In the video attached to this essay (see link at the end of this essay), a clip from Davido’s upcoming song and another one from a private party in Saudi Arabia were blended to form a whole clip, which, to my understanding, was done to educate the audience, especially following the uproar that followed David Adeleke’s teaser of his upcoming song social media.

In Davido’s original clip, a number of dancers were featured alongside him, wearing Jalabia, and dancing in front of a building that was outfitted with a Public Address System (PAS), and praying mats – just like in a mosque. Depending on what was included in the main video, there was no crescent, no star, no minaret on the rooftop, no muezzin, no inscription or any depiction that could, in any way, tie the video to Islam beyond the PAS, praying mats, and Jalabia. It must be added that a dancer was on the rooftop, however.

Alongside this imagery, Davido and others could be heard singing:

“O ngbona feli, feli.

Won fe mo bi mo se njeun lo.

Ko le ye won bi a se njeun lo.”

“It is super-hot.

They want to know the reason for our success.

They cannot know how we are successful.” (my translation).

With the imagery (of ostensibly a mosque) in the background, Davido and co. were simply adducing their joy, happiness, and attainments to God. Why then were some Muslims angry about this? Was it because Davido is a Christian?

As many have noted on social media, Davido and co. were culturally insensitive and their act – dancing in front of a mosque, constitutes an affront to Islam. For this, many have called on the Nigerian state to investigate Davido and co. and to prohibit the eventual release of the song. Some ultra-radical Muslims went as far as to call for the killing of Davido and his crew, a call that I found strange and outrageous.

A cross-section of Nigerians to which I belong saw nothing wrong with Davido, although a Christian, singing in praise of God whether inside or outside a mosque. To this group, cultural appropriation such as that done by Davido is a testament to Nigeria’s diversity.

My first reaction to Davido’s video clip was placid, as I found the clip relevant to national development, especially following Nigeria’s recent Presidential election and the polarization that followed the ruling party’s presentation of a Muslim-Muslim ticket. On account of this, I looked at both the lyrics and the imagery as unifying, more so because they symbolize an acknowledgement of and respect for Islam, and an acceptance of the primacy of God in human attainments. Yes, I agree that there exist elements of cultural appropriation, but I have not seen the disrespect that many adduced to the video clip.

For example, in about 50 comments and posts, there was no discussion of the song’s lyrics or any claim whatsoever about whether the lyrics were offensive to Islam or not. Were the words anti-Islam? No attempt was made to show how the imagery constitutes a smear of Islam. Can the lyrics be linked with the imagery? If so, was the entire clip edifying or denigrating Islam?

Until we have access to the entire song, I think it is wrong to run into any conclusion on the imagery and the lyrics. I say this not because Davido, although a Christian, was known to have sung any religiously-edifying songs, his adducing his happiness, success, and enjoyment to God (Allah in Arabic) should not be condemned in the manner in which it is being done at the moment. Even if the entire song was released and it turned out to be lewd, I still cannot bring myself to accept that only Muslims should adduce their attainments of happiness, success in life, and enjoyment to God. Neither would I accept that Davido was out of place in his Islamic/Muslim cultural appropriation.

The brouhaha that the video clip has garnered must have reached Davido, as the latest reports from social media were to the effect that he has pulled down the video clip – a step that I considered as sensible.

Davido, like me, is a Yoruba man and, as a Yoruba man, he lives in a cultural milieu where every family can boast of having adherents of Traditional African Religion (ATR), Islam, and Christianity. In such a cultural milieu, what was depicted in the video was an everyday occurrence.

Growing up in Oyo Town in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, I lived and co-mingled with adherents of the three religious persuasions. In 1977, at L.A. Primary School, Bola, I led a procession of students during the interment of our school’s imam. Except for myself and two others – Tunde and one other person whose name I have forgotten, others were Muslims. Not only was I a Christian, but my father was also a Baptist Pastor whose second wife was a practising Muslim.

In a reaction to my social media post, a professor of History from Kano noted that in Islam, dancing and drumming is prohibited and that Muslims do not play with their religion by dancing and drumming (in the mosques) as Christians do. As anyone with a knowledge of Islamic history would confirm, what the professor described cannot be divorced from Wahhabism, a puritanical Islamic tradition within the Sunni Islamic movement that arose with the works of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab who lived in the Arabian Peninsula between 1703 and 1792.

Wahhabism, as the dominant form of Islam in Saudi Arabia, has influenced other parts of the Muslim world, most especially Nigeria. The key characteristics of Wahhabi Islamic tradition include a strict interpretation of Islam, Tawhid or monotheism, the rejection of Bid’ah or the removal of Innovations from Islam, prohibition of veneration of shrines and saints, separation of gender, conservative social practices, opposition to intercession, and global influence of Wahhabi-Salafism.

