Nigeria and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation: A Discourse in Identity, Faith and Development, 1969–2016
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Date
2019-03-05
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religions
Abstract
Nigeria is both a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society, with Islam and Christianity being
the dominant religions. The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is therefore an institution that
the Muslim segment of the country can readily identify with. However, there is the question of the
secular posture of the country, which Christians within the polity use as an excuse to distance the
country from an institution they perceive to be exclusively for Muslims. However, despite being an
organization that emerged from Muslim solidarity, the OIC transcends faith to provide economic
and political opportunities for member nations. The fact that Islam remains a rallying point within
the OIC, however, made Nigeria’s relationship with the organization tenuous for the most part.
It is against this backdrop that the paper traces the origins and evolution of Nigeria’s involvement
with the OIC, identifying its cost and benefits. The essay argues that Nigeria will be the better for
it if both the Christian and Muslim segments of the population embrace the OIC as a whole or are
unanimous in discarding it. The divisive tendency that Nigeria’s membership breeds, however,
will be detrimental to the nation’s unity and development.
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Keywords
Nigeria, Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), foreign policy, secularity, economic aids