Last year I returned to Kaduna after six years away and was concerned by the religious divisions I encountered. They seemed more entrenched than ever. The city is increasingly split along ethnic and religious lines, with Muslims and Christians living apart. The state government is alive to the danger of sectarian division. Apart from providing more job opportunities for a teeming youth population, there is a need to check the activities of “rogue” extremist preachers who promote intolerance among the many with limited prospects.

State Governor Nasir El-Rufai, himself a Hausa Muslim, has forwarded a religious preaching bill to the House of Assembly for consideration. The revised Kaduna State Regulation of Religious Preaching Edict No. 7 of 1984 would place responsibility for oversight in the hands of the main Islamic and Christian religious bodies, the Jama’atu Nasiru Islam and the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN). It also provides for the establishment of an inter-faith ministerial committee whose members the governor will appoint.

Read more: http://www.naijiant.com/guestcolumn/religious-strife-view-kaduna/

anything hell rufus is bad