As a professor of African history, I teach Wahhabism/Salafism on a semester basis and can confirm that most of the Jihads that we read about in African history revolve around some, if not all of these Salafi or Wahhabi tenets. Of these tenets, the most relevant to the discussion at hand is the rejection of Bid’ah or the removal of Innovations from Islam and conservative social practices. Dancing and drumming were so frowned upon by the Wahhabis that they prohibited them altogether. At the height of their powers, the Wahhabis burnt down shrines and burial places of Islamic saints.

Prior to the time of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, these and other practices were allowed in Islam. The advent of the Wahhabis is therefore synonymous with the dubbing of these practices as innovations that must be uprooted from Islam at all costs, including killing. To the Wahhabis, these and other practices were innovations and they considered it their sacred duty to remove these innovations and restore Islam to its original state i.e., as practiced by the Holy Prophet.

From the foregoing, permit me to conclude that those who were and are still calling out Davido and co. for drumming and dancing inside or outside of the mosque are either Wahhabi/Salafis or exhibiting tenets that are associated with Wahhabi-Salafism. It is important to note that from Maitatsine and al-Qaeda to Boko Haram, these terrorist groups also advocated the removal of innovations from Islam and given these groups’ history, threats to the lives of Davido and crew must not be taken lightly.

Wahhabism is known for its strict and literal interpretation of the Quran and Hadith (sayings and actions of the Prophet Muhammad); hence, followers of this tradition believe that when the Holy Prophet ordered that Muslims should kill, not minding the context, they are mandated to kill and therefore must kill. To them, the Quran and Hadith are express words of God that MUST be obeyed and not be subjected to any form of contextual understanding or interpretation.

It is with this in mind that I salute Davido and co. for pulling down their video clip, as two or more incidences have shown the world how virulent adherents of Wahhabi-Salafism could be.

On 30 September 2005, the Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper, published 12 editorial cartoons on the Holy Prophet, a culturally insensitive step, as Islam forbade any depiction of Prophet Muhammed. As the newspaper argued, this was to contribute to the debate about criticism of Islam and self-censorship. However, Muslim groups around the world embarked on protests, some peaceful, some violent, leading to the death of many and the destruction of property. There was also the case of a YouTube video that led to the 2012 Benghazi attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Libya, which led to the killing of a US Ambassador. The attacks were occasioned in part by a purported production and posting of an alleged anti-Islam video on YouTube by an Egyptian-American. The attacks started at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi and subsequently its annexe.

Can any Nigerian forget such names as Gideon Akaluka, Deborah Yakubu, and Isioma Daniel? Did the Deputy Governor of Zamfara State, Mahmud Aliyu Shinkafi, not address citizens of the state on the radio, noting that “Like Salman Rushdie, the blood of Isioma Daniel can be shed. It is abiding on all Muslims wherever they are to consider the killing of the writer as a religious duty.” If Isioma had not voted with her legs, she would have suffered the same fate as Gideon and Deborah. There are numerous other examples, that for brevity’s sake, I won’t go into in this essay. Permit me to state that this essay did not approve of the allegations against Gideon, Isioma, Deborah or any other victims of religious violence and intolerance in Nigeria. Just as I condemn in no small terms the purported ‘crimes’ of these victims, I condemn in no small terms the gruesome, cruel, and bestial treatments some Muslims have meted out to these fellow human beings. Any Muslim that revels in these bestial acts does not represent Islam.

As could be seen in the second part of the video clip attached to this essay, Muslims in today’s Saudi Arabia – the primus home of Wahhabi Islam – are boogie-dancing while Wahhabi-Salafis in Nigeria are calling for the heads of Davido and co. for standing in front of an imaginary mosque, thanking God for their successes. One would have thought that the deeper meanings of the Shahada, the belief that “There is no god but God, and Muhammad is the Messenger of God” truly encompasses not giving to others, the praise, the glory, the adoration, that is due only to God (Allah).

What makes Muslims in today’s Saudi Arabia right and Davido and co. wrong? Is this because Davido is a Christian? When has praising God become a crime or sin? Did the Holy Prophet not send some of his earliest followers to Christians in Ethiopia (then called Abyssinia) when the prophet faced persecution in the Arabian Peninsula? Are Nigerian Muslims more Muslim than their counterparts from Saudi Arabia? By the way, when did Nigerian Muslims become snowflakes?

Link to video: https://www.facebook.com/100014434449053/videos/808010004241678/