysing these challenges, the relation to the laity becomes essential as
any attempt to challenge the existing structure needs to correlate with popular demands.
Considering the relation between experts (in this case typically sheikhs or imams) and laity
(ordinary Muslims), the issue of symbolic violence becomes pertinent. This would be the case
if the rhetorical level of abstraction of the religious experts is too abstract for the Muslim
population to actually understand with the latter still choosing to internalise it unaware of the
structural power they are subjected to.
In addition to the methodology introduced above, a religious market theory perspective will
be utilised to further explain the dynamics of the field transformation by elaborating on the
structural relation between producers and consumers of religion. This perspective, which is
somehow inherent in the perspective of Bourdieu,41 views the societal position of Islam as a
market and considers the level of ‘competition’ between producers of religious doctrines and
the ‘price’ for consumers to follow a specific Islamic doctrine. Isolated, the explanatory ability
of these concepts is limited, but they are a useful terminology when describing the dynamics
of the field transformation that a Bourdieu-inspired analysis exemplifies. In essence, what I
intend to identify is the practice of Muslims in Lagos and Cape Town and the sources defining
them. Practice should be seen as the product of the encounter between the habitus and the
field. The key to understand the social world and human practice is founded in an analysis of
this ‘double relation’, which operates in accordance with an economic logic of supply and
demand.42 Furthermore, as radical Islamic movements tend to use soft power to project their
40
Ibid.
Ibid., p. 22.
42
Terry Rey, ’Marketing the Goods of Salvation: Bourdieu on religion’, Religion, 34:4, 2004, p. 336.
41
11
INTRODUCTION
influence, 43 Joseph Nye’s understanding of this concept 44 will be introduced to emphasise
channels and methods of influencing external actors, in this case being religious scholars and
the populations in Lagos and Cape Town.Nye defines soft power as ‘getting others to want
the outcomes that you want’ and as the ‘ability to shape the preferences of others’.45While
countries in general aspire to accumulate soft power with the intention of increasing their
legitimacy, two more specific objectives for such accumulation can be defined and that is
either to reduce threats to internal security orto increase its attractiveness to external actors
with the intention of enhancing its power position. From the perspective of this thesis, the
latter objective will constitute the major premise of the analyses and will thus be elaborated in
chapter two.
In the second level of analysis (chapter five), I change from a micro or meso perspective to a
macro perspective by focusing on fields of a transnational character. The intention of such a
change in perspective is to discuss from the logic governing the regional power struggle
between Saudi Arabia and Iran how diffusion of religious discourse can be understood.
Theoretically, this can be constructed through a definition of a ‘Global Islamic Field’ or an
Islamic Power Field and a ‘Gulf Region Political Field’, which are characterised by heavy
interrelation.This interrelation is based on the assessment that the religious field in both Saudi
Arabia and Iran are rather monopolised by Salafi and revolutionary Shia doctrines respectively,
and that the countries’ particular Islamic doctrine is closely related to the domestic political
field.46 From this assumed relation stems my argument that successful diffusion of Salafi or
revolutionary Shia doctrines is a tool to influence the religious and political legitimacy of the
two Gulf regimes and thus indirectly their authority to act as legitimate representatives of the
ummah. This argument will be qualified further throughout the thesis as it in this rather raw
form presents an over-simplification of realities. In this second level of analysis, the unit of
analysis shifts to a more state-level perspective. Unlike the realist theoretical perspective
though, I neither consider states as uniform entities nor focus exclusively on materialistic
relations.47 Instead I stress the existence of internal diversity of identities and the importance
of ideas, identity and ideology.
My definition of transnationalism is in line with Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane, who
defined it as ‘contacts, coalitions, and interaction across state boundaries that are not controlled by the central
foreign policy organs of governments’.48 This move away from a state-centric approach opens up for
studying relations across borders both on a state and on an individual level as exemplified in
Bonnefoy’s study of Salafism in Yemen.Transnational interaction between religious actors is
particularly taking place at a sub-state level signifying a situation that could even be referred to
43
John O. Voll, ‘Trans-state Muslim Movements and Militant Extremists in an Era of Soft Power’, in Religious pluralism,
globalization, and world politics, ed. Thomas F. Banchoff (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008).
44
As outlined in Joseph S. Nye, Soft power: the means to success in world politics (New York: Public Affairs, 2004).
45
Ibid., pp. 5-6.
46
The assessment for this relation in elaborated in the second chapter ‘Saudi – Iran relations: soft power supremacy
dilemma’.
47
Rather than from Realism, the analytical focus on states is inspired by a historical sociology approach as presented by
Fred Halliday in The Middle East in international relations: power, politics and ideology (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2005).
48
Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye eds.,Transnational relations and world politics (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1972), p. xi.
Westerlund and Rosander ed., African Islam and Islam in Africa: Encounters between Sufis and Islamists, p. 10.
12
CHAPTER 1
as trans-local. Hence, it is actually what Peter Mandaville has coined trans-local spaces that I
intend to study.49
As with any analytical approach, applying an analytical strategy defined by Bourdieu’s field
ontology and some of his thinking tools50enable you to identify certain aspects while hiding
others. The methodology constructed in the preceding paragraphs allows me to identify the
structural relations between actors in the fields, their struggle for capital and power, and
through the notion of habitus to assess their ability to influence the Muslim populations. With
the two ontological fields, I become able to analyse inter-field relations and potential sources
of transnational influence, which is the central objective of the thesis. However, a focus on
specific fields leaves me unaware of the influence of actors not included in these fields, which
potentially could be of importance. This methodological deficit will be sought mitigated best
possible through additional reflections based on secondary literature.Taken all this into
account, the outlined analytical strategy will be sought applied throughout chapters three to
five not with the intention to create a strict and firm theoretical shape but rather organically to
foster an explorative character.
RESEARCH DESIGN
Whereas the previous section outlines the theoretical framework and analytical strategy, this
section will elaborate on the research design and the method applied to collect information
while also defining the theoretical and empirical scope of the research. Based on the
theoretical and strategic methodology outlined above, this study has been developed and
conducted with both a descriptive and explanatory objective asking the questions ‘What is the
current situation?’ and ‘Why are changes occurring?’.51 Naturally, the descriptive part will precede any
attempted explanation as the latter depends fully on the former. This relation between the two
parts is theoretically illustrated above in the relation between the two overlapping ontological
fields. As this approach focuses particularly on one suggested explanation, that is an external
doctrinal inspiration to any changes discovered in the descriptive part, it will never be able to
provide an exhaustive explanation of transnational religious influence although more holistic
considerations will be included in the analysis.
It is important to stress that the intention is not a rigid application of these theoretical
concepts and perspectives, but rather to accommodate their use to the specific research
context in order to foster an eclectic approach. As this study finds itself somewhere within the
spheres of international relations-, security- and religious studies, it is imperative to approach
it with an explorative and open approach in order to identify nuances. A few comments need
to be added to the scope of the thesis’ primary ontological field. In a context like Lagos and
Cape Town, it is clear that there is more than one religious field. Besides an Islamic field, it is
possible to identify a Christian field, a traditional religion field etc. However, from the
perspective of this research it should be underlined that it will only directly address the Islamic
field and thus leave other religious fields and the potential interaction between them aside.
49
Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen: Transnationalism and religious identity, pp. 15-16.
‘Thinking tools’ is a label by Anne Leander, who outlays an alternative practical use of Bourdieu’s theory focusing on
a limited range of his notions. See Anna Leander, ’Thinking Tools - Analyzing Symbolic Power and Violence’, In Klotz
and Prakash, Qualitative Methods in International Relations (Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan, 2008).
51
David A. De Vaus, Research design in social research (London: SAGE, 2001).
50
13
INTRODUCTION
In accordance with the analytical approach of Bourdieu, the empirical focus will be based on a
methodological openness, attempting to include a broad range of material differing in
character with the objective of strengthen the validity of the analysis best possible. This
strategy allows for an important degree of flexibility regarding the type of empirical data,
much depending on the tangible context.
The primary empirical data for the analysis of Muslim communities in Lagos and Cape Town
will be based on approximately30 interviews, both formal and informal in character,
conducted during two-months of fieldwork. Interviews have been conducted in English, in
Hausa, and in Yoruba, the latter two through translator, with a wide range of actors.
Regarding their structure, few interviews were of formal character as most took the form of
simple conversations regarding the local Muslim community and the role of the actor or group
in question. Such conversations were semi-structured by an identification of issues of interest
formulated prior to any talk. While the majority of the interviews were with imams from
differing Islamic sects covering the several Sufi brotherhoods, Ahmadiyya, Ahl al-SunnawalJama'a, Salafis, Shia and several Islamic societies, they also include actors such as Islamic
student organisations, Islamic NGOs, and madāris. Interviewees can be categorised into three
groups depending on how they were chosen for the interview. The first group was identified
through pre-departure research and thus covers the full range of actors, as this was deemed
essential. Actors in the second group were identified directly when being in the
neighbourhoods by visiting local mosques and madāris, while actors from the third group
were all recommended me to get in contact to by other interviewees in order to cover all the
particularities of the Muslim community in the specific neighbourhood. Through this
approach, I believe to have avoided the most severe pitfalls of selection as I have depended on
selection criteria characterised both by strategic research and an open and impulsive approach
in order to engage with as many and as diverse Islamic actors as possible. However, due to the
delicate character of the discussion of Shiism, Salafism, and any external influence, many
regarded my field of research and particular questions with suspicion, which in some cases
prohibited me from conducting interviews or from obtaining particular information.
The much differing structural setting of the two cities made it necessary with diverse strategies
for data collection. Whereas it is the case in Cape Town that Islamic actors are formally
organised and more often than not easily identifiable for the public through the Internet, the
exact opposite is the case in Lagos. This situation stressed the necessity of local social
interaction in identifying relevant actors and to understand the characteristics of the local
Muslim communities. Furthermore, due to the immense size of Lagos, it has moreover been a
challenge to cover the full spectrum of the city. Hence, particular neighbourhoods have been
selected due to their high percentage of Muslim population and/or their ethnic setting. In
Lagos I have particularly focused on the neighbourhoods Surulere, Idi Araba, Agege, Mushin,
Ebutte-Metta, and to a lesser extent on Apapa and Lagos Island. In Cape Town, the easy
access to information on the organisation of religious actors allowed me to cover the city
more broadly. Spending most of my time during the fieldwork in these local environments,
my own observations will likewise constitute information for the analysis. This is particularly
relevant for observations regarding prayers, the general social attitude of the Muslim
population, and the available Islamic literature. Due to the important transformative power of
14
CHAPTER 1
literature and recorded sermons, my findings in local bookshops and what is generally being
sold on the street will be considered valuable too when assessing the religious input to the
population both from a substantial and a geographical perspective. In addition, articles,
YouTube-videos, and debates on Islamic Internet forums will be included as will information
from informal discussions with domestic and international scholars in the field and with
journalists. Such discussions have either taken the form of face-to-face conversations or
longer e-mail correspondences. It needs to be mentioned that due to the particular
circumstances and complexity of the empirical situation, the analysis will depend more on a
theoretical foundation and existing literature when describing the Shia perspective. This does
not imply, however, that no findings from the field will be included in the analysis in the
description of Shia communities, but simply that these findings on Shias largely come from
interviews with Sunnis.
15
CHAPTER 2
SAUDI – IRAN RELATIONS:
A SOFT POWER SUPREMACY DILEMMA
As the thesis is based on the premise of an ongoing Islamic cold war between Saudi Arabia and
the Islamic Republic of Iran, it is the intention of this chapter to outline the thesis’ contextual
setting while providing both a theoretical and an empirical foundation for the analyses. Several
authors have already analysed how the 1979 Iranian Revolution influenced regional politics
and security in the Gulf and as such a detailed analysis of Saudi-Iranian relations post-1979
will not be the ambition here. Instead the objective is to introduce and focus my perspective
on the bilateral relationship as a way to contextualise and justify the analytical perspective of
the thesis by briefly outlining the political and sectarian dimensions triggering a regional power
struggle before finally explaining what I define as a soft power supremacy dilemma between Saudi
Arabia and Iran.
That an Islamic cold war is not just a phenomenon of the past became evident during the
Arab Spring. In his book Sectarian Gulf: Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and the Arab Spring that Wasn't,
Toby Matthiesen describes how domestic Shia uprisings in 2011 in eastern Saudi Arabia and
Bahrain were regarded by the Saudis as Iranian initiatives1 much like the situation in Qatif and
Al-Ahsa in 1979. Despite much scholarship on the topic, the actual reasons for the animosity
between the two states continue to be difficult to identify precisely as scholars fundamentally
disagree as exemplified by the following explanations of well-respected scholars. Representing
a sectarian explanation, Anoushiravan Ehteshami believes the rivalry is emanating from the
1
Toby Matthiesen, Sectarian Gulf: Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and the Arab Spring that wasn’t (Stanford, California:
Stanford University Press, 2013).
16
CHAPTER 2
revolution and thus of contemporary character. In contrast, Fred Halliday states it is atavistic
belligerence or imperialist interference, arguing that it is a result of state-building processes
and the rise of nationalism, while ShahramChubin and Charles Tripp say it is due to structural
factors and geopolitical differences.2 Academic disagreements aside, it is certain that the rivalry
between Saudi Arabia and Iran is of a complex character, taking several different forms such
as geopolitical and military competition. This thesis, however, intends to look at it primarily
from a religious perspective or at least by stressing the legitimating role of religion for both
states both domestically and externally with the objective of winning the support of the
Muslim population.
A POLITICAL AND HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
According to Saudi scholar Madawi Al Rasheed the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran
started in 1979, however to properly understand its emergence one needs to start a decade
earlier. In the aftermath of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, which left Egypt shattered, Saudi Arabia
considered itself as the sole defender of Arab and Muslim causes. This perception was only
strengthened after Anwar Sadat’s peace treaty with Israel in 1978. The Saudi self-proclaimed
monopoly of pan-Islamism changed radically with the Iranian Revolution as the new Iranian
clerical regime likewise claimed to champion Muslim interest and to apply Sharia law as the
foundation of society. Hence, the revolution initiated a struggle to win hearts and minds of
Muslims globally through methods such as promotion of religious literature and the
sponsoring of religious education, mosques, and Islamic conferences abroad. Al-Rasheed
argues that this process caused a politicisation of sectarian identity in the relationship between the
two states and it is this transformed character of sectarianism, which constitutes the overall
premise of the thesis.3 Other issues such as geopolitics, particularly the production and export
of oil, and alliance politics have influenced the relationship too as explained by
ShahramChubin and Charles Tripp, who nonetheless supports Al-Rasheed by stating that the
Islamic Revolution ‘considerable worsened Iran-Saudi relations, not least by expanding their
rivalry to Islamic leadership’. 4 Perhaps best put by Olivier Roy, he says that ‘this divide
[between Sunni and Shia], which was originally political, took a religious turn as the Salafist
and Wahhabi movements [of Saudi Arabia] increasingly denounced the Shi’a as heretics from
the mid-1980s on’.5
Some level of political competiveness did exist prior to the revolution though as both Iran and
Saudi Arabia have regarded themselves as natural authorities if not leaders in the region.
Ehteshami has explained how ‘the drive toward regional supremacy has long been a feature of
Iranian foreign policy. Derived from Iran’s long history and its geography, Iran sees itself as
uniquely qualified to determine, at the very least the destiny of the Gulf subregion’ thus clearly
stressing Iran’s ambitions of regional leadership.6 Likewise, the regime in Riyadh has for long
2
Mabon, Saudi Arabia and Iran, p. 41.
Al Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi state, pp. 104-10.
4
ShahramChubin and Charles Tripp, Iran-Saudi Arabia relations and regional order, Adelphi Paper No. 304 (London:
Oxford University Press for the International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1996) p. 53.
5
Olivier Roy, ‘The Impact of the Iranian Revolution on the Middle East’, in The Shi’a Worlds and Iran, ed. Sabrina
Mervin, (London: SAQI, 2010) p. 31.
6
Anoushiravan Ehteshami, ‘The Foreign Policy of Iran’, in The foreign policies of Middle East states, eds. Raymond A.
Hinnebusch and Anoushiravan Ehteshami (Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002) p. 286.
3
17
SAUDI-IRAN RELATIONS: A SOFT POWER SUPREMACY DILEMMA
regarded Saudi Arabia as a natural leader in the region based on the narrative of being the
cradle of Islam and the place of the two holy places, Mekka and Medina, which justifies their
claim for regional power.7
With the coming to power of Khomeini and his fellow Shia clergy, the competition between
the new Islamic Republic of Iran and the Saudi Sunni kingdom became fiercer, which prompted
several new policy initiatives, particularly by the Saudis. A central reason for this policy
adaptation was the philosophical aspect of revolution inherent in Shiism, which unfolded in
the process leading to the revolution. For Shia ‘ulama there are three distinctive ways of
relating to the state with one of them being political activism against state authority – an
approach not entirely different from Henry Thoreau’s philosophy of civil disobedience. Along
with the societal role played by the Iranian philosopher Ali Shariati, as explained by
MoojanMomen, this laid the theoretical foundation for the Iranian Revolution and potentially
elsewhere, which certainly constituted a source of fear for the Al Saud.8 The Saudi fear was
only aggravated by the discourse of Khomeini, who castigated monarchical rule with a clear
implicit reference to the Saudi royal family.9 To counter any suspected Iranian attempts of
provoking instability for Al Saud, the Saudis led the creation of the Gulf Cooperation Council
(GCC) in 1981 to increase its legitimacy in addition to its efforts in already existing
organisational forums like the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the
Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), where Saudi Arabia was a
leading actor in setting up the former. Politically, the bilateral relationship has not been
exclusively strained and distrustful as it has been dependant on events such as wars, alliances,
and not least political leadership. Hence, the presidential election of Akbar Hashemi
Rafsanjani, a pragmatic, followed by the reformists Ali Khatami implied a softened discourse
between the two states. However, during the presidency of Ahmadinejad, any attempts of
rapprochement were cancelled.
A SECTARIAN PERSPECTIVE
As my analytical perspective stresses the sectarian aspect of the competitive nature between
Saudi Arabia and Iran, an elaboration of the Salafi and Shia doctrines is central. However,
rather than a full and detailed explanation of either doctrine, I intend to more specifically
highlight particularities relevant for the understanding of their internal animosity and the
analyses.
Salafism, often described as a retrograde religious doctrine, should at its most general level be
understood as a return to the foundation of religion and the practices of al-Salaf al-Salih (the
pious ancestors; referring to the Sahabah) as their practices had not been altered by
innovations, which Salafis so critically denounce. A central aspect of Salafi identity is their selfperception of being the saved sect al-firqa al-najiya,10 thus indicating the superiority of their
doctrine to others. In contrast to other Sunni sects, Salafis do not follow any of the schools of
7
F. Gregory Gause, ‘The Foreign Policy of Saudi Arabia’, in The foreign policies of Middle East states, eds. Raymond
A. Hinnebusch and Anoushiravan Ehteshami (Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002) p. 193.
8
Momen, An introduction to Shii Islam, p. 193.
9
Gause, The Foreign Policy of Saudi Arabia, p. 197.
10
Roel Meijer, ,The Problem of the Political in Islamist Movements’, in What Happened to the Islamists? Salafis, Heavy
Metal Muslims and the Lure of Consumerist Islam, eds. AmelBoubekeur and Olivier Roy (London: Hurst and Co., 2012).
18
CHAPTER 2
jurisprudence (madhahib) as they reject imitation (taqlid), while they stress a literalist
interpretation of the sacred texts of Islam being the Qur’an and hadiths as they are presented
in sunna. With such explicit acceptance of only the Qur’an and sunna as legitimate sources,
Salafis abandon both the validity of ijma, referring to consensus between ‘ulama, and qiyas,
which is the use of reason in religious interpretation, as such methods would be against tawhid,
the oneness of God, which is essential to the Salafi doctrine. 11 It is on this theological
foundation that Salafis seek to purify Islam from ‘superstitions, celebrations and beliefs that
belong to popular Islam, particularly Sufism, which through the cult of saints appears to be
guilty of introducing intercession between God and the believer’.12
With this understanding of Salafism in mind, several aspects of contemporary Shiism become
interesting. 13 As Shias consider Ali ibn AbiṬalib the first imam, they do not accept the
legitimacy of Abu Bakr, Umar ibn Al-Khattab, and Uthman ibn Affan, the first three caliphs
according to Sunni belief, in addition to several other early companions of the prophet and
hence Shias reject the body of hadith transmitted by these people.14 As these companions of
the prophet are held in particular high esteem by Salafis, it is easy to understand how the Shia
rejection of their authority is regarded with anger by Salafis. A more recent source of
disagreement occurred in the aftermath of the Safavid dynasty in the 18th century, when the
Qajar tribe took power. Besides implying a split between the state and the ‘ulama, the change
of dynasty also witnessed the rise of a new philosophical approach to Islam as the reasonbased Usuli‘aqida came to dominate the Akhbari ‘aqida, which rejects ijtihad. 15 Besides
increasing the power of the Shia ‘ulama, the prominence of Usulis entailed a philosophical
tradition in stark contrast to what Salafis now agitate for.
Despite the attempts to generally define Salafism and Shiism so far, none on them should be
considered as heterogeneous in practice. Bonnefoy illustrates this diverse character of
Salafism, which scholars traditionally have divided into three distinct groups depending on
their manhaj.16 As of now further elaboration is not needed however, as it will be introduced in
the analysis. Same heterogeneous character can be applied to Shiism as religious practice varies
depending on what marja al-taqlid (source of imitation) one follows.17 Furthermore, Shiism is
divided into several groups or branches with Jafaris (Twelvers), Zaidis, and Ismailisbeing the
three largest. As Shias in Iran are Jaʿfaris and as Jaʿfari Shiism is defined as state religion in
the Iranian constitution, this branch will be what I refer to as Shiism throughout the thesis.
What is important to clarify in this section is the mutual animosity between Salafis and Shias.
While Salafis do not consider Shias as true Muslims at all, Jaʿfaris actually do regard Salafis as
Muslims, although they believe that Sunnis in general follow the wrong path and that they are
11
Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, pp. 39-52.
Ibid., p. 45.
13
As I do not intend to elaborate much on Shia origin, development, and doctrine, please see Momen, An introduction to
Shii Islam and SeyyedHossein Nasr, Hamid Dabashi and SeyyedVali Reza Nasr (eds.), Shiism: doctrines, thought,
and spirituality (Albany: State Univ. of New York Press, 1988) for more information; See Louër, Shiism and politics in
the Middle East and Sabrina Mervin, (ed.), The Shi'a worlds and Iran (London: SAQI, 2010) for more on the
transnational character of Shiism.
14
Momen, An introduction to Shii Islam, p. 73.
15
Ibid.
16
Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, p. 193.
