Kano’s sharia police launch immorality

Kano’s sharia police launch immorality
crackdown
on october 22, 2013 at 5:42 pm in news
Islamic police in Nigeria’s Kano launch immorality
crackdown
KANO, October 22, 2013 (AFP) – Police who enforce
Islamic law in Nigeria’s northern city of Kano have
arrested 150 people in the last week, including for
indecent dress, as part of a crackdown on
immorality, a spokesman said Tuesday.
Some people in Nigeria’s second city have been
picked up for sporting hair styles inspired by
prominent international football players, said
Mohammed Yusuf Yola, spokesman for Kano’s
sharia police, or Hisbah.
Others were thrown in jail and fined for wearing
their trousers too low on their waists, mimicking a
style that became prominent in the 1990s, partly
through the influence of some American hip hop
artists.
The arrests have followed an order by Kano state
Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso to cleanse the
city of immoral practices and the trend is set to
continue in the weeks ahead, said Hisbah Director-
General Abba Sufi.
The Hisbah is a state police force funded by state
government and is not part of the federal police.
“We have arrested 150 men and women in the past
week, including prostitutes and their boyfriends,
transvestites, alcoholics and those engaged in
indecent dressing in contravention of the sharia
legal code,” Yola told AFP.
Religion has repeatedly been used as a political
issue in Kano and the governor, seen as a
moderate, has been accused by rivals of lacking
commitment to sharia’s guidelines.
Yola insisted the operation was launched to reverse
disturbing trends in the city of some five million
people and is targetting people of various faiths.
“Those arrested include Muslims and non-Muslims
and we treat them equally because this is about
morality,” he said.
Kano, like the rest of northern Nigeria, is majority
Muslim, but the city has a sizeable Christian
minority.
Some of those arrested have been released after
paying fines ranging from 10,000 naira ($63, 46
euros) to 15,000 naira, Yola said.
“Those who could not afford the fine are being kept
in prison,” he added, but he would not specify the
number of people currently being held.
At the restoration of civilian rule in 1999, 12
northern states, including Kano, formally adopted
sharia, but the Islamic legal system has been
unevenly applied.
The Hisbah was formed in 2001, largely to enforce
sharia, but the force has other duties, including
some community development work and alternative
dispute resolution.
The southern half of Nigeria, Africa’s most populous
country, is mostly Christian.