Twenty-nine pan-Yoruba groups have rejected calls from some Muslims in the Southwest region for Sharia law and courts.
The groups claim to represent artisans, workers, students, community-based groups, traders, professionals and self-determination groups and millions of Yoruba people spread across Yoruba territories in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Osun, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara, Kogi and parts of Delta and Edo states.
The groups argued Sha- ria law will not solve the socioeconomic problems faced by the people of the region, noting that the majority of people in the 12 northern states where Shariah law is practised in Nigeria live in abject poverty.
It said, “We do not come as Christians, Muslims, animists, atheist or traditional worshippers but as Yoruba created the same way by Almighty God the creator of the universe, bound together by humanity seeking perpetuation of peace, love and progress of Yorubaland.
“We recognise the right to debate the future of the children of Oduduwa and the right to free speech as exemplified in the constitution of Nigeria and in the time- less culture of Yorubaland.”
The groups “observed the current proposal by a tiny group of people, backed by largely non-Yoruba domestic and international collaborators pushing for the introduction of Sharia in Yorubaland”.
They, however, stated that the introduction of Shariah cannot improve the economic, political, social and cultural deficit in Yorubaland.
They said, “That Yorubaland though seen as the most economically developed territory in West Africa, attained this feat not