17
Mervin, The Shi'a worlds and Iran.
12
19
SAUDI-IRAN RELATIONS: A SOFT POWER SUPREMACY DILEMMA
therefore not ‘true believers’.18 This hostility vis-à-vis the other part is increased both from a
religious and a political perspective as both Iran and Saudi Arabia – the cradles of Shiism and
Salafism respectively – claim natural leadership of the Muslim world.19 Hence, whether the
foundational source of the Islamic cold war conflict is sectarian or not, sectarianism is
certainly used as an integral part.20
SOFT POWER DILEMMA: DIFFUSING RELIGION FOR REGIONAL SUPREMACY
In 2003, regional structures changed, which affected the Saudi-Iran rivalry substantially. The
fall of Iraq and Saddam Hussein followed by almost a decade long American presence implied
a two-horse race in the Gulf region as the former powerhouse of Iraq was left in a devastated
condition. Although it somehow simplified the situation, it also pitted Iran and Saudi Arabia
directly against each other and made the regional equation a zero-sum game. Neither of the
two states have an abundance of hard power as the wealthy Saudi kingdom is military weak,
while Iran with strong military capabilities has been severely affected economically by the
international community’s sanction regime. From this perspective of competition for regional
supremacy, I consider the focus on soft power particular pertinent to analysis due to the
legitimising importance of religion in both Saudi Arabia and Iran and the central role of
sectarianism, thus leading to a situation of what I would define a soft power supremacy dilemma.21
Thomas Hegghammer argues that there are five main rationales for action that underlie most
forms of Islamist activism. One of the five rationales is ‘sectarian Islamism’, which is defined
by a desire to reduce the influence and power of the competing sect (Shia or Sunni). 22
Although his framework is applied in a specific context of militant Islamism and specific
Islamist movement, I believe it is valid to apply it more generally as well. It is from this
perspective that one can begin to understand attempts of Saudi and Iranian actors abroad –
even outside the Gulf region – to engage in power struggles by diffusing their particular
religious discourse. Mara Leichtman exemplifies this in her study of Shia communities in
Senegal, stating that Shia history in Senegal has been influenced by an Iranian strategy to
counter ‘Saudi objectives of spreading Wahhabi-influenced Islam’.23
However, to believe that such attempts of religious diffusion abroad started with the Iranian
Revolution would be misleading. According to David Commins, the prominent role of Islam
in Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy started already in the 1960s. Not only to battle Gamal Abdel
Nasser’s Pan-Arabism, this was also to protect against increased western cultural influence.24
Al-Rasheed dates the initiation of this process a decade later. In the 1970s, da’wa activities
abroad became a political strategy of the Saudi state, she argues, and through charity and
18
Momen, An introduction to Shii Islam, p. 192; Commins, The Wahhabi mission and Saudi Arabia, pp. 169-170.
In the Iranian constitution, the Guide of the revolution (referring to Khomeini) is also considered to be the Guide of the
entire Umma, see Roy, ‘The Impact of the Iranian Revolution on the Middle East., p. 29.
20
Mabon, Saudi Arabia and Iran, p. 64.
21
Recent events like the Saudi reaction to US-Iran rapprochement during the Iranian nuclear program talks (See
http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/11/26/iran_and_the_us_saudi_bargain) and the Saudi and Iranian
involvement in and attitude to the civil war in Syria vividly show that the power contestation is indeed ongoing.
22
Thomas Hegghammer, ‘Jihadi-Salafis or Revolutionaries? On Religion and Politics in the Study of Militant Islamism’,
in Global Salafism: Islam's new religious movement, ed. Roel Meijer (London: Hurst and Co., 2009) p. 258; See also
Thomas Hegghammer, Jihad in Saudi Arabia, introduction.
23
Leichtman, The Authentication of a Discursive Islam, p. 113.
24
Commins, The Wahhabi mission and Saudi Arabia, p. 150.
19
20
CHAPTER 2
education the regime tried to diffuse its religious doctrine. Such transnational engagement
occurred too on grassroots level and probably with greater efficiency. Al-Rasheed explains
how mosques, charitable organisations, religious schools, research centres, and da’wa
institutions were set up to complement the more formalised and institutionalised efforts of
organisations like the Muslim World League (MWL)25 and the World Assembly of Muslim
Youth (WAMY). From 1979 onwards, same intentions became part of Iranian political and
religious identity, as exporting the revolution was an explicit objective of the clergy regime.26 What
has been equal for both states is that several methods or arenas – both on a state and on a
sub-state level – have been used to wield their soft power objectives. Whereas neighbouring
countries and the Middle Eastern region has been at the forefront of their sphere of interest,
Muslim communities further away are increasingly considered relevant for da’wa activities.
This interest now seems to include Sub-Saharan Africa, which is considered a great potential
for conversion.
Because of their respective Islamic history and tradition, both Saudi Arabia and Iran have
strong soft power in the eyes of Muslims worldwide depending on their sectarian affiliation.
Besides being central centres of religious education, both states have been proponents of a
Pan-Islamism and are self-proclaimed defenders of the interests of Muslims globally.
Hegghammer describes how Pan-Islamism has been a central part of Saudi identity and,
particularly, its foreign policy for decades in order to claim political leadership in the Islamic
world.27 For Iran, focus has especially been on defending Muslims’ rights through the support
of oppressed Muslim population and sympathy with both Sunni and Shia Islamist
movements.28 For both states, this Pan-Islamism has taken the form of humanitarian work
and support for Muslim causes through discourses and in diplomatic circles. To exercise their
soft power, three methods appear central:
Education: Both Saudi Arabia and Iran are considered centres of religious
education and for decades Muslims from all over the world have travelled to
places like Mekka, Medina, Qom, and Mashhad to study Islam. Of a more active
character, Saudi and Iranian clerics are travelling to educate Muslims outside
their respective states in order to enhance their sphere of influence. As students
often stay in Saudi Arabia and Iran in prolonged periods for education,
influencing foreign students’ doctrinal understanding becomes relatively easy
due to the power of structural norms in the hosting society and the religious
authority Saudi and Iranian clerics posses. That education is considered of great
importance is illustrated by the establishment of the Islamic University in
Medina, which was created to train proselytisers and with regulations that 75%
should come from abroad.29
Literature and digital material: Publishing and distribution of Salafi or Shia literature
is another important source to wield soft power. Examples include handing out
general Islamic works to increase the Islamic awareness and, more importantly,
25
Al-Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi state, pp. 126-127.
Roy, ‘The Impact of the Iranian Revolution on the Middle East’.
27
Hegghammer, Jihad in Saudi Arabia.
28
Ehteshami, ‘The Foreign Policy of Iran’, p. 287.
29
Commins, The Wahhabi mission and Saudi Arabia, p. 152.
26
21
SAUDI-IRAN RELATIONS: A SOFT POWER SUPREMACY DILEMMA
fatwas and literature, videos, and sermons on ‘aqida by Salafi and Shia
authorities. In an African context, this has become increasingly important due to
the growing literacy of Sub-Saharan populations.
Hajj: The pilgrimage is particularly important from a Saudi perspective as it
provides an incredibly opportunity to influence pilgrims’ understanding of Islam
during their stay – normally of several weeks – in the kingdom. During such
stays, foreign pilgrims become acquainted with Islam as it is practised in Saudi
society, while engaging with the local population.
To wield such powers, established networks of ‘ulama and international institutions are
central. Commins explains for instance how the WML is utilised as an instrument for religious
diffusion by the Saudi state. 30 As most of these institutions are tools of the Saudi
establishment, Iran has been using connections to Lebanese diaspora on the African continent
to counter such disadvantage.31 But not only soft power is used as the use of funding by both
Saudi Arabia and Iran underlines the importance of a ‘harder currency’. In the context of Yemen,
Bonnefoy has shown the importance of Saudi funding for the development of Salafism in
Yemen.32 This typically happens through funding of scholarship to study in Saudi Arabia or
Iran, to the establishment of mosques and Islamic schools, and to arrange conferences. As will
be shown in the analysis, funding is paramount to successful diffusion, which severely has
affected Iran’s recent efforts.
It is within this framework that I intend to analyse Saudi and Iranian attempts to win over the
African street in the specific localities of Lagos and Cape Town.
30
Ibid., p. 152.
Mara Leichtman, ‘Migration, War, and the Making of a Transnational Lebanese Shi’i Community in Senegal’,
International Journal for Middle East Studies 42 (2010), p. 273.
32
Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, p. 151.
31
22
CHAPTER 3
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
Islamic history in Nigeria has its origin in the 9th century when Arab traders accompanied by
missionaries crossed the Sahara desert and initiated a process of conversion. Long before the
establishment of modern states in West Africa and indeed before colonial created polities,
Islamic influence was mainly among the Hausa and Fulani tribes in the northern region of
today’s Nigeria. This signalled the beginning of both Islam and the Arabic language in a
region, where it later came to dominate social and religious life. Forwarding to approximately
1450, Sunni Sufi brotherhoods came to Nigeria and has since enjoyed the following of the
majority of Muslims in western Africa.1 Although this is not a study of Sufi brotherhoods, a
few general characteristics of Sufism are appropriate. With a focus on spirituality and direct
communication between man and God, Sufis claim ‘a knowledge of the Real that could not be
gained through revealed religion’ 2 thus pitting them directly against Sunni orthodoxy.
Historically, Sufism developed as a reaction against the rationalisation of Islam in order to
secure the spiritual freedom of man. Sufism was thus a way (tariqa) of purification and its
followers consider it ‘the inner doctrine of Islam, the underlying mystery of the Qur’an’.3
Often organised in hierarchical systems with the sheikh or marabout at the top, focus is more
on guiding than actual teaching the followers (murid). Over time in syncretism with traditional
religious practices, Sufism developed into what scholars have labelled African Islam and which
generally has been understood to be more moderate and tolerant than the Islam practised in
the Middle East. The early 19th century saw the rise of the jihad movement of Usman
danFodio, an Islamic Fulani preacher in northern Nigeria, which resulted in the establishment
1
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 69.
J. Spencer Trimingham, The Sufi orders in Islam (Oxford: Clarendon, 1971) p. 2.
3
Ibid., p. 2.
2
23
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
of the Sokoto Caliphate in 1809 as has been extensively described by Murray Last. 4
Incorporating many Hausa and Fulani kingdoms and institutionalising Islamic practices, the
Caliphate attained substantial influence in the region, which has continued until present day
despite it being formally abolished by British colonial power. When the British colonised
Nigeria in 1914, they united the north and the south, which up to then had been separate
entities, but despite unification they continued to govern them as separate states until the decolonisation process. Notwithstanding the abolishment of the Caliphate, the British rulers
accepted the title of Sultan of Sokoto to remain and thus the sultan is still an influential religious
force particularly in the north as stressed by John Paden.5 Although not entirely clarified, the
movement of danFodio and the following Caliphate rule had some attachment to Sufi
brotherhoods, mainly the Qadiriyya 6 and Tijaniyya, 7 which historically have been the most
dominant brotherhoods in Nigeria. Sufi sentiments aside however, the emergence of the
Sokoto Caliphate also entailed increased religious interaction with Saudi Arabia. This
relationship became more important during the 1950s and 1960s when Ahmadu Bello was the
Sardauna of Sokoto. Bello himself occupied at some point the position of Vice President of the
Muslim World League (MWL), a Saudi established NGO, while his close associate Abubakar
Gumi functioned as liaison between Muslims in Nigeria and the Saudi establishment because
of his Islamic credentials and his fluency in Arabic. After Nigerian independence from British
rule, the relationship even included Saudi funding of the Caliphate.8 Until this period, Sufism
was dominant and Nigerian Islamic culture had experienced an Africanisation over time,9 but
from the 1950s and onwards anti-Sufi sentiments began to flourish first propagated by
political activist and Ahmadiyya follower Sa’aduZungur and later by Abubakar Gumi and the
Izala movement.10
Traditionally, the north has been defined as Muslim land whereas the south has been referred
to as Christian. However, in the southwestern region and the cities of Lagos, Ibadan, and
Ilorin this description does not fit reality. Partly due to what Paden describes as a period of
great conversion to Islam in Lagos in the 19th and 20th centuries and because of migration
4
For more on Sokoto Caliphate, see Murray Last, The Sokoto caliphate (London: Longman, 1967).
John Paden, Faith and politics in Nigeria: Nigeria as a pivotal state in the Muslim world (Washington D.C.: United
States Institute Of Peace Press, 2008), pp. 21-27.
6
The Qadiriyya brotherhood was established by the Persian ‘Abd al-Qadir (1077-1166), who himself was a Hanbali, but
whose adherents condemned orthodoxy. Now one of the most widespread Sufi brotherhoods, it is interesting that a
sheikh, who was not even a Sufi himself, founded it and thus the way or path of the brotherhood has been developed by
his successors. The Hanbali creed of al-Qadir has implied that much emphasis is placed on the fundamentals of Islam as
stressed by Salafis too. However, the latter are naturally very critically of the intermediary role of the sheikh, the loud
dhikr characterising Qadiriyya in addition to other of their practices (See Trimingham, The Sufi orders in Islam, pp. 4044).
7
The Tijaniyya brotherhood was founded by the Algerian Ahmad al-Tijani (1737-1815) as a reformist line of Sufism to
revive it in a period of decline. Particularly present in the Maghrib and in West Africa, the reformist Tijaniyya movement
sought to change some of the traditional practices of Sufism among others the overtly hierarchical system. The
brotherhood is characterised by simplicity as the rules followers are expected to follow are few and clear, while focus is
upon the need for an intercessor between man and God thus placing much power in the hands of the marabout or leading
sheikh (See Ibid., pp. 107-110).
8
SakahSaidu Mahmud, ‘Islamism in West Africa: Nigeria’, African Studies Review Vol. 47, No. 2 (2004), p. 86.
9
The radical Maitatsine movement in the 1970s led by Mohammad Marwa is an example of such Africanisation as he
preaching included not to follow the sunna, to only pray three times daily, and the prohibition of facing Mecca during
prayer in order to align Islam more with local culture and tradition. See John AlembillahAzumah, The legacy of ArabIslam in Africa: a quest for inter-religious dialogue (Oxford: Oneworld, 2001), p. 188.
10
Muhammad Sani Umar, ‘Changing Islamic Identity in Nigeria from the 1960s to the 1980s: From Sufism to AntiSufism’, in Muslim identity and social change in Sub-Saharan Africa, ed. Louis Brenner (Bloomington: Indiana Univ.
Press, 1993), pp. 157-159.
5
24
CHAPTER 3
from Hausa-land to Lagos, approximately half of Lagos’ population is Muslim. Despite these
demographical changes regarding religion, structural differences between the south and the
north continue to exist. In contrast to the north, the state is not directly involved in Muslim
religious affairs in the southwest, where voluntary Islamic organisations rather take on this
role.11 Another striking difference is the local division of Muslims. In Lagos, Muslims seem to
be divided into small and localised societies often irrespective of sects. This is in contrast to
the much larger communities in places like Kano, where sectarian and doctrinal differences
seem more determining for the social division.
Based on the interviews I have conducted in Lagos city in the Muslim dominated
neighbourhoods of Mushin, Surulere, Apapa, Agege, Lagos Island, Egbe, and Idi Araba, my
impression of the Muslim communities in the city differs substantially from the one outlined
in existing literature. Far from the monopolised position of Sufi brotherhoods, my findings
suggest the presence of a much more diverse doctrinal adherence and even an imminent
dominance of orthodox Sunni Islam if not more radical interpretations quite similar to the
Islamic development in the north dating back to the 1960s. This is closely related to what I
will define as a renewed religious consciousness among Muslims in Lagos. Hence, I believe the
Muslim communities are indeed characterised by a higher degree of pluralism than so far
acknowledged in academic literature and that this development to some degree has been
influenced by the political interests of foreign states including Saudi Arabia and the Islamic
Republic of Iran. As Ousmane Kane argues, ‘it is widely believed that this success [of Iranian
influence] led to a local countermove by another Islamic power and rival of Iran, Saudi Arabia,
to curb Iranian influence and sponsor its own conception of Islamic puritanism’.12
CHALLENGING EXISTING STRUCTURES:
NEWCOMERS TO A MONOPOLISED FIELD
Visiting the different neighbourhoods of Lagos, talking to Imams, and observing peoples’
prayer, rituals, and appearance it becomes evident that the Islamic religion is practiced in
several different ways and is indeed characterised by pluralism. As already explained, from a
scholarly perspective it has generally been assessed that Sufi brotherhoods (turuq, sing. tariqa)
have had almost a monopoly in the Islamic field in southern Nigeria in contrast to the north,
where diverse Islamic doctrines were present. In this regard, it is important to mention that
what is understood as a monopoly is the power to dictate the interpretation of Islam and
define religious goods due to the dominant actors high accumulation of powerful capitals as
understood by Bourdieu and because of this power being capable of influencing the religious
habitus of the Muslim population, thus leading to a reproduction of existing structures.13 This
dominant position of the Tijaniyya and Qadiriyya brotherhoods staunchly argued by scholars
has indeed been the case previously in and around Lagos, but such description seems no
longer appropriate to describe the contemporary situation. Instead Islam in Lagos appears to
11
John Paden, Muslim civic cultures and conflict resolution: the challenge of democratic federalism in Nigeria
(Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2005), pp. 64-99.
12
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 78.
13
Bourdieu, ’Genesis and structure of the religious field’, pp. 9-10.
25
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
be characterised by the existence of several different Islamic sects and multiple understandings
of what constitutes the correct creed (‘aqida).
Surely this change in the religious landscape or transformation of structures in the Islamic field in
Lagos has not happened over night, but has rather been a lengthy process taking place over
the last few decades. The structural transformation is due to the entrance of newcomers to the
field, who have managed to establish themselves through the preaching of new Islamic
doctrines and differing creed. Thus, these newcomers have succeeded in their propagation of
discourses that have challenged the hitherto dominance of a Sufi Islamic discourse and as such
created a more diverse Islamic field, characterised by a discursive competition for dominance.
During my stay in Lagos, I came across several Islamic sects namely the Tijaniyya and
Qadiriyya brotherhoods, Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at, Ahl al-Sunna, Salafis, Izala, Tablighi
Jama’at, and Shia. Several others exist but I believe that the ones mentioned constitute the
most dominating groups. Using the terminology of Bourdieu, one could argue that all of these
sects with the exception of Shiism have managed to restructure the Islamic field and its doxa
by stressing the importance of new forms of capital, by meeting the desires of the religious
consumers, and finally influencing their religious habitus.
Although the situation differs from neighbourhood to neighbourhood, my intention here is to
outline some general characteristics of the restructuring of the field and the effects of the
entrance of newcomers. Based on interviews in Lagos, my major argument is that Sufi
brotherhoods and particularly the Tijaniyya, which has been most dominant in recent times,
have experienced a radical decline in the number of followers while more orthodox Sunni
interpretation by radical groups of Salafis has attracted adherents. This conclusion seems to be
supported by the full Islamic spectrum, as the majority of my talks with Imams are testament
to. Ismail Yusuf, a 50-years-old Salafi Imam from the Epe area of Lagos, who spends most of
his time on da’wa activities throughout the city confessed his personal assessment that
approximately 60 % of Lagos Muslim youth adhere the doctrine of Ahl al-Sunnawal-Jama’a
thus following the Qur’an and sunna only. Although he himself did not follow any maddhab
and argued against any form of ‘taqlid, he explained that in practice the term Ahl al-SunnawalJama’a covered followers of both the Maliki and Hanbali school of jurisprudence in addition
to Muslims like himself, who refused the following of any school. However, what defined
most of the Ahl al-Sunna is the following of a literalist Athari creed.14 Identifying himself as a
Salafi, appearing with a long beard, shaved moustache and ankle-long thawb, Ismail Yusuf
represents a somehow biased grouping. However, many other actors including the Chief
Tijaniyya Imam of the Egbe Central Mosque and an Ahmadiyya Imam in Agege have
confessed similar statements thus supporting its validity.
A Salafi in doctrine and appearance, Ismail Yusuf represents a group of the Islamic
community in Lagos that is becoming increasingly more common in the daily picture.
However, the group of people who claim to adhere strictly to the Qur’an and sunna is more
nuanced than this as exemplified by Mubarak Abdelkhader, an Imam from the neighbourhood
14
Athari takes its roots in the creed of Ahmad ibn Hanbal and is characterised by textualism or literalism thus making it
synonymous with what could be referred to as Neo-Hanbalism. Interestingly, the word Athari is often used by Madkhalis,
the followers of the Saudi Sheikh Rabi' al-Madkhali, whose branch of Salafism (Madkhalism) is defined by a quietist
approach.
26
CHAPTER 3
of Mushin, who identifies himself as Ahl al-Sunna. Unlike Imam Yusuf, Mubarak
Abdelkhader follows the Maliki school of jurisprudence as is the norm in West Africa.
Furthermore, he does not identify himself as neither a Salafi nor Izala as he beliefs both terms
signify specific movements, which de does not wants to be identified with although he agree
on the doctrines of the so-called groups to a large extent. Following the Qur’an and sunna,
but not in what he refers to as the ‘radical’ way of Salafis, his position could be termed ‘liberal
Ahl al-Sunna’ – a term also applied within the Muslim community in the north – in contrast to
more literalist interpretations of the sacred texts. Illustrating the Islamic diversity in Lagos, the
Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’t is another example. A sect originating from India, it stands out due
to the stark contrast between the sect’s self-image and how other Islamic sects consider it. In
1889, MirzaGhulam Ahmad created the Ahmadiyya, controversially claiming to be the Mahdi –
the second coming of the Prophet Jesus – as proclaimed by Prophet Muhammad himself. Not
before 1960 was the movement established in Nigeria, but it has since gained many followers
and branches all over the country. Talking to the Imams of both the branch in Mushin and in
Agege, it becomes clear that representatives of the movement consider themselves as one of
the major sects in the community. However, much controversy surrounds Ahmadiyya, as
most other Muslim sects do not consider them as Muslim at all due to their belief in another
prophet after Muhammad, who in Islam is considered the last prophet of God.15 In contrast,
followers of Ahmadiyya claim to be the most pious Muslims as they too follow only the
Qur’an and sunna, while rejecting any form of ‘taqlid.16 In Mushin, the Imam assessed his
number of devoted followers around 200, while Imam Abdulsalaam Hakim in Agege believes
the number to be in the thousands in his local mosque. They explain how the Jama’a is very
active in peaceful da’wa activities in their local communities, trying to correct any deviations
from what they believe to be the correct practice of Islam with the intention to convert
Muslims to the Ahmadiyya creed.
These are just a few examples of the diversity within the Islamic field in Lagos. Differing in
creed and in jurisprudence (fiqh), all these movements or denominations share an opposition
to Sufism and what they regard as religious innovations (bid’a) introduced by the
brotherhoods. Taking the form of a discursive struggle, these newcomers actively try to
counter the influence of Sufism while caring less about the differences between themselves.
