Percy Onyeka
The 35th Inaugural lecture series of the Nasarawa state university presented by Professor Sa’adatu Hassan Liman took an emotional dimension as former governors , minister, traditional rulers, friends and well wishers of the inaugural lecturer in their various submission via their good will messages showered encomium on her.
Majorly , those that attended and spoke are friends and associates of professor sa’adatu’s late father, who was the Magajin Mallam Keffi of blessed memory.
The event which took place in the Assembly Hall of the Nasarawa State University Keffi, had tremendous support of the Keffi and Lafia community as well as guest from across the states of the Federation.
The lecture topic; Deconstructing The Notion Of Oppression And Suppression Of Women In Islam: Revisiting The Islamic Versus Universal Concepts Of Human Rights, examines the status of women in Islam and the future challenges, while doing doing that it affirms that mo religion or civilization has given the woman such an enormous rights she enjoys in Islam.
Professor Sa’adatu posited that all the rights to freedom that the modern woman is clamouring for today has been given to the Muslim woman over 1400 years ago by Islamic as proven by the textual sources (Qur’an and Hadith) and in the formulations of Shari’ah
According to her” These rights pertain to marriage, divorce, property, inheritance, custody of children, evidence of reward and punishments among others.
” Though the same religious texts- the Qur’an and the Hadith are often invoked to justified their lack of progress, it is discovered that numerous challenges are responsible for their dilema and these are mostly due to social structure and diversity rather than religious structure” She added.
Professor Sa’adatu maintained that nonetheless it is lack of proper application of these Islamic given rights due to enculturation of both the western and traditional cultures that are responsible for oppression and suppression of Muslim women today
Continuing , she said it is concluded that the call by the Muslim women activists and feminists and the western feminists groups for reinterpretation of Qur’anic verses and reformation of the Shari’ah principles on women’s rights are baseless and will not yield the desire results in the protection of the human rights of women.
In that light, professor Sa’adatu Hassan Liman recommended that parents should educate their children, ensure that every girl child is educated and where failure on the part of the parents prevails, every husband is duty bound to educate his wife.
She recommended that as much as differences and diversities can not be done away with, Muslims must try to be just to their women folk, just as the Prophet( S.A.W) commanded in his farewell pilgrimage speech.
That the Muslim feminist struggle should be geared towards strict application of Shari’ah rules regarding women’s rights as a preached and exemplified by the Prophet.
In the different speeches Senator Abdullahi Adamu, Dr Adamu Muazu , former Bauchi State Governor, Dem patience Pauline Tallen, the immediate past minister of women affairs and the emir of keffi, Dr shehu chindo Yamusa111 said , professor Sa’adatu has shown excellence and determination in her career which stands her out among women.
They said their relationship with the university don can be back dated to her father who was a very meek man, therefore the lecture will ot only exposed women and the girlchild to knowledge but encourage the girlchild to be more active as a matter of knowing her rights .
Earlier, the vice chancellor and the chairman of the inaugural le tire series, Professor Suleiman , Mohammed Bala in his address eulogies the inaugural lecture presenter, professor Sa’adatu Liman for he dexterity and commitment to service of the university and to humanity in general.
According to him, Sa’adatu Liman is a worthy partner in whose modest contribution to the development the institution is unquantifiable.
Professor Suleiman took time to acknowledge the contribution of the executive governor of the state engineer Abdullahi Sule for taking over the payment of staff salaries and his numerous gestures both official and personal.
In line with his out pouring gratitude, he thank the state deputy governor , Dr Emmanuel Akabe for his promised which he fulfilled by generously contributing the the school eye clinic.
The VC maintained that the university shall continue to partner with relevant stakeholders in the state and in the country at large to endure that inaugural lectures in NSUK is sustained.
Techrectory with Agency Report.
