Women, girls are jewels, not objects of molestation, say Ahmadiyya women

AHMADIYYA Muslim women under the auspices of Lajna Imaillah Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at Nigeria (LIMAN) have condemned the high rate of rape and other forms of violence against women and girls in Nigeria.

Rising from a virtual meeting/training against sexual violence against women in Lagos, the Muslim women described the rising cases of rape across the country as sad and unfortunate, considering the vulnerable nature of this group of people and their crucial roles in the society as mothers and homemakers.

According to the sadr (president) of LIMAN, Hajiya Taofeeqah Fagbolade, Islam frowns on any form of violence against women and regards rape as a grievous crime, under the Sharia.

Hajiya Fagbolade quoted the traditions of Prophet Muhammad on respectable status of women in Islam, stating that “when a Muslim girl is born, she becomes the reason for her father to enter Jannah (paradise). When she grows up and marries a man, she completes half of the religion of her man. And when she becomes a mother, paradise lies under her feet for her children.”

Consequently, the leader of the Ahmadiyya women group noted that when “you raise a female child successfully, you have raised a nation, because from her would future generations be borne.”

She argued that women and girls are “jewels that are never to be regarded as objects of ridicule or molestation” and should be recognised as such.

Hajiya Fagbolade commended the Federal Government on the sex offenders register it launched last year but pointed out that there is the urgent need for the government to back that gesture up with an enabling law for penalties against perpetrators of this violent act to serve as a deterrent for would-be offenders.

The group urged state Houses of Assembly to pass a bill on rape and gender violence.

It admonished parents, guardians and religious leaders to join in the fight against the scourge by sensitising their children, wards and followers to the implications of rape, especially in terms of the psychological, physical and social effects on the victims.

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