African Islam is often referred to not only as moderate, but also peaceful in the co-existence
between different Islamic belief systems. Although peaceful co-existence is still prevalent, it
seems that internal hostility is increasing between different Islamic doctrines with particularly
Sufi brotherhoods on one side and more orthodox and radical Ahl al-Sunna including Salafis
on the other. Talking to Imams from different denominations, it is evident that in several
neighbourhoods in Lagos a discursive battle takes place between the ‘ulama (producers of
religion) through activities such as da’wa and public lectures. From a consumer perspective, a
struggle is indeed also present as illustrated by the main online debate forum for Islamic
issues, Nairaland, where Muslims clearly show a curiosity for and knowledge of diverse
interpretations of Islam, leading to fierce debate between users. Interestingly, when looking
more closely into this struggle for determination of ‘correct Islam’, it becomes clear that
15
Author’s interviews with Salafi Sheikhs KamoladdeenJuma’a (Lagos, August 27, 2013) and AbdulhameedSalahudeen
(Lagos, September 1, 2013), and with the Executive Secretary of WAMY Nigeria, El-ShamiNoshy Ali (Lagos, August
26, 2013).
16
Author’s interview with Imam Abdulsalaam Hakim (Lagos, September 3, 2013).
27
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
strategies differ from one side to the other. Sufis, that being mainly Tijaniyya, have for
centuries found themselves in a dominant position in the Nigerian society and probably as a
result they simple try to keep status quo by avoiding any controversial statements regarding
other sects and try to downplay any problems or differences among Islamic groups. Adherents
of Ahmadiyya, Tablighi, Ahl al-Sunna, and Salafism are much more hostile in their attitude as
they constantly criticise Sufi practices and stress the need for substantial Islamic education in
order to really understand Islam 17 as particularly Salafis oppose what they define Sufi
deviations and the intermediary role of the marabout. These attacks on Sufism are conscious
attempts to restructure the Islamic field among the producers of religion through emphasising
particular capitals as essential for Islamic knowledge with the intention of influencing the
religious inclination and religious habitus of what Bourdieu refers to as the laity. Put into the
framework of Bourdieu, it could be stated that different doctrines within Islam try to reinforce
the symbolic force of their religious interpretation and practice in the social structure.18 It thus
becomes a process of legitimation of a particular religious practice in society.
Whereas the presence and well-established character of these different sects is certain, the
presence of Shiism is much more complex to assess. Prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution in
Iran it has generally been the perception that the number of Shias in Nigeria as elsewhere in
Sub-Saharan Africa was close to none. However, the revolution by Khomeini changed the
situation as particularly the revolutionary character of the events if not the doctrine itself
attracted Nigerian Muslims. Initially after the revolution the number of Nigerian Muslims
converting to Shiism has been understood to be rather significant as this trend of conversion,
which was regarded as a threat by Sunnis, enjoyed substantial backing from the Iranian
religious and political establishment. 19 Due to this perceived threat and because the
denomination is an small – but increasing – minority in Nigerian, Shias have been
continuously oppressed making it more convenient for Shias to hide their true religious
identity (taqiyya). Hence, assessing the number of Shias in Lagos and their actual influence
within the Islamic field is a complex matter, which I consider more carefully in a separate
section. At this stage, it is sufficient to state that proponents of Shiism in a Nigerian context
have tried vigorously to influence the Islamic field since the early 1980s and that foreign
support has been integral to these efforts.
From a structural perspective, the emerging pluralism and radicalisation is not surprising.
Backed by Gilles Kepel, Kane has argued in the context of Egypt how rapid urbanisation and
few livelihood options for the population led to increasing appeal of radical Islamist
movements. 20 Considering Lagos from this perspective, it is obvious that Lagos has the
structural conditions that could lead to increasing puritanism too. Hence, with a focus on
particularly Salafism and Shiism and the role of external actors Saudi Arabia and Iran, I will
elaborate on attempts of structural transformation of the Islamic field in the following
sections introducing brief case studies while applying theoretical notions.
17
Author’s interviews with Imams from the Salafi movements Ahl al-Sunna wal-Jama’a (Lagos, August 27, 2013, Idi
Araba Community Mosque (August 30, 2013), and Monar Islamic Reformative Movement (Lagos, September 1, 2013)
illustrate this hostility.
18
Bourdieu, ’Genesis and structure of the religious field’, p. 15.
19
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, and AbiodunAlao, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria –
Country Report’, King’s College.
20
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 16 and p. 249.
28
CHAPTER 3
THE EMERGENCE OF SALAFI DOCTRINE
The Salafi doctrine much associated with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been present in
Nigeria for several decades, but its introduction to the southern part of the country is rather
new. As explained, Salafism has attracted worldwide attention in recent years due to its strict
literalist creed, owning it labels such as fundamentalist and extremist. Associated to terror and
jihadism, the spread of the Salafi doctrine has been feared by international actors and,
particularly since Osama bin Laden’s statement February 11 2003 that Nigeria was one of the
nations qualified for an Islamic revolution,21 the prominence of Salafis in Nigeria has been a
focus of international scholars and policy makers.
As briefly explained above, the introduction of a Salafi creed in modern Nigeria is closely
linked to the person of Abubakar Gumi and the Izala movement in the north. Although
members of the organisation preferred to identify themselves as Izala rather than Salafi, they
clearly admit that they followed the Salafi path. Due to their importance for the rise of a Salafi
doctrine in Nigeria, Gumi and Izala require brief descriptions. A cleric of piety, Gumi
managed to rise to the top of both the religious and the political sphere in northern states.
During the prominence of Ahmadu Bello, Gumi became the Grand Khadi (Islamic judge) in
the north making him central to the interpretation of shari’a. Due to his fluency in Arabic, he
became the liaison with Saudi clerics and institutions and he later translated the Qur’an to
Hausa language, which naturally increased its local popularity. Emphasising his importance, he
was awarded the King Faisal International Prize for his ‘services to islam’.22 However, Gumi
was indeed also a controversial figure despite his popularity as he constantly challenged Sufi
practices in the Nigerian society. Through his teaching and public debates, he started
discursive conflicts with the dominant Sufi brotherhoods and thus he should be regarded as
the initiator of religious radicalisation in northern Nigeria. Although Gumi was never directly
affiliated with Izala, he was from the beginning the patron of the movement.23 Established in
1978 in the city of Jos, Izala has grown into the potentially most popular movement in
northern Nigeria. In his exhaustive study of the movement, Kane argues that based on
external doctrinal inspiration, Izala followers became ‘actors of social change’, not accepting
traditional Sufi practices and their hierarchical structure with the marabout in the top, even
considering Sufism as heresy.24 Izala has been particularly successful in attracting young and
educated northerners, whose religious habitus has not been steeped in traditional Sufi
doctrine. 25 Interestingly, exactly the same patterns are now taking place in Lagos, as my
research will reveal in the following sections. Despite popular support, the Izala leadership
was co-opted in the early 1990s through government engagement as the movement was
regarded a threat, but this formal failure did not eradicate support for the doctrine. In 2011,
21
In his statement, Osama bin Laden listed Nigeria among the six nations (along with Jordon, Morocco, Pakistan, Yemen
and Saudi Arabia) most qualified for "liberation" from unjust and renegade rulers, through jihad (See Douglas Farah,
‘Nigeria and the Muslim Brotherhood’).
22
International Crisis Group, ‘Northern Nigeria: Background to Conflict’, Africa Report N°168 – 20 December 2010.
23
See Gumi’s biography, Where I stand (Spectrum, 2008).
24
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria.
25
Alao, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria – Country Report’.
29
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
the Izala leadership managed to unite once again thus symbolising the strength of its social
embeddedness.26
Gumi’s dead in 1992 and the co-optation of the Izala leadership did not mean Salafi doctrine
disappeared in the north as several popular Salafi sheikhs have managed to make the literalist
doctrine more popular than ever. AminudeenAbubakar, 27 AbubakarMujahid, Sheikh Bin
Uthman in Kano, and the late Sheikh Ja’far Mahmoud Adam are vivid examples of popular
Salafis, all widely followed in the north.28 Their lectures on ‘aqida are flourishing in cities like
Kano, Zaria, and Jos where the legacy of Gumi is still evident. The prominence of Salafi
doctrine has even become so prominent in Kano and its surroundings that it would be fair to
say that the majority in the city’s Muslims identify themselves either as Izala or Salafi. Hence,
the Izala movement characterises the first step of the presence of the Salafi doctrine in
Nigeria. In contrast to what is stated in most literature on Islam in Nigeria, the Salafi doctrine
is no longer exclusively a phenomenon of the north. However, as I will claim, the Salafi creed
has during the last decade or two gained many followers in Lagos. However, one difference
seems to exist between the Salafi blossoming in the north and in Lagos as the former was
much inspired by external actors mainly from Saudi Arabia and Yemen due to the role of
Gumi, while the latter seems to be much more inspired by domestic religious actors from the
north. Nonetheless, the popularity of Sheikh-al-Islam, ibn Taymiyyah, his rejection of taqlid,
and a strong focus on tawhid are gaining prominence. To illustrate the increasing prominence
of the Salafi doctrine in Lagos, three case studies will be presented.
In the heart of Lagos Island, not far from the great central mosque of Lagos and the Muslimdominated bazaar, one finds the office of the group Ahl al-Sunna wal-Jama’a. Located in
primitive surroundings, the group claims to follow only the Qur’an and sunna identifying
themselves as Salafis in ‘aqida.29 All with long beard, shaved moustache and dressed in anklelong thawb, as is typical Salafi appearance, they focus on da’wa and social development in the
local community. As central Lagos Island is mainly populated by Muslims, their focus is not
conversion of people to Islam but rather to correct what they define as ‘the deviating
behaviour of Muslims and alleviate innovation’ which is a clear reference to Sufi practises.30
Such ‘corrections’ happen through lectures on creed, discussion circles on the Islamic value
system and training in fiqh, where they strongly condemn taqlid of any madhhab, which
clearly distinguishes them from the Wahhabi trend following the Hanbali madhhab.
Describing local Shias, their rhetoric becomes even more fierce as one refer to the Shia
doctrine as ‘infected’, while another tells that he ‘once saved a friend form Shiism’ thus
showing clear examples of vilification. Besides their religious training in religious schools
(madāris), most of them are university graduates and they stress the importance of their
26
Andrea Brigaglia, ’A Contribution to the History of the Wahhabi Da’wa in West Africa: The Career and the Murder of
ShaykhJa’far Mahmoud Adam (Daura, ca. 1961/1962–Kano 2007)’. Islamic Africa, VOL. 3, NO. 1 (2012).
27
Initially inspired by the doctrine of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sheikh AminudeenAbubakar adopted the Salafi-inspired
creed of Abubakar Gumi and got close to the Saudi religious establishment. This connection is indicated by the funding
he received from the Dar al-Ifta, a religious body led by Bin Baz, in addition to funding from the Kuwaiti Ministry of
Religious Endowments; Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, pp. 76-78.
28
An example of their popularity, Sheikh Aminudeen and Sheikh bin Uthman give weekly-televised lectures in English,
which are much followed.
29
Author’s interview with the administrative coordinator of the ASWJ group, KamoladdeenJumu’a (Lagos, August 27,
2013).
30
For more elaboration of Salafi condemnation of Sufi practices, see Alexander Knysh, ‘Contextualizing the Salafi – Sufi
conflict (from the Northern Caucasus to Hadramawt)’, Middle Eastern Studies, 43:4 (2007) pp. 503-530.
30
CHAPTER 3
continued education in the realisation of the ‘correct Islamic path’. Typical of most Salafis in
the southwest, they identify their doctrinal inspiration as national rather than international,
emphasising the importance of some 1992 lectures by the Salafi Sheikh QamarudeenJuma’a
for their personal religious transformation from Sufism to Salafism, although they
continuously mention their great admiration for the wisdom of ibn Taymiyyah. Much in line
with the purist tradition of Sheikh Nasir al-Din al-Albani,31 they regard religion as a private
matter and thus detached from the political sphere. The group argue that their followers
number in the thousands, constantly rising at the expense of the Sufi brotherhoods. To
exemplify this new dominance of stricter Islamic doctrine, they tell that most mosques in
Lagos have changed the time of Salat so that it is now in accordance with hadith, whereas
before it was on fixed times thus disregarding the changing length of the day. Despite denying
that they are funded externally and only receive financial support from the local community,
they reveal that the office we are sitting in including the numerous books particular on the
topic of ‘aqida and their pamphlets are provided by a Saudi patron from Medina.
Moving west to the neighbourhood of Idi Araba, one finds the Idi Araba Community Mosque led
by Imam Mohammad Salis. Appearing like a typical Salafi, the imam without hesitation
defines himself as a ‘radical Salafi’ who ‘follows only the Qur’an and sunna as done by the
Sahabah’.32 Like the Salafis on Lagos Island, Mohammad Salis’ focus is on Sufi deviations like
the celebration of the birthday of the Prophet (mawlud) and the use of charms, which he
lectures about for an increasingly large audience in the mosque. During jumuah, he explains,
several thousands attend prayer. In contrast to most other Salafi movements though, the Idi
Araba community is registered under the Izala name, which only emphasises their Salafi
identity. Just next to mosque is a madrasah, where they educate the local youth in the Salafi
doctrine thus making it a centre for diffusion of Salafism. Their experience from the local
community is that the popularity of the Salafi creed is increasing, particularly in the
neighbourhood of Idi Araba, which despite its large Tijaniyya mosque is known for the
prominence of more radical interpretations. Mohammad Salis explains that he was introduced
to Salafism himself during his studies in Ghana and he links this religious conversion with his
increasing level of schooling as it made him able to critically read Islamic literature hence
discovering ‘the true path of the Sahabah’.
Moving further west to the suburb of Egbe, the Monar Islamic Reformative Movement is found in a
newly established mosque. Still very much in its infancy, the reform movement also adheres to
a Salafi creed with imam AbdulhameedSalahudeen explicitly stating their objective to ‘revert
their lifestyle back to the Prophet and the Sahabah’. 33 Imam Salahudeen explains how his
trajectory towards Salafism has been shaped by the reading of both national and Saudi Salafi
theologians 34 in addition to his religious studies in Ile-Ife and Ilorin, where he followed
courses taught by sheikhs from Medina, which heavily inspired him. Being less than a year old,
the movement has only a core following of approximately 25, but the interest from the local
31
Stéphane Lacroix, ’Between Revolution and Apoliticism: Nasir al-Din al-Albani and his Impact on the Shaping of
Contemporary Salafism’, in Global Salafism: Islam’s New Religious Movement, ed. Roel Meijer (London: Hurst, 2009),
pp. 58-80.
32
Author’s interview with Sheikh Mohammad Salis (Lagos, August 30, 2013).
33
Author’s interview with Imam AbdulhameedSalahudeen (Lagos, September 1, 2013).
34
Of national sheikhs he mentions Abubakar Gumi and AminudeenAbubakar while the Saudis include classics such as
ibn Taymiyyah, Muhammad ibn al-Uthaymin and ibn Baz.
31
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
community of Muslims increases through a ‘desire to learn more about Islam’. The low
number is somehow misleading though as the core followers are actively participating in
proselytising the Salafi doctrine in their local environment. Believing in the necessity of
education to understand Islam, the imam has been writing several books to educate people
with two of them dealing with the deviations of Sufi practices and ideology and one on the
wrong path of Shiism.
Another neighbourhood where Salafism is prominent is Agege in the north of town, where
one of the city’s biggest Salafiyya mosques is located. Since the arrest of suspected Boko
Haram members in Agege in early 2013 suspicion has arisen towards non-local actors showing
interest in the more radical segments and thus all attempts to talk to people were refused.35
Through local assistance though, I managed to get to know that the mosque is primarily
visited by Hausa people, has a core following in the range of 500-600, and teaches courses on
tafsir and ‘aqida. Discussing the matter with the imam of the local Ahmadiyya mosque, the
conclusion of Salafi dominance in Agege was confirmed and when considered the Salafi
animosity towards Ahmadiyya, I believe the validity of such assessment.36
Furthermore, the Muslim Student Society of Nigeria (MSSN) needs to be mentioned in this
context. Although MSSN executives themselves claim that the organisation is far from the
radicalism of the Salafi creed, history illustrates differently as the major trends of Nigerian
radicalism emerged in the auspices of the MSSN.37 With more than 500.000 members, the
student organisation covers most if not all Islamic sects in Nigeria. With a strong political
focus not least through the publication of the newspaper Al-Fahm (the Understanding), I
believe it is fair to say that the MSSN is the closest you get to a Muslim Brotherhood-like
organisation in Nigeria as the organisation gave rise to an institutionalised Islamism. As this
would be in contradiction to a Salafi presence within the organisation due to rivalry and even
animosity between the two groups, it seems like the doctrinal diversity does exist. The
administrative secretary of the Lagos branch, Ghazali Yusuf, explained that radical elements
certainly do exist within the movement, which is not surprising considered the relatively high
educational level of their members – a point that I will elaborate on in a later section.38 Again
to no surprise, Yusuf explains how Salafi tendencies are found particularly among students,
who participate in the organisation’s courses on tawhid and among those who the MSSN
sends to the King Fahd University in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, for study exchanges. In general,
however, Salafi youth prefer not to be members of the MSSN as it is not ‘convenient for
them’ since the organisation has a practice of reporting radicals to school authorities.39
To sum up, the previous paragraphs have sought to establish prove of a Salafi presence in
Lagos contradicting hitherto scholarly claims that Lagos is heavily dominated by Sufism. From
35
ChiemelieEzeobi, ‘Suspected Boko Haram Members Arrested in Lagos’.
Interview with Imam Abdulsalaam Hakim (Lagos, September 3, 2013). Salafis do not regard the Ahmadiyya sect as
part of the Muslim ummah due to the Ahmadiyya belief in the coming of a new prophet.
37
Particularly two personalities are important in this regard. First, Sheikh AminudeenAbubakar, a prominent figure
within the MSSN and later the found of the radical Da’wa Group. Close to the Saudi religious establishment and the Dar
al-Ifta, he propagated a Salafi-inspired doctrine much in line with Abubakar Gumi. Second is Sheikh Ibrahim Zakzaky,
who initially was part of the MSSN before turning to Shiism and creating the IMN; See Kane, Muslim modernity in
postcolonial Nigeria, pp. 73-81.
38
Author’s interview with Ghazali Yusuf, administrative secretary of MSSN Lagos branch (Lagos, August 21, 2013).
39
Ibid.
36
32
CHAPTER 3
all Salafis I met, a consistency appeared in their explicit animosity towards Sufis and Shias, in
the importance they ascribe to education, in their focus on religious issues rather than
political, and in their assessment of the increasing popularity of Salafism. Salafi ‘ulama clearly
challenges local perceptions of Islam through their strict adherence to a literalist approach,
which one easy becomes aware of in their appearance and how they reference to sacred
sources.
SAUDI INSPIRATION AND INTERFERENCE
Being the heartland of Salafism, it becomes pertinent to consider the degree of Saudi influence
on the development of Salafism in Lagos. My argument is that Saudi influence and
interference is taking place, but that it is happening through subtle methods and indirect
relations. Hence, I do neither claim nor believe that this influence is only taking place on a
state level through official Saudi channels, but rather through sub-state interaction of various
characters.
Relations between Saudi religious actors and Nigerian Muslims are not new phenomena
though. In the north such relations have been present for decades, indeed assisting Muslims
with Salafi inclination to gain prominence both individually and structurally. Examples count
Saudi donations to the building of mosques in the 1960s, 40 Saudi financial support to the
Jama’atuNasril Islamiyya established by Ahmadu Bello, and Saudi distributed books. 41 Of
more recent incidents are the funding of the Nigerian Taliban, which later turned into Boko
Haram, by the Saudi NGO al-Muntada al-Islami,42 who also funded the northern-based group
Al Sunna walJamma43 through the local al-Muntada al-Islami leader Sheikh MuhiddinAbdullahi,
a Sudanese national. 44 This relation is further personified through the statement of Sheikh
AminudeenAbubakar, a beneficiary of Saudi Arabia, who said ‘those who label me a Wahhabi
are right, those who say I am a supporter of Izala are right. I have come to understand that
Iran is not a Muslim country and that Ayatollah Khomeiny is a demagogue’.45
The fact that Saudi actors are engaged in exerting their influence in southwestern Lagos has
been much less documented though and is thus of an uncertain character. Madawi al-Rasheed
has stated that Salafi literature and Saudi sponsored Islamic education centres have been
found in Lagos46 and this is indeed in accordance with my own observations. Visiting the
neighbourhoods of Mushin and Oshodi, where most Islamic bookstores are located, it
becomes evident that Salafi literature is easily available. Besides Muhammad al-Wahhab’sKitab
40
Paden, Ahmadu Bello, p. 543.
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 83 and p. 127.
42
Alao, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria – Country Report’, p. 21. According to Dr. Andrea Brigaglia, alMuntada al-Islami was founded by Muhammad Surer, who although not being Saudi himself, lived in Saudi Arabia for
many years and follow a Salafist creed, while stressing an activist manhaj, see Andrea Brigaglia, ‘Ja‘far Mahmoud
Adam, Mohammed Yusuf and Al-Muntada Islamic Trust: Reflections on the Genesis of the Boko Haram phenomenon in
Nigeria’, ARIA Annual Review of Islam in Africa Issue, No. 1 (2012), Centre for Contemporary Islam University of Cape
Town, pp. 39-40.
43
The group was established by graduates of the Islamic University in Medina and principally devoted to teaching and
implementing Wahhabi doctrine (See Ibid., p. 37).
44
Elizabeth Kendal, ‘Nigeria: Investigating Wahhabi Insurrection and Saudi Funds’, Assist News Service, February 26,
2004: http://www.assistnews.net/Stories/2004/s04020098.htm. The Almundata Al-Islam Foundation is characterised as a
charity that builds new mosques in Nigeria (42 just in Kano), promotes Wahhabism and being funded by wealthy Saudis.
45
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 79.
46
Al Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi state, p. 127.
41
33
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
al-Tawhid, I found books Saudi published books on ‘aqida such as The Fundamentals of Tawhid
by Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips and Islamic Creed based on the Qur’an and Sunna by Muhammad
bin JamilZino.47 In line with al-Wahhab’s classic, the objective of the latter two is through the
presentation of hadiths to outline the correct Islamic creed as understood by Salafis. This
include systematic refusal of many of the practices traditionally followed by Sufis including
celebration of mawlud, how to pray correctly, and the use of charms and amulets. At the
bookshops, sermons and lectures are plentiful both by Saudi and Saudi-educated Salafis. As all
Saudi sermons are in Arabic, their influence in a society like Lagos is probably not too
substantial as full proficiency in Arabic is relatively rare. Thus, sermons by Nigerian Salafis in
either Yoruba or Hausa or by foreigners like the Indian ZakirAbdulkarimNaik or the
American-born Sheikh Abdullah Hakim Quick in English are probably more influential in
spreading the Salafi discourse. Although not part of Salafi literature, radical Islamist writing
like Sayyid Qutb’sMilestones is also available, thus probably assisting in priming local
perceptions for more radical Islamic literature.
Another interesting institution is the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi NGO
established in 1972 with the Lagos office opening three years later. Fully financed by the head
office in Saudi Arabia, WAMY is considered ideologically linked to the Saudi religious
doctrine. Although three Egyptians lead the WAMY office in Lagos, the objectives of the
organisation are nevertheless coming from Saudi Arabia and their creed is Salafi-inclined
although some Muslim Brotherhood sentiments are present too.48 Thus, the fact that WAMY
funds the building of mosques, the establishment of religious schools, and provides Islamic
education is potentially a great source of Saudi influence on social practices among the youth.
So far more than 100 mosques have been built and more than 10,000 copies of the Qur’an
and Islamic textbooks including works and fatwas by al-Uthaymin and ibn Baz. Furthermore,
WAMY also arranges for approximately 75 students per year to go to Saudi universities for
further studies.
In addition to funding through organisations like WAMY, more direct funding also takes
place. However, such practices are generally not admitted and happen in secrecy. While Salafis
rarely acknowledge any external funding, other sects and denominations feel assured that
financial support from Saudi actors is widespread. 49 As such discursive reactions are what
could be expected, one should be careful when analysing them. However, since such practices
have been prevalent in northern Nigeria, where Salafi sheikhs have received funding, such
practices should be considered likely too in Lagos although is surely happens on a lesser scale.
A more direct interaction between Saudi religious actors and Muslims in Lagos occurs during
hajj. Estimating the doctrinal influence of these visits to Mecca and Medina is almost
impossible, but according to Paden ‘the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, undertaken by Muslims
from around the world, and various educational links with Saudi Arabia have had enormous
47
Although none of them are Saudi nationals, Bilal Philips a Jamaican and JamilZino from Syria, the former has studied
extensively in Medina and in Riyadh while the latter taught in the Grand Mosque and in Dar-ul-Hadith al-khairiyah both
of them in Mecca. Furthermore, both books have been published by Saudi publication houses, which are Tawheed
Publications Riyadh and Maktaba Dar-us-Islam respectively.
48
Author’s interview with El-ShamiNoshy Ali (Lagos, August 28, 2013). El-Shami explains that they do not follow any
madhhab and he is fierce in his critique of the deviating path of both Sufis and Ahmadiyya.
49
During interviews, Ahmadiyya and Shia imams explained that they are confident Saudi funding is taking place.
34
CHAPTER 3
influence on Nigerian Muslim perspectives in recent years’.50 Though covered in uncertainty
such statement does sound plausible as visits of often three to four weeks entailing numerous
encounters with Saudi religious practices and the religious legitimacy such practices are
steeped in do set a context for doctrinal influence.51
THE ROLE OF SHIISM AND THE RELATION TO IRAN
Turning to Shiism, it becomes evident that in Nigeria as a whole the trajectory of Shiism
differs much from that of any other Islamic sect. Before 1979 it is generally believed that
Shiism had no followers in Nigeria, but as happened many places in the world, the Iranian
Revolution led to an increase in Muslims converting to Shiism, which nevertheless still
constitutes an extreme minority. Assessing numbers in situations like this is always carrying
much uncertainty and this is no less the case in the context of Nigeria as many of the so-called
Shia should in fact be defined as political Shias or Khomeinists52rather than Shia in doctrine.53
Based on estimations by scholars and Nigerian Shias themselves, the number is believed to be
in the range of three to five million making it a clear but still substantial minority.54 Despite
the relative number of Shias was low, the increasing conversion during the 1980s influenced
the Islamic field in Nigeria by bringing in new religious discourses both regarding doctrine and
politics. Particularly the latter gained prominence within the field as it helped change the
Islamic awareness to include political issues more explicitly by stressing the revolutionary
legitimacy of Iranian events.
Like Salafism, the Shia centre in Nigeria is in the north and more exactly around Zaria in
Kaduna state as this is the stronghold of the main Shia organisation the Islamic Movement in
Nigeria (IMN). Led by Imam Ibrahim Zakzaky, the IMN takes its roots in Sunni radicalism
and the Iranian Revolution. A prominent member of the MSSN in the north, Zakzaky initially
established the Nigerian Muslim Brothers with a revolutionary objective much inspired by Sayyid
Qutb and his concept of Jahiliyya (ignorance) and the revolutionary discourse of Khomeini. In
fact Milestones by Qutb was mandatory reading for members of the group, which helped infuse
an idealistic ideology into the group.55 However, in the aftermath of the revolution Imam
Zakzaky started to adopt the Shia doctrine and after a visit in 1980 to the now Islamic
Republic of Iran, he initiated a campaign of Shia propagation at Nigerian universities.56 This
led to a split within the Muslim Brothers and the creation of the IMN, as some members
could not support the Shia doctrine as they only subscribed to ideals of Islamic revolution.
This division represents the historical split between political Shiism and religious Shiism in
Nigeria. Since then, the IMN has grown into Africa’s largest Shia movement, managing more
50
Paden, Muslim civic cultures and conflict resolution, p. 14.
The 2012 issue regarding 1,000 Nigerian female pilgrims shows that hajj can also be a potential source of controversy
between the two countries although this is probably more influential on a state level as explained by Alexander Thurston
in ’To Hajj Without an Escort’, the Revealer, October 16 2012.
52
Jacob Zenn, ‘The Islamic Movement and Iranian Intelligence Activities in Nigeria’, CTC Sentinel, October 2013, Vol.
6, Issue 10, p. 13.
53
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 97.
54
Shireen Hunter, Iran's foreign policy in the post-Soviet era: resisting the new international order (Santa Barbara, Calif:
Praeger, 2010) and author’s interview with the representative of the IMN in Lagos, Ilorin and Ibadan, Imam Miftah
(Lagos, September 11, 2013).
55
Alao, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria – Country Report’. Interestingly, Milestones is still found in
many Islamic bookshops in Lagos hinting at an interest in radical Sunni literature.
56
Zenn, ‘The Islamic Movement and Iranian Intelligence Activities in Nigeria’, p. 14.
51
35
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
than 300 Islamic schools, known as Fudiyyah, nation-wide and being capable of rallying more
than a million people to religious events like Ashura (the commemoration of Hussein’s
martyrdom in Karbala), where former and current Shia leaders Khomeini, Khamenei, and
Hezbollah-leader Hassan Nasrallah are being revered. This stresses an important fact, that
members of the IMN are in fact following Ali Khamenei as their marja al-taqlid (source of
imitation)and not Ayatollah Ali Sistani in Najaf, who traditionally has been the preferred marja
outside of Iran.57 That Shia doctrine indeed has gained popularity in Nigeria is illustrated by
the numerous videos on YouTube showing Ashura processions with people dressed in black
engaged in dancing and flagellation.
As could be expected, the IMN is clearly less prominent in the south including Lagos than in
the north. According to Imam Miftah, who is the representative of the movement in Lagos,
Ibadan, and Ilorin, one reason for this difference is that Shias in Lagos do not feel
comfortable explicitly following Shia doctrine due to fears of persecution. Because of this,
Shias practice taqiyya that is concealing their true religious identity from the Sunni majority.
Lately it has been the objective of IMN though to strengthen activities in and around Lagos in
order to improve religious conditions for their followers through activities such as debating
tafsir, the reading of hadith, and the celebration of religious events, while also assisting
students getting to Qom to study Shia doctrine. Since Shias in Lagos practice taqiyya, it is
neither possible to identify them through appearance nor practice in public areas, which
makes conclusions regarding popularity, geographical domination, and actual influence very
challenging. The impression of most of the Sunni imams I spoke to was that initially (right
after the revolution in Iran) there was many Shias in Lagos, but that their number has
decreased during the last decade.58 Whether this is due to Shias hiding their religious identity
or because of increasingly nuanced perception of differences between political Shiism and
doctrinal Shiism seems impossible to answer. Geographically, the neighbourhood of Apapa,
which is an enclave of Lebanese diaspora, could be a potential ‘Shia centre’ in Lagos. Mara
Leichtman, who has studied the Lebanese diaspora in Senegal extensively, claims that
Lebanese immigrants in West Africa are almost exclusively Shia, but that their doctrine is
characterised by a general lack of religious knowledge, which entails confusion about the
correct practice of doctrine and rituals.59 Although not entirely clear, such conclusions are
assumed to be valid in the case of Nigeria too.
As already mentioned, Nigerian Shias have Iran as their main source of doctrinal influence.
However, history and current events show that this relationship is more complex and
potentially more pronounced than hitherto believed. In an article in the CTC Sentinel Jacob
Zenn argues that there is nowhere outside the Middle East where Iranian ideology has a
stronger impact than in Nigeria and an un-named Iranian diplomat even refers to the IMN as
an ‘Iranian proxy’.60 Describing the relationship between Iran and Nigerian Shias, one has to
start with the Iranian Embassy in Nigeria, as the embassy has been the historical cornerstone
for Iranian engagement. Right after the revolution, books and folders were handed out to the
57
The other identifiable Shia movement in Nigeria is called the RasululA’azam Foundation and follows Ali Sistani, Ibid.,
p. 13.
58
Based on interviews with several Sufi and Salafi imams in Lagos.
59
Mara Leichtman, ‘Migration, War, and the Making of a Transnational Lebanese Shi’i Community in Senegal’,
International Journal of Middle East Studies, No. 42 (2010).
60
Zenn, ‘The Islamic Movement and Iranian Intelligence Activities in Nigeria’, pp. 13-14.
36
CHAPTER 3
public and according to Imam Miftah of the IMN, such practices continue to present day.
Furthermore, the IMN has continuously been financed by Iranian sources, while also
publication of Islamic newspapers and magazines have been funded by Iran. 61 It has even
been argued that Iran has provided economic, organisational, and propaganda support for Sufi
brotherhoods with the objective of countering the increasing popularity of Salafi inclinations,
which clearly indicates less hostility of Shias towards Sufis than is the case with Salafis.62 Just
the attitude of Imam Zakzaky himself is telling. On YouTube one can find videos from
conferences, where the imam is praising Khomeini and Khamenei and his regular visits to Iran
– last year he visited the holy cities of Qom and Mashhad for instance – illustrates his close
relations to the Iranian clerical regime. And much in line with Iran, the IMN has even its own
paramilitary guards called the hurras imitating the organisational setup of Hezbollah.63
Of more recent occurrence, two events are striking in the narrative of the relationship
between Iran and Nigerian Shias. In October 2010, custom officials in Lagos seized 13
containers of weapons being shipped from a Teheran-based company owned by the Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps, an institution close to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, destined for
Nigerians with affiliation to the Quds forces. In February 2013, Nigerian forces uncovered an
‘Iranian-funded cell whose leader admitted to plotting attacks on prominent Nigerians to
unsettle the West’ with the Saudi ambassador to Nigeria being one of the targets. The leader
of the cell was identified as a Shia imam, who studied in Qom at the Imam Khomeini
University back in 2006, while receiving military training in Iran in 2011.64 On a state-level,
relations between the two states have been improving lately as well as indicated by the signing
of several bilateral agreements in August 2012 covering electricity, agriculture, and education.
Furthermore, both states are members of the Developing Eight, which is a group of Islamic
countries working for increased economic collaboration.65
Despite the lacking studies of Shiism in Nigeria in general and in Lagos in particular, the
assumption that they only constitute a small minority is correct. However, it could be argued
though that the actual influence of Shiism – politically rather than religiously – is more
significant than one would think. As the IMN emerged from the ranks of the MSSN and
developed among the educated class, members now include central people in politics, in
business, and in media thus placing them in positions of great influence.66 The introduction of
Shiism in Nigeria and in Lagos post-1979 has without a doubt affected the Islamic field as
both the political revolutionary aspect and the Shia doctrine have influenced Islamic discourse
in the sense of broadening the perception of what Islam is and how it is practiced and by
constituting a legitimate alternative to Sunnism. Nonetheless, the influence whether of
religious or political character of Shias in Lagos should not be overstated as their social
presence and influence has been rather limited. Events in recent years though could be an
61
See Paden, Faith and politics in Nigeria, p. 35 and Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, p. 78.
Irit Back, ‘Iran and Nigeria: Friendship or Rivalry?’,The Alliance Centre for Iranian Studies - Iran Pulse, No. 54, 14
January 2013.
63
Zenn, ‘The Islamic Movement and Iranian Intelligence Activities in Nigeria’.
64
Ibid., pp. 16-17.
65
Back, ‘Iran and Nigeria: Friendship or Rivalry?’.
66
Author’s interview with the representative of the IMN in Lagos, Ilorin and Ibadan, Imam Miftah (Lagos, September 11,
2013).
62
37
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
indication of a more prominent Shia presence than generally assumed and a strengthened
Iranian focus on Nigerian Shias to counter the increasing popularity of Salafi discourse.
TRANSFORMATION OF THE ISLAMIC FIELD:
THE IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION
The objective of the previous sections has been to illustrate how the Islamic field in Lagos has
transformed during recent decades with a particular focus on the emergence of Salafi and Shia
doctrines and any potential relations to Saudi and Iranian sources of inspiration. On this basis
the intention of this section is to apply the theoretical framework more explicitly in order to
draw some conclusions. An assumption in Bourdieu’s field theory is that struggles occur
between newcomers and dominant actors. Specifically for newcomers is that they try to
undermine the structure of the socio-religious field or to restructure the field (by breaking
doxa), while actors in general seek to convert specific capitals into what Bourdieu defines as
symbolic capital with the objective of increasing their dominance in the field.67 Based on my
fieldwork and existing literature, I believe these processes have taken place not only in the
north, but also in the south in a city like Lagos thus causing profound changes within the
Muslim community.
In this process, education has been a particularly important factor. When assessing the Islamic
field in Lagos, it becomes evident that its transformation has generally followed the pattern of
the north, where the field changed from the 1970s in an increasingly radicalised direction. As
already mentioned, these changes were spearheaded by the efforts of Abubakar Gumi and the
creation of the Izala movement. Due to his prominent position, Gumi was capable of causing
a politicisation of the Islamic field as political issues and concerns – not least discussions of the
imposition of Shari’a rule – suddenly started to influence a social arena, where religious
considerations traditionally had been the only concern.68 As a result, the Islamic communities
in the north became much more interrelated with both the domestic and the international
political spheres. Additionally, Gumi and Salafi imams after him began to emphasise the
importance of Islamic education as a prerequisite to understand Islam correctly. Education
had not been an issue of particular interest for Tijaniyya and Qadiriyya imams as they preach
strict following of their sheikhs and thus individual knowledge of Islam is of less importance.
In Lagos, politicisation of the Islamic field has been less widespread however. This could
partly be due to the historical situation in the south, where the state has never been involved
in Muslim affairs like has been the case in the north through the Sokoto Caliphate. Hence, the
majority of Salafis in Lagos seem to follow a quietist trend, generally framing their discourse
on a religious level rather than through political references.
Regarding the role of education it is interesting that in all my interviews with Salafis or
Muslims who identify themselves as Ahl al-Sunnawal-Jama’a, conclusions were unequivocal
stating that Islamic education and knowledge is essential to understand the ‘correct Islamic
path’ and that deviating Islamic doctrine as is claimed practiced by Sufis or Shia is due to
lacking knowledge.69 Thus their argument is that an increasing educational level of the public
67
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria, pp. 227-229.
See for instance Alao, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria – Country Report’, p. 56.
69
Such comments are shared by both Salafi and Ahmadiyya imams and by WAMY executives.
68
38
CHAPTER 3
including increasing literacy enables Muslims to critically read and assess Islamic literature by
themselves with the result that they decide to adopt a literalist approach and to follow only the
Qur’an and sunna as legitimate sources. Furthermore, in accordance with statements by Salafi
imams and verified by my own observations, Salafi mosques are predominantly visited by
younger Muslims with many of them being professionals or pursuing a university degree on
the side of their religious education.
This emphasis on religious education to understand Islam by newcomers like Salafis is a clear
example of a challenge to the structure of the field by stressing the importance of new forms
of capital. Thus when Salafi imams preach a doctrine which entails a particular appearance,
particular praying rituals, and the legitimacy of specific Islamic sources over others, while
saying that religious education and knowledge is imperative to understand this ‘correct Islam’,
they try to redefine what sources that should constitute power in the field. This is particularly
interesting since the objective of Sufi sheikhs is rather than to guide their followers than to
teach them. While Sufi sheikhs have traditionally been dependant on aspects of what Bourdieu
calls social capital meaning their family relations, local network, and reputation, then Salafis seek
to empower aspects of cultural capital and particular Islamic education. Furthermore, in the
situation of an uneducated public, as Nigeria certainly is an example of, exercising symbolic
violence – a situation where the laity accepts being subjected to power structures without
realising it – becomes more feasible. Without sufficient knowledge ordinary Muslims
potentially find themselves in a situation not understanding the religious rhetoric of the
educated Imams, but nevertheless they internalise the discourse propagated by the religious
elite. In non-Arab countries, the fact that proficiency in Arabic is often limited to the religious
elite helps strengthen symbolic power relations by increasing the level of esoteric knowledge.
For decades Sufi imams have been in a position where they could exercise symbolic violence,
which has implied a continuously reproduction of power structures within the Islamic field.
Hence, the major objective of Salafi imams is to break this Sufi monopoly to exercise
symbolic violence by propagating the need for Islamic education. Interestingly, while
attempting to do this, Salafis themselves try to increase the level of abstraction by discussing
important theological concepts (such as tawhid and the role of taqlid) and specific theologians,
generally unknown to the public and thus producing relations characterised by symbolic
violence themselves. What Salafis hope for is affecting the religious habitus of Muslims in
Lagos to increase the attractiveness of their doctrine. This however is a much longer process
and probably a greater challenge particularly towards the older generations, whose habitus is
steeped in Sufi practices. Shias on the contrary are not capable of seriously challenging field
structures besides the ‘shock-effect’ caused in the immediate aftermath of the Iranian
Revolution. This impotence is primarily due to their practice of taqiyya and the absence of an
institutional base, which the control of mosques and religious schools would provide, thus
leaving them in a situation without much authority or credibility. In a society so heavily
dominated by Sunnism, some aspects of the theological beliefs of Shias is on the verge of
being outside the field’s doxa.
At the core of these structural challenges to transform the Islamic field is a discursive battle
between the producers of religion with the objectives of defining powerful capital and influencing
the religious habitus. This battle easily takes on a sectarian character. In the context of Lagos,
39
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
this sectarian animosity is mainly caused by aggressive Salafi rhetoric against both Sufis and
Shias. During my interviews with Salafi imams, deviations of Sufi and the ‘wrong path’ of
Shias were constantly pointed out in order to legitimise their own doctrine while some of
them have even authored books on the topic. In a symposium titled Shiism Incursion:
Covetousness and Malevolence, which is sold on DVD throughout Lagos, a Salafi movement
devotes five lectures of 40 minutes duration each to discredit Shia doctrine in fierce language.
The attitude of Shias and Sufis is generally less confrontational with Shias focusing their verbal
attacks on Salafis only while Sufi sheikhs try to downplay the sectarian element. On the
Nairaland forum, discussions between Salafis and Shias are ongoing too where followers of
each sect accuse the other part of religious misinterpretation and hostility. The latest example
is several discussions regarding the permissibility of celebrating mawlud, in which Shias argue
in favour while Salafis vehemently oppose. Interestingly, Shias are using Sahih al-Bukhari and
the example of ibn Taymiyya to critique the Salafi opposition, thus using sources normally
invoked by Salafis. A historical review of the discussions in the forum illustrates that the
number of discussions regarding Shiism, Salafism or internal disagreements have increased
considerable in numbers during the previous year and that the discursive character is
increasingly hostile. These discursive battles are all part of a power struggle between the sects
with the objective of obtaining positions in the field from where they can credibly exercise
their influence on Muslims in Lagos. From the perspective of a struggle for sacred authority, it
is clear that Salafi and Shia followers are constantly praising ingroup intellectuals (most often
ibn Taymiyya in the case of Salafis with Shias invoking Khomeini and the martyrdom of
Hussein), while decredentialing the expertise of rivals.
CONCLUSIVE REMARKS:
THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF THE EDUCATED YOUTH
The analysis of the Islamic community in Lagos has revealed a field transformation from a
state of Sufi monopolisation in the 1960s to a situation characterised by religious pluralism
through the emergence of several Islamic sects. Albeit not being the only newcomers to the
field, the analysis focuses on the presence of Salafi and Shia discourses and potential relations
to Saudi and Iranian actors. From this perspective, two conclusions are of particular interest.
First, based on the fieldwork it was evident that orthodox Sunni and Salafi discourses have
gained much prominence in Lagos at the expense of Sufi brotherhoods. Muslims are
increasingly abandoning the blind following of their Sufi sheikhs, they start to dress
differently, and prayer times have been adjusted in accordance with orthodox practices as
particularly stressed by Salafis. A central factor in this process is the dual role of education,
which has been integral both on a societal basis and from the perspective of changing power
structures within the field.
Societal role: An argument stated by all interviewees except Sufis is the crucial
effect of the improved educational level of the public. Literacy and education
are currently increasing with incredible pace in Lagos, changing the way people
relate to religion as it enables the public or the consumers of religion to read
religious writings themselves. From a situation in the past, where most religious
input came from the mouth of the Sufi imams, Muslims are now to greater
40
CHAPTER 3
extent capable of consuming and critically assess religious literature without any
filter.
Structural role: From a field perspective, education in a religious sense has
been constantly emphasised by Salafis as a requisite for understanding Islam
properly. As Salafis are often well educated and well versed in the Qur’an and
sunna, the emphasis on religious education is an attempt to influence the
hierarchical order of capitals within the field and thus affecting their relative
position of power and credibility. Assessed by debates on forums, it seems
Salafis have been successful in stressing the importance of religious education as
users increasingly use education as an argument to enhance the legitimacy and
authority of statements.
These two perspectives on the role of education, the latter of them so far successfully
managed by Salafis, have been strong factors in the increasing prominence of Salafi doctrine
in Lagos among the youth. This development could likely continue in the future due to four
other circumstances. First, the educational level will only increase during coming decades.
Second, technological development has implied that traditional structures for religious
knowledge have exploded and continuously make religious literature more accessible. Third,
because the ‘price’ of following orthodox Sunni or Salafi doctrine is decreasing as more and
more start to adopt the doctrine70 and, fourth, since the contemporary youth will affect future
young generations through their Salafi-inclined habitus. Based on these circumstances, I
believe the educated Muslim youth is essential in the process of influencing and changing the
Islamic landscape.
The second conclusion is how Salafi and Shia discourses in Lagos have been influenced by
Saudi and Iranian sources.71 Due to limited financial means partly as a result of international
sanctions regime and the minimal presence of Shiism in Lagos, Iranian influence seems much
less prevalent than Saudi influence.
S
audi influence: Doctrinal inspiration appears to be of both direct and indirect
character. Directly through Saudi publications in Lagos’ bookshops, through the
provision of scholarships to study in Saudi Arabia, and interaction during hajj.
Indirectly, it happens through northern-based Salafi sheikhs, who have strong
Saudi links either through educational experiences or financial relations thus
indicating several levels of interaction. From the perspective of funding, again
this seems to happen indirectly through Saudi NGOs, who distributes funds
strategically in the society, and more directly to specific Salafi Sheikhs or
organisations although the latter is of a covert character. While most of such
70
Starting to adhere to a religious interpretation, which differs from the norm will normally come at a cost initially, but
as the doctrine gains support, the ‘price’ is reduced.
71
Although it is not part of the scope of this thesis, it is important to state that Islam and Islamism in Nigeria has been
influenced by other Middle East actors of which particularly Sudan and Egypt have been influential during the 1960s, see
Alexander Thurston, Interactions Between Northern Nigeria and the Arab World in the Twentieth Century, M.A. Thesis
at Georgetown University, April 22 2009.
41
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN LAGOS
funding appears as developmental activities, it certainly has an influence on the
soft power of the provider in religious regards too.
I
ranian influence: The Iranian revolution instigated a process of conversion to
Shiism in Nigeria and has ever since continued to be the source of doctrinal
inspiration as members of the main Shia movement follow Ali Khamenei as
marja al-taqlid. Furthermore, Qom is also the primary destination for Nigerian
Shias to pursue religious studies, while the Iranian Embassy continuously
distribute Shia literature. As recent events have shown, Iranian relations to Shias
in Lagos have been of a clandestine character as the objective has been to
support militant actions. As the main Shia movement in Nigeria, the IMN is the
central source for diffusion of Shiism and thus interaction with Iranian actors
happens mainly through the northern-based organisation. However, as the
limited Shia presence in Lagos indicates, it seems Lagos is not yet ripe for more
substantial adoption of Shia doctrine due to unfavourable opportunity
structures.
42
CHAPTER 4
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
Turning the focus to Cape Town, initially a brief historical introduction to Islam in the
specific context is necessary. The historical trajectory of Islam in South Africa differs much
from how the religion was introduced to most other parts on the continent. Whereas Islam
started to spread to the African continent in the 8th century, it did not reach South Africa
before the 17th century where after the arrival of Muslims can be divided into three periods.1
The first wave started in 1652 when the Dutch East India Company governing South Africa at
the time brought back Indonesian and Malay prisoners to the Cape region. The second wave
took place around 1750 and is characterised by the arrival of large numbers of Indonesian
slaves, while the third wave was initiated with the abolition of slavery in 1838 as the British
created depositories in South Africa for former slaves from around the African continent.
Later from around the 1860s, indentured labourers of Indian origin emigrated to the eastern
province of Natal and later to Transvaal while African Muslims from mainly Eastern Africa
known as Zanzibaris were brought to South Africa to mitigate labour shortage. That the
Muslim community in South Africa developed late compared to other African states is
furthermore stressed by the fact that the first madrasah was established in 1793, while the first
mosque was created five years later in 1798. From the outset, Islam in South Africa and
particular in Cape Town was dominated by Sufism as Sufi sheikhs from Indonesia like Tuan
Guru, who is generally referred to as the ‘founder’ of Islam in South Africa, managed to
spread their doctrine in an environment without much religious contestation. This Sufi
dominance has particularly been the case in Cape Town, regarded as the centre of tasawwuf(can
be translated ‘Islamic spirituality’) tradition in South Africa, where brotherhoods such as
1
Charlotte A. Quinn and Frederick Quinn, Pride, faith, and fear: Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2003).
43
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
Qadiriyya, Alawiyya, and Chistiyya have been present for centuries2 and where practices such as
the visitation of Sufi shrines, the use of talismans and amulets, celebration of mawlud, and
collective prayer to bless the dead have been the normality. In its initial period, Islam also
appeared to appeal much to the indigenous black communities, who were subjected to the
strict rule of Dutch, British, and Afrikaner powers and as a consequence some converted to
Islam. Despite a Sufi monopolisation of Islamic doctrine, ample ethnic diversity existed thus
representing a complex and sociologically diverse community. 3 This trajectory of Islam in
South Africa has implied the influence of different Islamic traditions, which through time has
developed in the particular sociocultural milieu of Cape Town into what scholars have labelled
a ‘local Islam’.4 In an attempt to generalise, it is fair to argue that the vast majority of South
African Muslims are Ash’ari in ‘aqida. In fiqh however, the Shafi’i madhhab has traditionally
been followed in the Cape due to the arrival of Indonesian Muslims, while Indian Muslims in
the eastern part of the country areHanafi.5
Right from the beginning, the Islamic faith has developed within a context of constant
challenges. During colonial rule, law prohibited the practice of non-Christian denominations
why Muslims were forced to follow their religion covertly, which naturally prevented the
development of an Islamic embeddedness in society. In addition, Islam’s late introduction to
Cape Town has implied a lacking tradition of Islamic teaching and a low level of relational
links into the historical centres of Islam in the Middle East and its institutions of Islamic
education. Two interesting processes started in the 19th century, which affected the future
development of Islam in South Africa. First, a demise of African traditional religion and,
second, a decline in legislative restrictions on the public expression of non-Christian religion
causing a proliferation of Muslims institutions in the Cape. 6 During the apartheid era,
governmental attempts were made to counter Muslim unity through the racial groupings
system, which divided Muslims into either ‘coloured’ or ‘Indian’ with the result of reinforcing
already prevalent ethnical divisions. Despite immense structural challenges, Muslims have now
become one of the most significant groups in Cape Town as recent decades have helped
transform the community considerably as will be illustrated in the following sections.7
RELIGION TURNING INCREASINGLY PUBLIC AND PLURALISTIC
For centuries the Cape region had been the epicentre of Sufism in South Africa, but from the
mid-20th century two simultaneous processes started and later on challenged if not changed
this Sufi monopolisation of the Islamic field in Cape Town. While the first process is centred
2
Yunus Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, Annual Review of Islam in Africa, 20082009, No. 10 (2009) p. 23.
3
On a country basis, Islam in South Africa in comprised of indigenous Blacks, Indians, Malays, Indonesians, Arabs, and
East Africans.
4
See for instance Suleiman Dangor, ‘The expression of Islam in South Africa’, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 17:1
(1997) p. 143 or Quinn and Quinn, Pride, Faith, and Fear.
5
Michael Mumisa, ‘Islam and Proselytism in South Africa and Malawi’, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 22:2
(2002) pp. 275-298.
6
See David Chidester, Religions of South Africa (London: Routledge, 1992) and EbrahimMoosa, ‘Islam in South Africa’,
in Living faiths in South Africa,eds. Martin Prozesky and John W. De Gruchy (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995), p.
135.
7
Abdulkhader Tayob, ’Islamism in South Africa’, Al-Mesbar Monthly Book Muslims in South Africa, History, groups
and Politics (2011) p. 3.
44
CHAPTER 4
on an increasing politicisation of the Islamic field, the second concerns the emergence of new
sects to the Cape Islamic landscape.
Although political concerns had been driving Muslim initiatives earlier, its prominence really
started with the establishment of the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) in 1945 and the
engagement of Imam Abdullah Haron in the 1950s. As an organisation of Sunni sheikhs and
imams in the Cape, the MJC had both the objective of influencing religious and social affairs
with the latter necessarily connected to the political sphere. Of equal importance was the role
played by Imam Haron in his anti-apartheid struggles. At the time, religious authority was very
much in the hands of the MJC sheikhs and imams, who dominated the religious scene. This
was reinforced by the symbolic power of the sheikh concept as religious education at foreign
institutions and preferably in the Middle East was a requisite to acquire the title. Although not
being a sheikh, Imam Haron managed to rise to prominence and initiated a process of
empowering the religious youth to counter the dominance of MJC leaders. In 1958 he created
the Claremont Muslim Youth Association, which through its newsletter Islamic Mirror started to
circulate the writings of Pakistani ideologue AbulA’laMawdudi and Sayyid Qutb. This created
the foundation for the emergence of that Tayob refers to as the ‘paradigm of Islamic
resurgence’ in the Cape pioneered by the Muslim Youth Movement (MYM) created in 1970.
Much engaged in the empowerment of Muslims and fighting against the social injustices of
apartheid, the MYM initially tried to impose a stricter interpretation of Islam, which they
considered ‘a way of life’. Although the young and educated MYM leaders later discovered
that their struggle against the established religious elite was too challenging, thus making them
ease their approach and accommodate it to the South African environment, their engagement
was an important step towards increasing politicisation of the Muslim community and a move
towards orthodox Sunnism.8
Simultaneously with this process, the Cape region saw the influx of Deobandi, Tablighi, and
Barelvi doctrines in the 1960s from the Indian-dominated eastern regions, which diversified
the hitherto Sufi centre. The coming of Deobandi and Tablighi doctrine implied an
introduction of stricter interpretations of Islam critical of most Sufi practices, while Barelvis
were less critical of practices such as mawlud and thus more lenient towards Sufism.9 The
Iranian Revolution in Iran caused further diversification with the awareness of Shi’ism and the
establishment of the Ahlul Bait Foundation of South Africa with its headquarter in Cape Town.
However, the greatest change followed the 1994 abolishment of the apartheid system as it
facilitated a structural change within the Islamic field by easing restrictions on religious and
political organisation. One effect of the new system was the emergence of new Sufi
brotherhoods through immigration from around the continent. Hence, brotherhoods such as
Naqshabandiyya, Murabitun, and Tijaniyya became part of the Islamic field in Cape Town and
increased the internal struggle between Sufi brotherhoods to attract followers. 10 However,
another – and probably more critical – outcome was the introduction of Sunni reformist and
later a Salafi discourse propagated initially by Azhari graduates followed by graduates from
Saudi Arabia and Yemen. As explained by prominent Salafi Sheikh FaaikGamieldien, the rise
of these new discourses was accompanied by an increasing Islamic consciousness in general
8
Abdulkhader Tayob, Islamic Resurgence in South Africa, pp. 16-77.
Moosa, Islam in South Africa, p. 146.
10
Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, p. 23.
9
45
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
and the transformation of religion from being a personal matter to suddenly becoming a
public issue.11 Thus as argued by Yunus Dumbe, at the start of the 21st century the Cape
‘Islamic traditions have been influenced by those of southeastern Africa and Indo-Pakistan, as
well as the Middle East’, with the latter as the strongest source of inspiration lately.12
THE EMERGENCE OF SHIISM IN CAPE TOWN
As in the case of Lagos, Shiism emerged in Cape Town in the aftermath of the Iranian
Revolution. While few Capetonians did convert at the outset, Shia influence initially took the
form of an anti-apartheid political struggle through the Qibla movement. The movement,
which was created two years prior to the revolution, has been described a Shia movement by
scholars, however such definition lacks nuances. Probably some members of Qibla had
converted to the Shia doctrine, but it was rather the political discourse of Khomeini that
inspired AchmatCassim, the founder of the movement.13 Thus, it was much more a Muslimstruggle than a Shia-struggle. During the 1980s, the early followers of Shia doctrine assembled
in Jama’at in different parts of the country, where they engaged in activities like Du’aKumayl (a
supplication recited to protect against enemies) every Thursday night. Such organisation and
limited Shia presence continued until 1989, when Ahmad Irvani, an Iranian alim, arranged a
month long educational camp in Harare, Zimbabwe, with the objective of teaching the Shia
doctrine. According to Imam Bashier Rahim of the Ahlul Bait, the camp turned out to be a
success, as it became the beginning of a process of Shia proselytising in South Africa both
verbally and through the circulation of Shia literature.14 In 1991, the Shias in South Africa
became formally organised when MaulanaAftabHaider founded the Ahlul Bait in the auspices
of the global Ahlul Bait movement. Since then, the movement has expanded considerably now
counting 20 Shia centres nationwide with their head office and mosque in the Ottery suburb
of Cape Town. During the 1990s, Iran’s role in promoting the Shia doctrine in South Africa
continued as the Iranian Ambassador, Sharif Mahdawi, lectured on Shia ‘aqida in the evenings
in his private house.15 Despite this clear Iranian relation, members of the Ahlul Bait are free to
choose which marja al-taqlid to follow.
As the major Shia movement in Cape Town and South Africa in general, the Ahlul Bait is an
interesting case study. Placed in the southern suburb of Ottery, the organisation has a mosque,
a library, and a bookshop. Both politically and religiously engaged, they focus on issues such
as economic empowerment of black and coloured communities, minority rights, and
propagating the Shia doctrine. Adopting a non-confrontational stance, Imam Rahim explains
that they only focus on non-Muslims in their da’wa activities, as Sunnis already are Muslims.
As a result, their focus is on black communities, who generally have been following traditional
religious practices now in decline. According to a local Shia, the Ahlul Bait provides bus
services from black and coloured neighbourhoods like Mitchell’s Plain to the mosque in
11
Author’s interview with Sheikh FaaikGamieldien (Cape Town, September 30, 2013).
Yunus Dumbe, ‘The Salafi Praxis of Constructing Religious Identity in Africa: A Comparative Perspective of the
Growth of the Movements in Accra and Cape Town’, Islamic Africa, Vol. 2, No. 2 (2011) pp. 92-93.
13
Author’s interview with AchmatCassim (Cape Town, October 2, 2013). In his article ‘Islamism in South Africa’, Tayob
describes the Qibla movement stating that the movement was founded in 1981 and caused fears among the Sunni ‘ulama
that Shi’ism was on the rise. However, not only is Tayob mistaking about the founding year, which is of relevance due to
the Iranian Revolution, but he is probably also overestimating the Shia character of Qibla.
14
Author’s interview with Imam Bashier Rahim, Ahlul Bait (Cape Town, September 20, 2013).
15
Ibid.
12
46
CHAPTER 4
Ottery in order to facilitate easy access to jumu’ah and other events.16 Attending a jumu’ah at
the mosque, the diversity of the Shia followers was evident both regarding social classes and
ethnicity.17 In regards to the former, it was interesting to see that food was served afterwards
and food rations were handed out to the needy. Based on the sermon delivered by Imam
Rahim on the inequalities in society, it certainly appears as if the Shias try to depict themselves
as supporting the struggle of the poor. There is absolutely no doubt that Shias constitute a
small minority within the Islamic field of Cape Town as they have not managed more than a
slow but steady growth in followers since the 1980s. According to the imam, there are two
reasons for the difficulties in attracting people to the Shia doctrine. First are insufficient
finances, which are essential to establish a strong organisational structure and to organise
events for potential followers, while the second is insecurity about how to engage in the
communities either heavily dominated by Sunnism or other religions. Nonetheless, recent
years have seen a rise in the interest for Shiism, which is illustrated by the high attendance to
the weekly Sunday classes in ‘aqida in another of their centres in the township of Phillipi,
where the limited allowance of 100 people is no longer sufficient.18 Despite being a minority,
the imam stresses that the actual influence of Shias in Cape Town outweighs their numbers –
a situation much similar to the one in Lagos. Many Shias occupy powerful position in regional
politics, which is a result of the educational level among the followers. Furthermore, of the
two Muslim radio stations in the Cape, one of them is Shia-led, which is indeed a significant
resource to spread the Shia message. Finally is the library and bookshop of the Ahlul Bait,
which is the primary source of Shia literature to Capetonian Shi’ites. Among an impressive
collection of works in English, Arabic, and Urdu important works such as Shara’i’ al-Islam Fi
Masa’il al-Halal wal-Haram by Muhaqqiq al-Hilli, an influential 13th century Shia Mujtahid
writing on fiqh, and Adab as-Salat: The Disciplines of the Prayer by Ruhollah Khomeini on the
discipline of praying correctly are available. In addition, one finds biographies of several Shia
Imams, books on Hussein and his martyrdom and more generally on Shia ‘aqida and fiqh.
Interestingly, all books are published and sponsored by Iranian-based publishing houses such
as Ansariyan Publications in Qom and The Institute for Compilation and Publication of Imam Khomeini's
Works.
As an offspring to Ahlul Bait, although still somehow affiliated on an organisational level, is
the Al Jihad group. Led by Imam Abdullah Shafiq, Al Jihad provides a doctrinal alternative to
Ahlul Bait as they have a more strict religious focus and thus the two organisations divide the
Shia community in the Cape. Gaining his religious training in Iran and in Lebanon, Imam
Shafiq has close relations to Shia centres in the Middle East, which represents a strong
doctrinal influence on the movement. As an objective of this thesis is to analyse sources of
Iranian influence, it is striking to see that relations between Iranian institutions and South
African Shi’ites are quite substantial. Besides the 1989 Iranian organised educational camp in
Zimbabwe and the educational role of the Iranian Ambassador to South Africa in the 1990s,
Iranian influence continues to be instrumental in present days. Once a year the Al Mustafa
16
Author’s interview with Khalid Sayed, a Shi’ite and the Chairman of ANC Youth in the Western Cape (Cape Town,
September 19, 2013).
17
The Jumu’ah was attended by Pakistanis, Indians, Iranians, Iraqis, Nigerians, Congolese, Turks, and South African
blacks. These clearly included people from all levels of society and more youth than at any of the jumu’ah I attended in
Sunni mosques.
18
Author’s interview with Imam Bashier Rahim.
47
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
International University in Qom organises an educational conference in Johannesburg with the
objective of teaching the Shia ‘aqida and fiqh to South African Shias. Fully financed by Iran
and the religious legitimacy of Iranian clerics considered, these conferences are potentially a
strong source for diffusion of religious discourse. As the Shia tradition in South Africa is of
recent origin, educational inspiration from external actors is imperative to disseminate the
doctrine. Therefore, clerical delegations from Iran visiting the Shia mosque in Ottery, which
takes place on a regular basis according to the imam, are instrumental to increase the religious
legitimacy of the Shia doctrine in a Cape context and to support da’wa activities. Besides
education, financing is an aspect the Ahlul Bait in Cape Town is dependant on Iran for. It is
indeed telling that at the time of my visit at the Ahlul Bait, MaulanaAftabHaider was on a
fundraising campaign to Najaf and Karbala in Iraq and Qom in Iran to secure financing for
the construction of a new and modern mosque in Ottery.19 Due to the strained economic
situation of the Iranian state and institutions as a result of international sanction regimes,
funding of Shia movements around the world is an increasingly critical problem, which will be
further elaborated in chapter five.
As a central perspective of the thesis, the analysis will in a later sections deal more explicitly
and more detailed with how Shia doctrine has influenced the Islamic field in Cape Town and
how Iranian sources have been instrumental in facilitating this process.
THE EMERGENCE OF SALAFISM:
LITERALISM IN A TOLERANT COMMUNITY
Turning the focus to Salafism in Cape Town the immediate paradox appears as the presence
of a staunch literalist doctrine in an Islamic environment historically characterised by
moderation and tolerance. Nevertheless, since the early 1990s Salafi-inclinations have
increased in popularity as a result of the activities of religious graduates from Saudi Arabia,
Yemen, and Egypt returning to the Cape to diffuse Salafi interpretation.20 The relationship
between Middle East graduates and Salafi diffusion in Cape Town has not been a straight
positive line though as a lacking local tolerance for such literal and somehow confrontational
doctrinal interpretation has been prevalent. Thus, a process of priming of a stricter Islamic
interpretation has been ongoing since the 1960, which has prepared, or from a Salafi
perspective matured, the Islamic field for the introduction of Salafi discourse. This priming
process can be divided into two stages. The first stage started with the migration to the Cape
of Indian Muslims from the eastern regions in South Africa bringing in Deobandi and Tabligh
doctrines. Although different to Salafism,21 these doctrines are stricter in their interpretation
of religious sources than the more lenient Sufi brotherhoods and thus gave the Cape Muslims
a taste of a more pious Islamic discourse. The second stage in the 1980s and 1990s continued
this trend through the introduction of what can be labelled Islamic reformism. This doctrine,
neither Sufi nor Salafi, was directly related to graduates from Cairo and Medina and somehow
19
Ibid.
Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, p. 23.
21
This difference will become evident later on in the section, but the Deobandi and Tabligh adherence to the Hanafi
madhhab is a clear point of disagreement with Salafis.
20
48
CHAPTER 4
resembles the thoughts of Muhammad Abduh22 as its proponents stress the imperative to
follow only the Qur’an and sunna, while dismissing many Sufi practises and embracing
modernity. Linked to clerics such as Sheikh Thafier Najjaar23 and Sheikh Irfan Abrahams,24
this doctrine is likewise far from the Salafi literalism and their rejection of reason, but it has
helped prime a discourse challenging Sufi practices,25 while emphasising the sacred legitimacy
of only the Qur’an and sunna. These two stages moulded the structures of the Islamic field in
the Cape, making a transition from Islamic reformism to Salafism feasible. This process is
characterised by Sheikh FaaikGamieldien, a self-declared Salafi despite never studying in Saudi
Arabia. Instead he obtained his degrees from Al-Azhar and the Pakistan International Islamic
University, while he is now pursuing a Ph.D. degree in fiqh in Malaysia. Growing up with a
Sufi father and a non-religious mother, Sheikh Gamieldien ascribes his Salafi-inclination to his
educational experience in Cairo and in Pakistan, where he got in contact with Salafis.
Although defining his ‘aqida as Hanbali, he is not exclusively rejecting the use of reason in
religious interpretation indicating some accommodation to the local religious environment.
When it comes to Sufism though, he is indeed very critical arguing from the religious
terminology of Salafis. Initially he was the imam in the Gatesville Masjid, but his time there
was short as his interpretation of Islam was not accepted. From then on, he turned focus to
criticism of Sufism arguing that many of their practices are bid’a and that they do not adhere
to tawhid, clearly indicating a Salafi focus. Particularly an article on the subject of shrine
worshipping, 26 which he fiercely criticises, made him infamous within the Cape Islamic
environment to a degree where he needed bodyguard protection during a three month
period.27
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the presence of a more pure Salafi doctrine reached Cape
Town through younger graduates from Medina and Yemen. So far Salafism had been
confined to individuals, as no Salafi-movements existed until a few years ago. But as Dumbe
rightly points out, ‘the absence of an organised Salafi movement cannot be translated into the
absence of Salafism from the Muslim community of the Cape’.28 This lacking organisation
changed however as younger sheikhs founded organisations to bolster their efforts of
proselytization. Of particular interest are Sheikh Abu Ilhaam Jameel Adam and Sheikh Ismail
Gqamane.
Growing up in the township of Mitchell’s Plain in a religious family, Sheikh Jameel Adam
experienced several traditions of Islamic learning including the Shafi’i tradition of the Cape,
22
For an elaboration of the Islamic thought of Muhammad Abduh, see Mark Sedgwick, Muhammad Abduh – A
Biography (Cairo: AUC Press, 2009).
23
Sheikh Najjaar is a product of both the Islamic University of Medina, where he studied for nine years ending with a
BA honour in Da’wa, and Al-Azhar, where he studied a master. In contract to the brief biography of Najjaar given by
Dumbe and Tayob (2011), I find it misleading to categorise Sheikh Najjaar as a Salafi as he decline this himself and as
his ‘aqida clearly differs from a Salafi ‘aqida (Author’s interview with Sheikh Thafier Najjaar, Cape Town, September
26, 2013).
24
A graduate from Medina, Sheikh Abrahams define himself as a Islamic reformist and has indeed accommodated his
’aqida to the Cape environment. Though he has been challenging popular Sufi practices like Sheikh Najjaar, describing
him a Salafi as done by Dumbe is incorrect (Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, p. 25).
25
Yunus Dumbe and Abdulkader Tayob, ‘Salafis in Cape Town in Search of Purity, Certainty and Social Impact’, Die
Welt des Islams, No. 51 (2011) p. 201.
26
FaaikGamieldien, ‘Letter to the Cape Argus by ShaykhFaaikGamieldien’:
http://www.sunnah.org/aqida/cape_town_wahabi/letter_by_sh_gamieldien.htm, January 8, 2001.
27
Author’s interview with Sheikh FaaikGamieldien (Cape Town, September 30, 2013).
28
Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, p. 24.
49
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
Deobandi and Tabligh doctrine before being introduced to the serious study of hadith by a
Yemeni trader, who settled in Cape Town.29 With the help from his Yemeni friend, Jameel
Adam learned the MukhtasarBukhārī before he was suggested to go to Dammaj in Yemen and
study under Muqbil bin Hadi al-Wadi’i at the Dar al-Hadith madrasah. Here he discovered the
‘authentic way’ of Islam, which in contrast to local Sufi traditions in the Cape was the ‘path
towards truth’.30 Returning to Cape Town and Mitchell’s Plain in 2002 as a 25-year-old, Jameel
Adam started preaching as an assistant imam in the Portland mosque, and as the following
statement indicates he had returned with a firm belief in the Salafi doctrine:
I will lead the salāt but my methodology after salāt is the prophetic
methodology, which is to make individual dhikr, whereas they have this
collective dhikr in tone. Because he [the imam] has a problem with me
because I don’t do it the way they do it. I told them that this is the way I
believe it’s supposed to be done.31
This uncompromising approach got him dismissed from the mosque and as a result, he has
since focused on educating the public through activities such as private classes in several
Islamic disciplines32 and da’wa initiative like public lectures at the Portland Recreational Centre
in Mitchell’s Plain. These activities take place in the auspices of the Ahl-us-Sunnah Society
established by Jameel Adam himself. During Dumbe and Tayob’s 2008 study of Salafism in
Cape Town, the society was still in its infancy, but it has since developed into a more efficient
and legitimate source to diffuse the Salafi thought. Right from the beginning upon his return,
Jameel Adam adopted a very critical and fierce approach to local practices. Just short of
characterising the society as jahiliyya, he has spent his time criticising the practices of local
imams, while teaching Muslims what he considers the only true Islam as illustrated by a
situation from one of his classes:
I always ask them to go and search for their proof, and I will present to you
my proof, and then you judge what the correct way is. [...] Sometimes, they
will bring me the proof from their teachers. Like some of the students attend
another class, which is being organised by one Maulana Abdul-Nabi, they
will bring me writings proof by him on the permissibility of Mawlūd. [...] So
I will destroy all his arguments to the students. [...] Eventually, they find out
that not all their teachings are rooted on the Qurʿān and Sunna.33
Attending a lecture titled Are the Shia Muslim?, the same self-confidence and aggressive rhetoric
was evident. In front of approximately 60 devoted and pious-looking Salafis, Sheikh Jameel
Adam talked for an hour and a half in critical terms about the deviating path of the Shia.
Although he accepted the Muslim identity of more moderate Shia like the Zaidi in Yemen, he
29
It needs to be stated that the biographical details on Sheikh Jameel Adam stem from Dumbe and Tayob’s (2011)
article, which is referred to for more detailed biography, as the Sheikh turned down all my invitations to talk due to
suspicion. However, the following analysis of him and his movement is based on a lecture of his I attended and video,
audio, and literary material from his website: http://www.ahlussunnah.co.za.
30
Dumbe and Tayob, ‘Salafis in Cape Town in Search of Purity, Certainty and Social Impact’, pp. 195-196,
31
Ibid., p. 195.
32
Classes are counting disciplines such as ’aqida, tawhid, fiqh, hadith, and tafsir.
33
Ibid., p. 197.
50
CHAPTER 4
was definite in his takfir of Jafari Shia due to their ‘belief in the infallible and divine character
of Ali and his offspring […] implying their worship of other than Allah’ against the principle
of tawhid.34 Such lectures have become a landmark of Jameel Adam and theAhl-us-Sunnah
Societywith previous lectures concerning issues like Bid’a in Islam, What is the Salafiyya and who
are the Salafees, The manhaj of Ahlus Sunnah, Tawhid, Does Allah have body parts and Shia’s & Sufi’s
are there similarities? 35 On their website, one can also find Muhammad al-Wahhab’sKitab alTawhid and fatwas by Abdul Aziz ibn Baz on the impermissibility of celebrating mawlud36
among a great achieve of texts by Saudi Salafis. On the audio front, there is a lecture series
Jameel Adam on Kitab al-Tawhid, a 23-lesson series on Ahmad ibn Hanbal’sUsool as-Sunnah,
and several refutations of among others the Ashari ‘aqida, the Sufi, Shia, and Tabligh
doctrines, and the manhaj of the Muslim Brotherhood37. Handing out these digital videos,
literature, and audio on CDs, the Ahl-us-Sunnah Society has managed to create a digital
source to diffuse the Salafi discourse in addition to preaching it in the masjid, which is
effective particularly among the younger audience. Despite Sheikh Jameel Adam obtaining his
religious education at the Dar al-Hadith in Yemen and thus not being a ‘Saudi graduate’, I
believe the history of his teacher Muqbil al-Wadi’i and the doctrinal affiliations of the Dar alHadith institute validates a Saudiconnection. Spending many years in Saudi Arabia, where he
obtained his religious education being taught by prominent Salafi sheikhs like ibn Baz and alAlbani, al-Wadi’i is very much a product of the Saudi Salafi tradition as taught in the
universities and practiced in society. This is clear from the connections the institute that he
later created in Yemen has to the Saudi Jamiyyamovement and to Rabi bin Hadi al-Madkhali, a
prominent Saudi sheikh and former head of the Sunna Studies Department at the Islamic
University of Medina.38 Being moulded in this Islamic tradition, Sheikh Jameel Adam’s Salafi
doctrine is closely related to Saudi religious institutions.
The trajectory of Sheikh Ismail Gqamane differs considerable from that of Jameel Adam. This
is not only due to his educational history, but also because his Salafi approach is much less
confrontational than Jameel Adam’s aggressive rhetoric. Sheikh Gqamane’s educational
experience started in a Tabligh madrasah, where he completed the memorisation of the
Qur’an at the age of 11.39 Later he went to a madrasah in Johannesburg before being accepted
to the Islamic University of Medina, where he initially studied two years of Arabic followed by
four year at the School of Shari’a. Immediately after his return to Cape Town, Sheikh
Gqamane started as Imam in Langa, but as the practices he preached often contradicted the
dominant Sufi discourse, his time there was brief. Afterwards he moved to his childhood
neighbourhood of Gugulethu, where he became part of the local Masakhane Community.
According to Gqamane, the community seeks to ‘establish a society around Islam’ and ‘make
Islam an African religion’. Certainly not compromising on his personal ‘aqida upon his return,
Sheikh Gqamane has nonetheless adopted a rather moderate and non-confrontational
approach to his da’wa. His objective has been to preach and explain what he considers the
correct Islamic path while pinpointing when he sees shirk (idolatry), but avoiding the more
34
Sheikh Abu Ilhaam Jameel Adam, lecture on ’Are the Shia Muslim?’ (Cape Town, September 15, 2013).
Videos of the lectures can be found at: http://www.ahlussunnah.co.za/video/
36
From Nur `Ala Al-Darb by ibn Baz.
37
Audio files can be found here: http://www.ahlussunnah.co.za/video-and-audio/.
38
For information on Muqbil al-Wadi’i see Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen, pp. 54-61.
39
This section is based on author’s interview with Sheikh Ismail Gqamane (Cape Town, September 23, 2013).
35
51
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
radical approach of excommunication applied by Jameel Adam. During our talk he
continuously refers to ibn Taymiyya to justify his arguments, a scholars he labels the ‘greatest
Islamic scholar to date’, which underlines his Salafi influence. Despite moving back to Cape
Town, he has maintained connections to Saudi Arabia from where he just came back after
participating in a conference on the subject of the Unity of Muslims. Engaged in a
neighbourhood characterised by low education level and low literacy with the majority without
a strong religious foundation, the initial struggle for the sheikh has been to introduce the
basics of Islam in line with his own beliefs. He believes that his preaching has become
particularly popular due to the ‘simpleness of the Salafi doctrine’, which attracted himself a lot
during his time in Medina. Although the Masakhane Community was established in 2002, its
institutional foundation is relatively new with the recent establishment of a mosque as part of
the complex.
Based on the research on Salafi presence in Cape Town in 2008, it is evident that its
acceptance and popularity has increased since. This seems particularly to be the case with
Sheikh Jameel Adam, whose lectures are well-visited and through his movement he manages
to educated people in the Salafi doctrine, while doing extensive da’wa. A characteristic of the
new Salafi trend is that it finds its followers mostly among coloured and blacks in townships
such as Mitchell’s Plain, Lansdowne, Langa, and Gugulethu, where religion traditionally has
not been particularly embedded in society. This leaves both a potential and a challenge for
da’wa in these areas as the volatile religious affiliation makes it easier for people to embrace
Islam, while their lacking religious knowledge makes proper understanding of the religious
message a challenge. The increasing attractiveness of Salafism is backed by Imam Rashied
Omar of the Claremont Main Road Mosque – a liberal and progressive imam much against
Salafi fundamentalism – stating that ‘the context seems supportive for Salafis’. 40 This
beneficial context saw the emergence in 2011 of Al Huda Foundation, a new Salafi da’wa
movement, with the objective to ‘propagate the pristine teachings of the Quran and Sunnah as
shown by the Holy Prophet Muhammed [SAW], his illustrious Sahaabah [companions](ra) and
our Pious Predecessors’.41 Still in its infancy, the movement is in the process of building an
Islamic centre and a masjid at Victoria Road and currently focuses on educational events on
the topics of ‘aqida, fiqh, hadith, and tafsir, while trying to reach out to the youth through
extensive use of Facebook.42 This increasing Salafi popularity transpires in practical influence
too as the Salafi sheikhs’ opposition to several Sufi practices has implied growing doubt and
confusion among the youth as some begin to neglect popular religious practices such as dhikr
and the celebration of mawlud.43 Sufi sheikhs have noted this increasing Salafi popularity and
have recently reacted to counter Salafi doctrine with the establishment of the Medina Institute,
which provides educational programs for the youth taught by some of the most prominent
Sufis in the Cape.
All these initiatives show that Salafi sheikhs have managed to challenge the Islamic discourse
previously so dominated by Sufis and emphasise the importance of Islamic education as was
illustrated in Lagos too. Although on the rise, the numerical presence of Salafis is still inferior
40
Author’s interview with Imam Rashied Omar (Cape Town, September 26, 2013).
Al Huda Foundation website: http://www.al-huda.co.za
42
Author’s discussion with Al Huda member IhssanIdriss.
43
Dumbe, ‘The Salafi Praxis’, pp. 96-97.
41
52
CHAPTER 4
to the discursive influence the Salafi sheikhs have obtained and their presence is still only felt
in heavily populated southern suburbs among coloured and blacks.
A SUNNI-SHIA SECTARIAN STRUGGLE
Having discussed the introduction of Salafi and Shia thought to Cape Town, the internal
discursive relationship becomes significant due to the fierce animosity existing between the
doctrines. As chapter two outlined, sectarian differences between Shiism and Salafism are an
important source of the reciprocal hostility. This is no news and well known from particularly
the Middle East.44 Interviewing Shia and Salafi imams in Cape Town this hostility is evident as
they each try to discredit the other part with Salafis accusing Shias for being on the wrong path,
while Shias highlight the extremist and confrontational character of Salafis. Sheikh Jameel Adam’s
takfir of Jafari Shia and his numerous lectures and sermons on the deviation of Shia are vividly
illustrating this strained relationship. Somehow surprising though considered the historical
prominence of tolerant Sufism in the Cape, this sectarian struggle had lately become organised
on a strict Sunni-Shia division with even moderate Sunnis attacking Shias too.
Discussing the issue of sectarianism with Sunnis and Shias, the general perception of a Shia
threat since 1979 seems to be central to the Sunni hostility, which is well illustrated by three
separate initiatives:
-
Ahlus-Sunnah Defence League (ADL): The ADL is a rather recent initiative
primarily on Facebook45 organised by a united Sunni front against Shiism. They
state their objective to be ‘creating awareness on the dangers of Shiism’, while
they in a post argue that Shias are not Muslims as they do not acknowledge the
authenticity of books on hadith by ‘Sahih Al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim, Sunan
Abu Dawood’ and due to their ‘hatred towards the Sahabah’, the latter being
continuously praised in posts on the site. Also on the site one finds the antiShia magazine Al-Khutoot Al-Areedah, which strongly refutes Shiism.The general
hostility in their rhetoric indicates a situation far from the moderation normally
characterising South African Sunnis and since the Muslim Judicial Council
supports the ADL initiative and collaborates in arranging conferences, it should
not be regarded simply as an isolated extremist faction of the Sunnis.
-
Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) anti-Shia educational campaign: Independent of the
ADL, the MJC has initiated an educational campaign, which according to MJC
spokesman, Shuaib Appleby, is levelled at Shia proselytization.46In a November
2013 conference on the Finality of Prophethood, sheikhs from India, the UK, and
Saudi Arabia, lectured on ‘aqida with the purpose to ‘educate the local scholars
and Muslim public about the various deviant sects that are often incorrectly
44
Lacroix describes how anti-Shiism became commonplace of the Saudi religious discourse; Lacroix, Awakening Islam,
p. 124.
45
For Facebook see: https://www.facebook.com/ShiaAwarenessPage, and for blog see:
http://youpuncturedtheark.wordpress.com.
46
Author’s interview with Imam Shuaib Appleby, Spokesperson of the Muslim Judicial Council (Cape Town, September
25, 2013).
53
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
perceived to be an extension of Islam’.47 As an educational campaign, focus has
particularly been on the youth as this demographical group is considered
vulnerable for doctrinal influence and thus as a doctrinal battlefield.
-
Muslim Student Association (MSA) constitutional amendment: Although comprising
several different Islamic sects, the MSA at the University of Cape Town
illustrates sectarian animosity between Sunnism and Shiism too. In 2009 when a
Shia tried to run as a candidate for the executive committee, the association
amended their constitution to prevent the eligibility of the Shia student to run
due to the perceived deviance of the Shia doctrine.48 This shows that sectarian
animosity is taking place at all levels within the Muslim community in Cape
Town.
The three examples above are all of Sunni antagonism against Shiism, which can be viewed as
a struggle for sacred authority. The general rhetoric and response of the latter has been rather
moderate probable due to their extreme minority position. To relax tensions Shias try
rhetorically to create a sense of unity by stating all sects are Muslim and that they do not focus
on Sunnis in their proselytising work. However, from the perspective of a central MJC imam,
Shias threaten that if the fierce Sunni agitation against Shias does not stop, it will develop into
a more serious sectarian battle.49
Besides the historical discourse of a Shia revival and expansion in the aftermath of the Iranian
Revolution, two aspects seem to be central to this sectarian struggle. First is an actual Sunni
conviction that Shias do focus on Sunni in their da’wa despite Shia denial. Even rather
moderate sheikhs like Thafier Najjaar explains that he is certain of the Shia intention to
convert Sunni Muslims.50 Second is a common focus of Shia and Salafis on black communities
in their da’wa. With a heavy on-the-ground presence in a neighbourhood like Mitchell’s Plain,
Shias and Salafis become direct competitors in their attempt to attract people to Islam and
their specific sect. This second aspect highlights the centrality of Salafis in the sectarian
animosity. Although the ADL consists of a unified Sunni front against Shiism, the rhetoric
used both by the ADL and the MJC is evidently inspired by Salafi criticism of Shia doctrine.
As such critical and fierce rhetoric would have been difficult to imagine some decades ago, it
seems reasonable to argue that the critical religious discourse introduced by Salafis in Cape
Town has influenced the Islamic environment considerably.
The fierce rhetoric of Jameel Adam and the Ahlus-Sunnah Defence League in addition to the
general discursive animosity between Sunni and Shia in Cape Town vividly illustrate a struggle
for sacred authority in the eyes of local Muslims. Explicit praise of ingroup scholars, while
criticising opponents in hostile terms is transforming the previously so tolerant Islamic
47
Muslim Judicial Council ’Finality of Prophethood’ conference:
http://www.mjc.org.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=532:the-finality-of-prophet-hoodconference&catid=15:press-releases&Itemid=13, accessed December 3, 2013.
48
Author’s interview with Dr. Andrea Brigaglia, Assistant Professor University of Cape Town (Cape Town, September
29, 2013).
49
Author’s interview with Imam Shuaib Appleby, Spokesperson of the Muslim Judicial Council (Cape Town, September
25, 2013).
50
Author’s interview with Sheikh Thafier Najjaar (Cape Town, September 26, 2013).
54
CHAPTER 4
environment into a discursive battlefield, indicating that all actors are aware of the challenge
they pose to each other.
THE TRANSNATIONAL CHARACTER OF SHIISM AND SALAFISM
As became clear in the sections on the emergence of Shiism and Salafism, respectively, the
introduction of both Shia and Salafi doctrines have been closely related to transnational
relations, with Iran and Saudi Arabia being the main sources of influence. When assessing the
transnational character of Shiism and Salafism, a situation much resembling the one in Lagos
appears as education and financing stand out as the most central sources for diffusion of and
influence on the religious doctrine practised in Cape Town among Shias and Salafis.
Considering the role of education, the role of the sheikh term is of particular importance in the
context of South Africa. In order to become a sheikh, one has to obtain religious education
outside of the country and preferably in the Middle East. 51 Naturally this emphasises the
attractiveness of studying in the Middle East, where Iran and Saudi Arabia stand out as some
of the most important educational centres, and the accompanying symbolic power in
obtaining a religious degree from one of these countries. Hence, graduates from Middle
Eastern religious centres are bestowed with religious authority upon their return to Cape
Town. This is important as it makes it more attractive for Capetonians to pursue education in
the Middle East and because of the religious influence they will have when returning home.
For both Iranian and Saudi actors, educating South Africans becomes the strongest method of
da’wa in their toolbox. Studies in Iran is almost exclusively arranged through the Ahlul Bait
foundation with MaulanaAftabHaider personally in charge of the process, and they send
regularly students to universities in Qom or Mashhad to pursue education fully financed by
Iranian sources. Maybe because this is a relatively costly affair, the Al Mustafa International
University in Qom arrange a yearly seminar in South Africa to provide teaching in Shia
doctrine in order to enable South Africans to proselytise in their local environments. 52 As
stressed by Khalid Sayed, a local Shia, finances definitely seems to be a constraint for Iranian
institutions in this regard and therefore alternative methods to educate people need to be
explored. This is less the case for Saudi Arabia. Studies in the kingdom is mainly organised
through the MJC and by former graduates. In the past, the number of students going to
mainly Mecca or Medina was quite high, but it has been decreasing lately due to two factors;
reduced intake at the universities and a fear by the MJC that students become radicalised
during their studies. Although the number of students is not vast, history has shown that
particularly graduates from Saudi religious institutions – and Dammaj in Yemen in the case of
Jameel Adam – are inclined to return to proselytise the doctrine, they were introduced to on
the Arabian Peninsula, thus underlining the incredibly powerful role of education in the
diffusion of religious doctrine. According to Dumbe, this influence has lately been amplified
by ‘the fact that many Ulama of Cape Town today depend on Saudi scholars in matters of
religious doctrine, also contributes to an overall decrease of interest in Sufism’. 53 It is
important to stress, however, that studies in for instance Saudi Arabia do not necessarily lead
to students embracing Salafism, as Sheikh Seraj Hendricks is testimony to. A graduate from
51
Tayob, Islamic Resurgence in South Africa, p. 51.
Author’s interview with Imam Bashier Rahim, Ahlul Bait (Cape Town, September 20, 2013).
53
Dumbe, ‘Salafism and its Impact on Sufi Movements in the Cape’, p. 26.
52
55
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
Saudi Arabia Sheikh Hendricks returned to Cape Town only to become a staunch critic of
Salafi doctrine, which he defines as extreme. Imam of the Sufi Azzaviya order and one of the
founders of the anti-Salafi Medina Institute, Sheikh Hendricks has engaged in an anti-Salafi
discursive struggle, vividly illustrated by his attack on Sheikh FaaikGamieldien, whom he
labels ‘a Wahhabi and a Kharijite whose religious fervor is embedded in extremism and
fanaticism’.54
Another source to exert influence is through more direct financing practices. As mentioned,
due to financial constraints such practices have been less widespread by Iranian institutions
lately compared to Saudi engagement. However, the Ahlul Bait foundation does receive
financial support from Iranian sources as the ongoing process of building a new mosque
witnesses although it probably is not an entirely institutionalised process. Also, most of the
literature in the Ahlul Bait library and bookshop is provided by Iranian sources. Although far
from being of extensive character, Saudi funding is occurring too. Besides financing
Capetonians’ studies in the kingdom, it is also widely believed that continued funding of
graduates’ activities upon their return is taking place. Sheikh Ismail Gqamane is one example,55
but it is generally believed – by Sufis and Shias though – that such financing practices are
more widespread. Despite the obvious strategic motives Sufis and Shias have to promote such
arguments, the assertion is far from unrealistic. The provision of Islamic literature is another
case in point. Previously a member of the MYM, Abdulkhader Tayob explains how the Saudi
WAMY provided most of the movement’s literature. 56 Such Saudi trend seems to have
continued as the literature I received when visiting the MSA at the University of Cape Town
was provided by al-Muntada Al-Islami.
State-level economic relations between South Africa and Iran on one side and between South
Africa and Saudi Arabia on the other indicate an interesting tendency too. In the postApartheid period until 2012, South African-Iranian economic relations were strong with Iran
providing South Africa more than a quarter of its crude oil import, while also investing
billions in South Africa’s power-generation sector. 57 However, in June 2012 South Africa
temporarily halted the import of Iranian oil due to the international sanction regime on Iran
leading to Saudi Arabia becoming the main exporter of oil to South Africa. In June 2013
South Africa made the halt of importation of Iranian oil permanent.58 Interestingly, in June
2012 Saudi Arabia and South Africa sat up a $2.4 billion holding company, the Saudi Arabian
South Africa Holding (SASAH), with the intend to invest in South African business to assist the
struggling economy.59 Furthermore, according to AchmatCassim, Saudi Arabia is also a major
shareholder in the South African media industry.60 These relations indicate a change in statelevel economic leverage in South Africa in favour of Saudi Arabia. How this relates to the
diffusion of religious doctrine is difficult to assess, but it certainly illustrates closer relations
and thus a stronger interface between Saudi and South African actors.
54
Dumbe, ‘The Salafi Praxis’, p. 97.
Dumbe and Tayob, ‘Salafis in Cape Town in Search of Purity, Certainty and Social Impact’, p. 203.
56
Tayob, ’Islamism in South Africa’, p. 13.
57
Eliot Pence and MehrunEtebari, ’Reaching Iran through South Africa’, The National Interest, May 23, 2012.
58
See IOL News, ’ SA cuts oil imports from Iran’. August 1, 2012 and IOL News, ’ SA ends Iranian oil imports’. June 7,
2013 .
59
Reuters, ’South Africa, Saudi Arabia earmark $2.4 billion for joint ventures’. June 11, 2006.
60
Author’s interview with AchmatCassim (Cape Town, October 2, 2013).
55
56
CHAPTER 4
CONCLUSIVE REMARKS:
FIELD TRANSFORMATION AND LIMITATIONS
The Islamic community in Cape Town – historically so embedded in Sufism – experienced a
first step towards religious pluralism in the 1960s when Deobandis, Barelvi, and Tablighi
migrated from the eastern part of the country. From the perspective of this paper, however,
the introduction of Shiism from the early 1980s and Salafism in the 1990s is of greater
interest. Although of a more limited character than in Lagos, Shias and Salafis have managed
to influence Muslim communities in Cape Town and again education has been central. Sufi
brotherhoods and traditions are characterised by strong hierarchy with the imam or sheikh at
the top, who guide his followers in their religious practices thus reducing incentives for
religious education or reflection by the separate Muslim. It is exactly this lack of self-reflection
that Salafis like Sheikh Jameel Adam and to a lesser degree Shias have challenged by stressing
a critical approach to Islam, naturally as an attempt to reduce the Sufi grip on power, which in
Bourdieudian terms could be translated into a situation of symbolic violence. Simply the
existence of Shiism as an Islamic alternative and the Salafi emphasis on education to legitimise
their own position, has led to an ‘educationalisation’of the Islamic field in Cape Town as Sufi
sheikhs and imams have chosen to accept education as the battlefield as proposed by
newcomers. It is in this perspective that the recent establishment of the Medina Institute
should be regarded.
Despite bringing some ‘disturbances’ to this near-monopolisation of Sufi brotherhoods, Shias
and Salafis have been critically limited in their challenges. These limitations can be defined on
a social level and on a structural level.
61
Societal limitation: From a social perspective, the da’wa of Salafis and Shias
has been limited in their success due to a continued South African perception
that both sects somehow represent deviations, which is easily observed either
through their appearance (in the case of Salafis) or during prayer (in the case of
Shias). As both sects are regarded as alternatives to the norm, Capetonian
Muslims in general still hold reservations towards Salafism and Shiism as they
probably consider ‘the price’ too high to follow such abnormal doctrines.
Structural limitation: An equally critical limitation of the diffusion of Shiism
and Salafism is structural and posed by Cape Town’s mosque system, which
limits the access of non-Sufis to positions of authority including preaching in
mosques. This seems to have been a particular problem for young Salafi
graduates returning to Cape Town as they initially lacked a platform to
proselytise. This lack of access is aggravated by the fact that sacred authority is
to a large extent attached to these formal positions. In a comparative analysis
between Salafism in Cape Town and in Accra, Ghana, Yunus Dumbe stresses
this structural limitation as the main reason for the lacking Salafi prominence
compared to Accra, where Salafis have become a dominant Muslim
movement.61
Dumbe, ‘The Salafi Praxis’, pp. 89-94.
57
ISLAMIC DOCTRINE AND DISCOURSE IN CAPE TOWN
To further elaborate on these limitations in general, it becomes clear in the case of Cape
Town that Islamic newcomers have struggled due to lacking opportunity structures – except
potentially the complacency on the behalf of Sufi religious leaders regarding their grip on
power. In the words of Salafi Sheikh Gqamane, ‘Cape Town welcomes everything except
Shiism and Salafism’ and he continues by stating regarding Salafism that ‘the Cape Town
community is very tolerant – therefore, it was problematic for people when Salafis suddenly
turned up and started telling them what to do and what not to do’.62 Among the implications
of these limitations is that Salafi graduates accommodate their views upon return to Cape
Town in order to get ‘food on the table’ according to Sheikh FaaikGamieldien.63 Another
more ‘self-inflicted’ Salafi cause for the initial slow growth could be due to the manhaj itself of
the Salafis as expressed by Sheikh Jameel Adam, who states that da’wa should be focused on
yourself and your closest family. 64 Despite limitations, Salafis have recently become more
organised as is evident with the examples of the Ahl-us-Sunnah Society and the Al Huda
Foundation, and although integration into formal institutions have continued to be an issue,
Salafis have managed to create their own platforms to propagate their discourse. This
development is mostly due to Sheikh Jameel Adam as he, according to Sheikh Gqamane, has
managed to bring new energy to the Salafi struggle.
In brief, more than any of the other non-Sufi doctrines new to Cape Town, Salafism and
Shiism have entailed an intensified interaction on both a producer-producer level – through
discursive struggles – and on a producer-consumer level – through increased Islamic
education and da’wa initiatives, which particularly focus on black communities. For the Shia,
their situation is rather stagnant as they experience difficulties in attracting high numbers of
followers. Nonetheless, they are expanding their institutional facilities and activities and they
are clearly considered a threat by Sunnis. The trajectory of Salafism has differed as its
proponents initially experienced serious difficulties, but considered recent developments such
as a renewed Islamic focus in society, an increasing organisation of Salafis, and the sacred
authority attached to education it seems reasonable to argue that Salafi organisations will gain
in popularity in coming years. This process will be eased as the symbolic cost associated with
leaving Sufi brotherhoods is slowly decreasing. This leads to another important conclusion of
how Iranian and Saudi influence, respectively, should be assessed in the rise of Shiism and
Salafism in Cape Town.
I
ranian influence: The Iranian relation was integral for the initial process of
conversion to Shiism in South Africa exemplified by the Iranian organised
conference and regular lectures. This was in the immediate aftermath of the
Iranian Revolution and it seems like the intensity of relations has decreased
somehow since to now consist of yearly conferences on Shia doctrine organised
by an Iranian university, occasional funding, and the provision of scholarships
to South African students going to Iran to study. Nonetheless, Iran continues to
be the geographical centre for doctrinal inspiration as highlighted by
62
Author’s interview with Sheikh Ismail Gqamane (Cape Town, September 23, 2013).
Author’s interview with Sheikh FaaikGamieldien (Cape Town, September 30, 2013).
64
See lecture ’Manhaj of Ahlus Sunnah’ by Sheikh Jameel Adam: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVG8VTKvRsU
63
58
CHAPTER 4
publications available at the AhlulBayt and the Iranian clerical delegations
visiting from time to time.
S
audi influence: The recent emergence, the outspoken character, and the critical
attitude to the established Muslim community of Salafis in Cape Town make
them an interesting phenomenon. The Salafi emergence has been heavily
influenced by the Saudi educational system and Salafi/Wahhabi literature with
the latter providing the discursive arguments to criticise other Islamic sects. This
clearly shows how powerful a tool the provision of scholarships to study an
Islamic education at Salafi institutions in the Arabian Peninsula really is to
instigate doctrinal diffusion abroad. Although the extent is of uncertain
character, funding of Saudi graduates from Saudi sources seems to be occurring
too thus emphasising a financial relation.
59
CHAPTER 5
EXPLAINING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION:
THE APPLICABILITY OF THE ISLAMIC COLD WAR PRISM
The previous two chapters have sought to describe and analyse the development of Islamic
doctrine in Lagos and Cape Town paying special attention to the influence of Saudi and
Iranian actors. Leaving such closer examinations, I now turn focus more specifically to the
efforts of Saudi Arabia and Iran with the intention to assess and explain transregional
relations. This implies a change in analytical perspective from a micro perspective on Lagos
and Cape Town to a macro perspective on the Persian Gulf and transnational relations and
the logic guiding the regional contestation for power. My objective in the assessment of
transnational influence is to contemplate to what extent the Islamic Cold War framework or
prism offers a valid explanatory perspective on the diffusion of Islamic discourse or if other
motives should be considered more crucial.
Right from the beginning – which I date as the revolutionary period in Iran – the Iranian
regime has been much more aggressive than Saudi Arabia in its religious diffusion with the
objective to export the revolution. Because of Khomeini’s rhetoric and the establishment of
the Quds force with the explicit purpose of exporting the revolution, few Sunni governed
states – least of all Sunni Iraq and the Gulf monarchies – felt safe in this period. Events in
Saudi Arabia such as the Shia rebellion in Qatif in 19791 and in Kuwait and Bahrain2 are clear
1
Toby Craig Jones, ‘Rebellion on the Saudi Periphery: Modernity, Marginalization, and the Shi’a Uprising of 1979’,
International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 38, No. 2 (2006), pp. 213-233.
2
Laurence Louër, Transnational Shia politics: religious and political networks in the Gulf (New York: Columbia
University Press, 2008).
60
CHAPTER 5
examples of Iranian interferenceorsupport in external states. As explained by Toby Jones and
Laurence Louër, these examples are characterised by efforts of clerical networks around a
marja al-taqlid, which in the context of the Gulf has been the Shiraziyyin after the late
Ayatollah Mohammad al-Shirazi and throughal-Da’wa al-Islamiyya established in Najaf by
Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr. 3 Although Shia communities in nearby states like the
Gulf monarchies, Iraq, and Lebanon were of primary interest of the Iranian regime, Muslim
communities in Sub-Saharan African were not completely neglected. Kane even argues that
outside the Middle East, nowhere did revolutionary Shia ideology become more popular than
in the case of Nigeria.4As described by several authors, this led to a countermove from the
Saudi political and religious establishment to instigate processes to diffuse Salafi doctrine
among Africans.
It is evident that neither Lagos nor Cape Town is the epicentre of Saudi and Iranian interests.
This was never my intention to prove. However, I believe the two case studies are useful to
test my hypothesis andto assessthe transregional efforts of Saudi and Iranian actors to diffuse
their religious doctrine in Sub-Saharan Africa more generally as both countries should be
considered attractive from a proselytising perspective. Neither has it been the intention of the
study to measure the Salafis or revolutionary Shias in Lagos or Cape Town in terms of their
numbers. This is simply not possible and potentially not even relevant. My approach has been
qualitative rather than quantitative with the intention to discover and assess tendenciesand trends
in the societies. More precisely, it has been a study of doctrinal transformation in Lagos and
Cape Town, the recent prominence and societal influence of new doctrines, and to what
degree external sourceshave been influential in this transformation. As focus has been on
Salafi and Shia doctrines and the external influence of Saudi and Iranian actors, many
interesting aspects have been left out. This is, however, an inevitable limitation of research.
ASSESSING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION
The analyses have so far shown that Salafi and (revolutionary) Shia doctrines are indeed not
absent in the Muslim communities in Lagos and Cape Town as academic literature otherwise
seems to indicate to some extent. Furthermore, I feel confident in arguing that the emergence
of these doctrines can partly be ascribed to external sources with Saudi Arabia and Iran being
two examples. The question becomes how such diffusion of Salafism and Shiism can be
interpreted in the context of the Islamic Cold War.
Salafis and Shias in Lagos and Cape Town are not products of official policy papers produced
in Riyadh or Teheran stressing the importance of spreading their religious doctrine. Neither
are they the results of organised proselytising efforts from the Gulf. Hence, if the Islamic Cold
War framework or logic is to make sense, one has to consider other and subtler dynamics,
which poses extreme difficulties from a research perspective. In an attempt to summarise, I
will argue that both the Saudi and the Iranian state have developed institutions partly for the
purpose of exerting their soft power by diffusing their religious discourse and that – either
directly or indirectly – Muslim communities in Lagos and in Cape Town have been influenced
3
Ibid. The Shiraziyyin has been dominant in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia with minor presence in Bahrain and
Kuwait where al-Da’wa has been the prominent Shia network.
4
Kane, Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria.
61
EXPLAINING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION
through this institutionalised setup. On a general level, the same overall conclusion, although
to different degrees, can be made regarding the sources of diffusion of Salafi and Shia doctrine
in both Lagos and Cape Town. Rather than being an active engagement in Lagos and Cape
Town, the diffusion is more due to African Muslims visiting the Saudi kingdom or the Islamic
Republic of Iran, where they become exposed to Salafi and Shia doctrine. Thus one could
argue that the process is less Saudi and Iranian in character as it is often the indigenous actors
who are active. They are what TerjeØstebø has labelled the returnees.5
This does not imply however, that Saudi and Iranian actors do not play a role, but simply that
it is of a more indirect character. Two aspects seem to be immediately important; the role of
educational institutions and of clerical networks.
Inherent in the Islamic Cold War logic is that efforts by one side occur as a reaction to an
action by the other side. Despite accounts differing in who reacted against whom –Ousmane
Kane’s argues that Saudi interest in Nigerian Muslims came as a counter-reaction to the
success of Shia proselytization in the aftermath of the Islamic Revolution while Mara
Leichtman’s describes how Iranian actors started to exert influence through the Lebanese
diaspora to counter the spread of Wahhabi doctrine – these insights are clear examples of this
logic. At an indirect level, institutionalised Saudi efforts to wield soft power started as early as
the 1960s when several universities were established in the kingdom. Probably the most
important of these is the Islamic University of Medina founded in 1961 with an objective of
attracting foreign students as a counter-move to Nasser’s Pan-Arabism. Following the demise
of Pan-Arabism, focus changed to the threat posed by the revolutionary Shia discourse post1979. Not surprisingly, most Salafis and Shia I interviewed in Lagos and Cape Town have
either had direct or indirect exposure to Saudi or Iranian educational institutions. Whereas in
Lagos contact with Saudi universities appears as more of an indirect character through Saudi
educated clerics from northern Nigeria or from attending lectures by visiting Saudis, in Cape
Town several Saudi educated sheikhs are to be found. Interestingly however, the most ardent
proponent of Salafi doctrine in Cape Town was educated in Yemen in the tradition of Muqbil
al-Wadi’i. The situation with the Shia is much more difficult to assess, which is largely due to
the smaller number of Shias and, in the case of Lagos, because it is Shia practice to hide their
religious identity. Discussing the matter with a Shia imam in Cape Town, he emphasises the
importance of receiving religious education in Shia centres in Iraq or Iran in order to develop
a Shia identity. 6 The yearly practice by the Iranian Al Mustafa International University to
arrange a conference in South Africa confirms that Iranian actors likewise consider education
as a central tool for diffusion, which is supported by the frequent visits to the Shia society in
Cape Town by delegations from Iranian universities. These dynamics indeed indicate that
neither Salafism nor Shiism in the two case studies is entirely ‘home-grown’ or a result of
domestic dynamics. What is interesting – and particularly evident in the case of Cape Town –
is how students influenced by Saudi and Iranian educational institutions have become religious
pioneers upon their return and actual entrepreneurs of social change in the society in regards
to how religion is understood and exercised.
5
See online lecture by Professor TerjeØstebø titled ’Salafism in Africa: Religious Purity and the Politics of Purity’,
February 27, 2013.
6
Author’s interview with Imam Bashier Rahim.
62
CHAPTER 5
The role of clerical networks is linked to educational institutions, but nonetheless deserve a
few additional comments. Scholars like Louër in the context of the Gulf and Leichtman with a
focus on Senegal have described the importance of transnational clerical networks for the
development of Shiism. As both Nigeria and particularly South Africa are on the outskirts of
the Islamic world and far from traditional Shia centres, the connection to such networks is
much less clear. In Nigeria, IMN members follow Ali Khamenei as their marja, whereas in
Cape Town Shias are free to choose. Both IMN leader Zakzaky and Chief Imam AftabHaider
of the AhlulBayt in Cape Town have relations to Iranian clerical networks due to their time
studying in the Islamic Republic and from several visits to Iran. Despite being much less
substantive than the transnational prominence of clerical networks in the Middle East, it
should still be regarded as an important channel for initial doctrinal diffusion. Louër
introduces an important point, however, as she argues that a secularisation of Shia political
Islam is taking place. This implies an increasing autonomy of peripheral Shia movements as
they are predominantly motivated by domestic concerns and thus move away from traditional
centres of Shia power and the marja’iyya whether that is in Qom or in Najaf.7 Attending several
jumu’ah in the AhlulBayt mosque in Cape Town, I can verify the same observation as Louër
in the context of the Gulf region as domestic issues dominate the focus entirely. Nonetheless,
talking to local Shia it is clear that theological and perhaps to a smaller extent political
sympathy for the Iranian state continues to be prevalent. Thus despite this domestication of
interests, the influence of transnational bonds still impacts.
A final point on the diffusion is related to the applied channels. Interestingly – and much in
contrast to Salafi methods – Iranian actors are using media propaganda heavily as a tool to
influence the perception of Shiism in both Nigeria and South Africa. Particularly through the
Iranian channel Press TV and the Ahlul Bait TV, where programs and news on the emerging
prominence of Shiism are broadcast.8Without considering the validity of the information, I
will argue that the intentions of these broadcasts are twofold. On the one hand it is a message
to the world and particularly the local Sunni population that Shiism is on the rise, while on the
other it can beconsidered as a form of auto-communication to the local Shia population with the
intention of changing the perception of being Shia in Sunni dominated communities. If
analysed from the latter perspective, it is closely related to the process of ‘lowering the price’
of following Shia doctrine. Observing the discussions on the Nigerian online forum for
Muslims, Nairaland, these programs get a good deal of attention as Sunni and Shia alike
discuss the validity of the information, which indicates the success of these programs in
instilling the perception that Shiism is gaining ground.
Considering the discourse between Salafis and Shia in both Nigeria and South Africa it is
striking how it resembles the fierce discursive animosity between Saudi Salafi sheikhs and their
Iranian counterparts. Hence, one could argue that the logic of the Islamic Cold War has been
extended and created what could be defined as proxy-struggles in local contexts. If considered
more closely the Salafi and Shia discourses give indications of how they have been
constructed. Starting with the Shia, any substantial revolutionary aspect is difficult to identify
7
Louër, Shiism and politics in the Middle East, p. 125.
For examples see YouTube, where one can find videos on Ashura processions in Nigeria and South Africa in addition to
longer programs on how the number of Shia is rising.
8
63
EXPLAINING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION
in their discourse. Among Shias in Cape Town, revolutionary objectives are all but absent.
They do indeed have a political focus, but they do not regard Shiism as the general solution
for society. This is less the case with the IMN, which actually considers Shiism as part of the
solution. To argue their case, they have adopted much of the fierce rhetoric of revolutionary
Shiism to discredit others while promoting their own doctrine. If we consider their actions in
practice however, the revolutionary objective seems to fade, their opposition to the
implementation of shari’a in the north being a clear example. For Salafis, the discourse is
interesting too. First, it is important to stress that Salafism is not a homogenous movement.
Scholars have traditionally divided them into three groups depending on their manhaj
(perception of ‘how to engage in the world’ or methodology); these are Purists, Politicos, and
Jihadis.9 Interestingly, as emphasised by TerjeØstebo and confirmed by my own interviews,
Salafis in Sub-Saharan Africa tend to be purists, focusing on da’wa, religious reform, and on
Islamising society rather than political engagement. However, more than an inspiration from
the official religious establishment in Saudi Arabia, which opposes direct political activity, this
should probably be considered an effect of the local environment and its constraining
structures. When studying Salafis and Shia in Nigeria and South Africa, the influence of
glocalising effects is evident, as they clearly have sought to adjust themselves to their local
environment. The best example of this is Sheikh Ismail Gqamane in Cape Town, who defines
himself as a ‘relaxed Salafi’ as he considers it imperative to adjust his behaviour to the
Capetonian discourse. Despite being rather uncompromising in theory, such accommodation
makes sense from the logic of Bourdieu, as it is a method to influence doxa from within.
As I focus on soft power structures, it is relevant to reiterate Joseph Nye’s characterisation of
such power. He argues ‘power means the ability to influence the behaviour of others to get
the outcomes one wants’.10 If this characterisation is taken to its extreme, neither Saudi nor
Iranian actors’ efforts to project their soft power on Muslims in Lagos or in Cape Town
should not be considered successful. Despite the existence of transnational relations, Salafis
and Shias in Lagos and in Cape Town are not necessarily agents of Saudi Arabia or Iran or of
their ideological sub-state patrons. Rather it would be fair to argue they probably regard the
Saudi and Iranian institutional and ideological authority with sympathy and consider their
world-views attractive.
LIMITS OF THE ISLAMIC COLD WAR PRISM
From the outset, it was my intention to test through an examination of two case studies to
what extent the Islamic Cold War prism explains diffusion of Salafism and Shiism in SubSaharan Africa. Thus it was never my intention to argue that this perspective is the sole source
of influence, as this certainly is not the case and would be a grave oversimplification. Surely,
other factors such as socio-economic deprivation and instable political situations should be
considered important parameters too.
The constructivist approach inspiring the analysis emphasises the importance of the identity
of religious actors in their desires to diffuse their doctrine rather than being the result of state
9
See for example Wiktorowicz, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’. Other scholars have applied different terms such as
Quietists instead of Purists, but all with the same meaning.
10
Nye, Soft power, p. 1.
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CHAPTER 5
policies. While I believe this approach offers some important insights, it also poses a difficulty
in assessing motives behind the diffusion. As Salafis and Shia are part of what can be defined
as identity movements, it is their interest to spread their religious doctrine, especially if they
consider da’wa as the core of their activities. This leaves a question that seems impossible to
answer with certainty; is diffusion a result of the Islamic Cold War or of aspirations stemming
from the identity of religious actors in Saudi Arabia and Iran? The most likely answer seems to
be that the motives are profoundly intertwined. Taking the example of educational institutions
again, in both Saudi Arabia and in Iran teaching positions at these institutions have been
occupied by a wide range of actors with different levels of loyalty to the ruling regime and the
dominant doctrine. This has varied through time in the case of Saudi Arabia 11 and more
recently in Iran.12 As universities have been influential in religious diffusion, the identity of the
professors and their logic for diffusing religious doctrine becomes relevant.
Another circumstance, which complicates the explanatory capacity of the Islamic Cold War
prism, is the glocalised nature of the doctrines practised in Lagos and Cape Town, which is
partly a result of the actors, who introduced them in the respective societies. I believe that the
Islamic Cold War to some extent can account for the introduction of Salafism and Shiism
Lagos and Cape Town, but falls short in explaining why the doctrines have developed as they
have. Unlike in the Gulf where Shia movements were often led by Iranians or Iraqis, in
Nigeria and South Africa indigenous returnees have been the local pioneers. I believe this
glocalisation partly explains why Salafis and Shia in Sub-Saharan Africa tend to differ in practice
and discourse from their Middle East counterparts. For Salafis this often manifests itself in
more moderate behaviour and a lenient approach to the surrounding society whereas the Shia
to a large extent abandon the revolutionary discourse of the Iranian regime.
WHAT DOES IT INDICATE FOR THE FUTURE?
As has been shown in the contexts of Nigeria and South Africa, Saudi and Iranian efforts to
diffuse their religious doctrines are taking place to varying degrees. Just as it was expected, in
neither Nigeria nor South Africa would it be correct to talk about a Saudisationor Iranisation,
but it seems reasonable to define it as processes of attracting sympathy. The question then becomes,
what these observed dynamics indicate for future development of Salafism and Shiism in
Lagos and Cape Town.
Assessing the current tendencies in Lagos and in Cape Town, it is fair to argue that the
popularity of the Salafi doctrine is increasing while the number of Shia is stagnant if not even
decreasing. In Cape Town the Shia community is well established and embedded in society
but finds it difficult to increase its popularity. In Lagos, on the other hand, it seems the case
that the number of Shias is potentially decreasing although such estimation is very uncertain.
At a general level, however, it seems that current structures and dynamics are beneficial for
Salafism as the liberal Imam Rashied Omar of the Claremont Main Road Mosque in Cape
Town argued as well. These dynamics include a general spread of the Salafi doctrine on a
global level and the increasing level of education in Lagos and Cape Town, which – as has
11
Lacroix, Awakening Islam.
Mohammad Ali Kadivar, ‘The Battle Over Higher Education in Iran’, Middle East Research and Information Project,
February 20 (2014).
12
65
EXPLAINING RELIGIOUS DIFFUSION
been shown – has been imperative to the hitherto growth of Salafism. With the doctrinal
inspiration from the north in the case of Lagos and the propagation campaign led particularly
by Sheikh Jameel Adam and Sheikh Ismail Gqamane in Cape Town, it is likely that Salafism
will continue to grow in importance in the coming years. One should be careful, however, of
not overestimating the potential growth of Salafism, as Salafis need political support or power
to dominate with their doctrine as stated by Madawi Al Rasheed in her analysis of the Saudi
state. Furthermore, the general religious tolerance in Sub-Saharan communities and the
connotation of Salafism associated with terrorism will counteract, to some extent, the effects
of these beneficial structures. As became clear throughout the research, the heavy Sunni
dominance, general animosity towards Shiism, and the scant resources of Iranian actors make
increasing Shia prominence unlikely. That said, the revolutionary discourse put forward by the
Iranian clerical establishment will always be capable of attracting parts of societies –
particularly the underprivileged in societies characterised by high inequality. A general factor
that is influencing the future role of Salafism and Shiism is the low level of religious
knowledge prevalent among lay Muslims. This lack of knowledge should be regarded as both
holding potential and as an obstacle. It holds potential from the perspective that is increases
the religious elites’ possibilities of manipulating or indoctrinating the Muslim masses. At the
same time however, it can be an obstacle since Islamic doctrines regarded as foreign are
perceived with great suspicion. Considering the societal influence of Salafi and Shia discourses
in Lagos and Cape Town, two trends stand out. First is increasing discursive animosity
between the two sects, which almost takes the form of a soft power proxy conflict with reference
to Saudi Arabia and Iran. This is particularly the case in Cape Town, where both sides believe
that animosity could spiral into a serious crisis if the opposite side does not soften its rhetoric.
In Lagos, this fierce rhetoric is evident too both among ‘ulama and between lay Muslims on
Internet forums. The second circumstance is the apolitical approach of the Salafis. According
to TerjeØstebo most Salafi movements in Sub-Saharan Africa are Purists (or Salafiyya da’wiyya)
as they oppose political engagement and focus on religious reform, da’wa and to Islamise
society.13 This seems also the case with Salafis in Lagos and in Cape Town, who primarily
focus on eradication of local customs and religious innovations thus making them actors of
social change rather than politically engaged.
13
See online lecture by Professor TerjeØstebo titled ’Salafism in Africa: Religious Purity and the Politics of Purity’,
February 27, 2013.
66
CHAPTER 6
CONCLUSION
Commenting on the recent Geneva negotiations on the Iranian nuclear programme, Mehdi, a
45-year-old florist in Teheran, stated that 'Saudi Arabia is afraid Iran will become the number
one power in the region. It is obvious. The Arabs have feared Iran for many centuries, and
they’re frightened now.’ 1 Despite the contextual difference, the comment highlights the
continued relevance of the Islamic Cold War narrative today approximately 35 years after the
Islamic Revolution took place in Iran and it is within this narrative the thesis positions itself. It
is my argument that Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran are struggling for regional
hegemony in the Gulf thus producing what I define as a soft power supremacy dilemma. With
inspiration from the conceptual framework of French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, the thesis
has sought to test the hypothesis that religious diffusion of Salafi and revolutionary Shia
doctrine and discourse in the Sub-Saharan metropolises of Lagos and Cape Town can be
explained and interpreted from the perspective of the ongoing Islamic Cold War context.
Furthermore, it has been my objective to define what level of interaction and through which
types of actors religious diffusion occurs, while more generally seeking to describe the
reciprocal influence of Salafi and Shia doctrines in the local environments of Lagos and Cape
Town, respectively.
Based on extensive study of Islamic doctrine and its historical development in Lagos and Cape
Town including two months of fieldwork in the local environments, I feel confident to
present three general conclusions from the research:
An increased Islamic pluralism in Lagos and Cape Town is affecting the
structures of the Islamic field.
1
Guardian, ’ In Iran, France, not Britain, now the 'Little Satan'. November 13, 2013.
67
CONCLUSION
Radicalisation of religious discourse functions as a tool for consolidation
and condemnation.
Indirect – but crucial – influence of Saudi and Iranian actors takes place in
the diffusion of Salafi and Shia doctrine in Lagos and Cape Town.
First, increased Islamic pluralism refers to the emergence of new doctrines in the Islamic
landscape of Lagos and Cape Town. Traditionally, Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa has been
associated with Sufi brotherhoods, which have been dominant guiding the practice of the
religion on the continent. In the 1960s-70s however, this monopolisation of Islamic practice was
challenged by the emergence of movements like Deobandi, Tablighi Jama’a and Ahmadiyya.
The proliferation of Islamic doctrines was further increased in the aftermath of the Iranian
Revolution and in more recent decades when Shia- and Salafi-inspired doctrines have become
parts of the doctrinal landscape thus challenging not only how Islam is practiced but also the
discourse within the Islamic field. Understood through the terminology of Bourdieu, the result
is a substantial change in the structure of the field and how religious authority is constructed
and achieved.
Second, the introduction of new doctrines has influenced the religious discourse of both
imams and lay-Muslims critically. The presence of Shia- and Salafi-inspired discourses has
implied a discursive radicalisation with the dual objective of consolidation within the Islamic
field and religious condemnation vis-à-vis the other sect and of Sufi brotherhoods. This
discursive struggle focuses on contentious issues regarding what constitutes religious knowledge and
what ‘true’ Islam is and has led to the introduction of rhetoric for religious accusation to define
the opponent sect and their practices. A second aspect is an increased focus on religious
knowledge, which is considered paramount by newcomers to the field like Salafis. Directly
attacking the paternalistic relation in Sufi brotherhoods between the marabout and his
followers, Salafis stress the necessity of acquiring substantial religious knowledge and to assess
Islamic sources critically, which in both the context of Lagos and Cape Town has instigated an
Islamic revivalism.
Third, the emergence of Salafism and Shiism in Lagos and Cape Town cannot be understood
properly without considering the impact of the Islamic Cold War and the role of Saudi and
Iranian actors in religious diffusion. It is my argument that neither Salafism nor Shiism is a
home-grown phenomenon but a product – either direct or indirect – of educational ties to Saudi
Arabia or the Islamic Republic of Iran. Having been exposed to Salafi or Shia doctrine,
Nigerians and South Africans return home to become religious pioneers and actors of social
change by adopting Salafism or (revolutionary) Shiism as their discursive reference. It is my
belief, however, that both Salafism and Shiism take a native character due to structural
restrictions in the local environments and as a result of the processes of diffusion. As so-called
returnees pioneer diffusion locally in both Lagos and Cape Town, the result is a glocalisation of
Salafi and Shia doctrine, which influences how the doctrines develop in the local context.
Analysed and interpreted within the Islamic Cold War narrative, I argue that this narrative can
account for specific dynamics of the development of Salafism and Shiism in Lagos and Cape
Town, specifically, and potentially more generally in Sub-Saharan Africa. I do not argue,
however, that the Islamic Cold War offers a complete explanation for the presence of Salafism
68
CHAPTER 6
and Shiism as I find it inadequate to explain certain aspects. Hence, despite its explanatory
prowess being far from complete, I nonetheless believe the research helps identify interaction
with Saudi and Iranian actors and institutions, which has been essential to the development of
Salafi and Shia doctrines outside the Gulf in environments like Nigeria and South Africa.
Historically, academic studies of Islamic doctrine in Sub-Saharan Africa have been largely
dominated by a focus on Sufism thus neglecting alternative doctrines like Salafism and Shiism.
Not only does this indicate a critical lack of studies on challenging Islamic doctrines, it also
implies an absence of research considering the transregional influence of religious centres in
the Middle East on the development of contemporary Islam south of Sahara. In my research I
identify critical changes in the Islamic landscape in Lagos and Cape Town compared to
conventional wisdom and illustrate the importance of external influence in regards to the
emergence of new Islamic doctrines. Hence, I believe that the conclusions can contribute not
only with important perspectives on the development of Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa but also
on the dynamics of the Islamic Cold War and its geographical scope. Because so little research
has been conducted in the field, the potential for continental generalisation becomes desirable.
As argued by Mara Leichtman, an assumed absence of Shias does not necessarily imply they
are not present, but more likely it indicates an absence of scholarly research. As the same can
be said for Salafism, the general absence of scholarly work on the topic presents a challenge to
our understanding of the development of Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa. One should always be
careful when generalising and particularly regarding a geographical area as vast as Sub-Saharan
Africa.Considering the diversity of the case studies –on matters of geography, religious
composition, historical trajectory and closeness to Islamic centres – I believe the tendencies
illustrated in Lagos and Cape Town indicate patterns that are valid for several others cities,
regions or even states on the continent.
With a stringent focus on the prominence of Salafism and Shiism and the analytical prism of
the Islamic Cold War, many interesting perspectives have been left out intentionally. A
premise inherent in research, this exclusion nonetheless entails certain limitations of the
descriptive and explanatory prowess of the analyses. Neither Salafism nor Shiism has
developed solely as a result of Saudi or Iranian influence, as other factors such as socioeconomic deprivation and instable political situations must be assumed to have been
important parameters too. These constrains underline the importance of further research of
Islamic radicalisation in Sub-Saharan Africa, how external sources influence such processes of
radicalisation, and how doctrines become glocalised. Meanwhile, I consider this research as an
important first-step contribution to the field, which hopefully will instigate continued interest.
69
ANNEX: MAPS
LAGOS
70
CAPE TOWN
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Louis Brenner. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993.
Wagemakers, Joas. A Quietist Jihadi: The Ideology and Influence of Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
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Westerlund, David and Evers Rosander, Eva (eds.).African Islam and Islam in Africa: encounters
between Sufis and Islamists. London: Hurst, 1997.
Wiktorowicz, Quintan. ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’. In Studies in Conflict & Terrorism,
29:3 (2006): pp. 207-239.
Wiktorowicz, Quintan. ‘Framing Jihad: Intramovement Framing Contests and al-Qaeda’s
Struggle for Sacred Authority’. In International Review of Social History, No. 49 (2004): pp.
159-177.
Zenn, Jacob. ‘The Islamic Movement and Iranian Intelligence Activities in Nigeria’. CTC
Sentinel, Vol. 6, Issue 10 (October 2013): pp. 13-18
Zine, Muhammad binJamil. Islamic Creed: Based on the Qur’ân and Sunna. Saudi Arabia:
MaktabaSar-us-Salam, year unknown
Zubeida, Sami. ‘Is Iran an Islamic State?’. In Political Islam: Essays from Middle East Report, eds.
Joel Beinin and Joe Stork. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.
Østebø, Terje.Localising Salafism. Religious Change among Oromo Muslims in Bale, Ethiopia. Leiden:
Brill, 2012.
SOURCES CONSULTED
WEBSITES
Alao, Abiodun, ‘Islamic Radicalisation and Violence in Nigeria – Country Report’. King’s
College:
http://www.securityanddevelopment.org/pdf/ESRC%20Nigeria%20Overview.pdf,acces
sed October 20 2013
Back, Irit, ‘Iran and Nigeria: Friendship or Rivalry?’,The Alliance Centre for Iranian Studies - Iran
Pulse No. 54, 14 January 2013: http://humanities.tau.ac.il/iranian/en/iran-pulse/10-iranpulse-en/207-iranpulse-54 , accessed August 12 2013
Ezeobi, Chiemelie, ‘Suspected Boko Haram Members Arrested in Lagos’. This Day Live,
March 22 2013: http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/suspected-boko-haram-membersarrested-in-lagos/142896, accessed November 13, 2013
Farah, Douglas, ‘Nigeria and the Muslim Brotherhood’. March 10th, 2006:
http://www.strategycenter.net/research/pubID.94/pub_detail.asp, accessed November
9 2013
International Crisis Group, ‘Northern Nigeria: Background to Conflict’. Africa Report
N°168 – 20 December 2010: http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/africa/westafrica/nigeria/168%20Northern%20Nigeria%20%20Background%20to%20Conflict.ashx, accessed November 9 2013
IOL News, ’ SA ends Iranian oil imports’. June 7, 2013:
http://www.iol.co.za/business/international/sa-ends-iranian-oil-imports1.1528937#.UrBBhJHfZCU
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
IOL News, ’ SA cuts oil imports from Iran’. August 1, 2012:
http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/sa-cuts-oil-imports-from-iran1.1354428#.UrA-FJHfZCU, accessed November 20, 2013
Kadivar, Mohammad Ali, ‘The Battle Over Higher Education in Iran’, Middle East Research
and Information Project, February 20 (2014): http://www.merip.org/mero/mero022014,
accessed March 13 2014
Kendal, Elizabeth, ‘Nigeria: Investigating Wahhabi Insurection and Saudi Funds’, Assist
News Service, February 26, 2004:
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Pence, Eliot and Etebari, Mehrun, ’Reaching Iran through South Africa’.The National Interest,
May 23, 2012: http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/reaching-iran-through-southafrica-6956, accessed December 3, 2013
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Thurston, Alexander, ‘To Hajj Without an Escort’, in the Revealer, October 16 2012:
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www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/13/iran-france-not-uk-now-the-little-satan,
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INTERNET SOURCES
AhlulBayt Islamic Mission (http://www.aimislam.com/about-us/)
AhlulBayt Foundation of South Africa (http://www.afosa.org/about-afosa/ahlul-bayt-insouth-africa.html)
AhlulBayt Digital Islamic Library Project (http://www.al-islam.org)
Ahl-us-Sunnah Cape Town (http://www.ahlussunnah.co.za)
Al Huda Foundation (http://www.al-huda.co.za)
Islamic Movement in Nigeria (http://www.islamicmovement.org)
Muslim Forum South Africa (http://www.muslimforum.co.za/forum.php)
Muslim Students’ Society of Nigeria, Lagos State Area Unit (http://www.mssnlagos.org)
Nairaland, Nigerian Forum for Muslims (http://www.nairaland.com/)
Salafi Manhaj (http://www.salafimanhaj.com)
VIDEO SOURCES
78
BIBLIOGRAPHY
‘Are you from Ahl-us-Sunnah?’. Sheikh Jameel Adam, Ahl-us-Sunnah Cape Town
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKNob9KuLgg)
‘Imam Khomeini Conference 2009’. Sheikh Ibrahim Zakzaky
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5rs6L7oUdY)
‘Rise of Shia Islam in Nigeria’. Press Tv (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flCJjDWWlTo)
‘Salafism in Africa: Religious Purity and the Politics of Purity’. TerjeØstebo (online lecture),
February 27, 2013 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BovxTcXw0aQ)
‘Shia Islam in South Africa part 1 to 4’.AhlulBaytTv
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTTX48qZok0)
‘Shia Muslims mark Ashura in Nigeria’. Press Tv
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrrIewfJatg)
‘The Manhaj of Ahlus Sunnah’. Sheikh Jameel Adam, Ahl-us-Sunnah Cape Town
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVG8VTKvRsU)
‘Tauhid conference’. Sheikh Jameel Adam, Ahl-us-Sunnah Cape Town
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAlw1o0Gdts)
AUDIO SOURCES
Sheikh Jameel Adam: Lecture series including talks on (lectures can be found here:
http://www.ahlussunnah.co.za/pages/main_pages/audio.html):
– The Aqeedah of the Salaf
– The Manhaj of the Salaf
– What is Salafiyya & Who are the Salafis
– Are you from Ahlussunnah
– Bidah In Islam
– Shia's & Sufi's
– Mawlid
– Shufism
Sheikh Muhammad bin Uthman: Lectures on Salafiyya and Tafsir
Sheikh Abubakr Gumi
FIRST-HAND INTERVIEW
Name
AbdulhameedSalahudeen
Abdul MonineOmolajaYousuph
Abdurrahma Ibrahim
AchmatCassim
Title / Occupation
Imam at Monar Islamic
Reformative Movement (Salafi)
Head of the Islamic and Arabic
Training Centre in Agege
Imam at MusbauDeen Mosque
(Tijaniyya)
Political activist and founder of
Qiblah (Shia)
79
Place and date
Lagos: September 1,
2013
Lagos: September 3,
2013
Lagos: August 21, 2013
Cape Town: October 2,
2013
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ahmad
AlhajiTijaniAdisa
Bashier Rahim
El-ShamiNoshy Ali
FaaikGamieldien
Ghazali Yusuf
IdrissaEbrahim
Ismail Gqamane
Ismail Yusuf
KamoladdeenJuma’a
Khalid Sayed
Miftah
Mohammad Abubakar
Mohammad Salis
Mubarak Abdelkhader
Rashied Omar
Shuaib Appleby
ShuaibBooley
SulaimonOpeyemiBuhariOlaniyo
TajuddeenEkemode
Thaffir Najjar
UstazAbdulsalaam
Zakaria
Imam at the Ahmadiyya Muslim
Jama’at, Mushin (Ahmadiyya)
Chief Imam at Egbe Central
Mosque (Sufi)
Imam at the AhlulBayt Mosque
Cape Town (Shia)
Executive Secretary of WAMY
Nigeria
Imam at Masjid al-Sunni (Salafi)
Administrative secretary of the
MSS Lagos branch
Head of Africa Muslim Agency
(NGO)
Imam at Masakhane Muslim
Community (Salafi)
Imam in Epe, Lagos (Salafi)
Administrative Coordinator at the
Ahl al-Sunna wal-Jama’a Lagos
group (Salafi)
Chairman of the ANC Youth
Western Cape (Shia)
Head of Islamic Movement in
Nigeria in Lagos, Ilorin and
Ibadan (Shia)
Imam at Central Mosque Idi
Araba (Tijaniyya)
Imam at Idi Araba Community
Mosque (Salafi)
Imam in Mushin (Ahl al-Sunnah)
Imam at Claremont Main Road
Mosque
Imam and Spokesperson of the
MJC, Cape Town (Sunni-Ashari)
Former Imam at Al Jihad and a
founding member of Hezbollah
in Cape Town (Shia)
Chief Imam at Central Mosque
Mushin, Lagos (Tijaniyya)
General Secretary at the Ansarud-Deen, Fadeyi Branch
Head of ICSA (Islamic reformist)
Imam at Ahmadiyya Mosque,
Agege (Ahmadiyya)
Chairman of Muslim Student
Association, UCT
Lagos: August 22, 2013
Lagos: September 1,
2013
Cape Town: September
20, 2013
Lagos: August 26, 2013
Cape Town: September
30, 2013
Lagos: August 21, 2013
Cape Town: September
20, 2013
Cape Town: September
23, 2013
Lagos: August 21, 2013
Lagos: August 27, 2013
Cape Town: September
19, 2013
Lagos: September 11,
2013
Lagos: August 30, 2013
Lagos: August 30, 2013
Lagos: August 23, 2013
Cape Town: September
26, 2013
Cape Town: September
25, 2013
Cape Town: September
Lagos: August 22, 2013
Lagos: August 23, 2013
Cape Town: September
26, 2013
Lagos: September 3,
2013
Cape Town: October 1,
2013
SECOND-HAND INTERVIEW/DISCUSSIONS
Abdulkhader Tayob, Professor, Islamic Studies, Religion and Public Life, University of
Cape Town
80
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Alexander Thurston, Ph.D. candidate in the Religion Department at Northwestern
University and runs Sahelblog.wordpress.com
Andrea Brigaglia, Associate Professor, University of Cape Town
Brandon Kendhammer, Assistant Professor, Political Science, Ohio University
BukolaAdeyemiOyeniyi, Professor, Political Studies and Governance Department,
University of the Free State (South Africa)
Ganief Hendricks, Leader of Al Jama’ah South Africa
Irit Back, Professor, The Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African
Studies, Tel Aviv University
John Paden, Professor, Public and International Affairs at George Mason University
Mara Leichtman,Assistant Professor at Department of Anthropology, Michigan State
University
Muhammad Kabir Isa, Professor, Ahmadu Bello University (Zaria, Nigeria)
Roman Loimeier, Professsor at Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology,
UniversitätGöttingen
TerjeØstebø, Assistant Professor, Department of Religion and the Center for African
Studies, University of Florida
81