Hardline Islamic cleric, Sheik Abdallah Usman Gadan Kanya, has started mobilizing fellow clerics and adherents against the proposed Muhammadu Buhari film village in Kano State saying Allah would curse the initiators.
Sheik Gadan Kanya, a doctorate holder from Bayero University, described the project as a plot to undermine Muslims and their religion in Kano State by creating a hub for immorality and un-Islamic acts. He threatened that, unless the government stopped the film village, clerics would embark on spiritual prayers that would result in blindness and deaf diseases on those behind the film village.
The proposed film village is meant to be located on a 12-hectare piece of land in Kano State. Officials of the Nigerian Film Corporation recently toured the site, while Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje also hosted a stakeholders meeting to discuss the feasibility of the project.
SaharaReporters obtained the sheik’s Hausa language audio message being circulated in Kano in which the preacher states that the naming of the film village after President Buhari was a gimmick. He declared that Mr. Buhari was neither Allah nor the prophet, adding that he and other clerics and believers would resist the film village even if it has the president’s backing.
Below are excerpts from Sheik Abdallah Usman Gadan Kaya’s take on the proposed Muhammadu Buhari Film Village, Kofa, Kano State:
“We have details of a plot in our state of Kano. There is a plan to establish a film village in Kofa, Bebeji local government area of Kano State. There is going to be massive preachings against it and lectures by Islamic clerics considering the danger coming with this. So the first benefit Muslims in Kano and Nigeria will get is the establishment of a national or international film village? In which from all parts of the world, people will be coming to Kofa to do film or drama. A southerner will come and do film in Kofa; a northerner will come and do film in Kofa. American will come and do film in Kofa, Indian will come and do a film in Kofa and Britons will come and do the same thing in Kofa. To come and practice immorality and destroy our values.
“They have earmarked billions of naira for the project that will stretch over an eight-kilometer complex...We are calling on all our writers to start writing against it. Southerners want the film village in their place, but they refused to take it there because they know there are Muslims in Kano, and they want to destroy our religion and values.
“Some Yoruba who are pagans want it, but they refused and insisted that it is in Kano State that they will establish it. We heard that it is one lawmaker that is bringing this calamity to us from Federal Government. Another mischief is that they have put the picture of the President and calling the place Muhammadu Buhari Film Village because they know people love Buhari and are supporting him. But Buhari is not Allah, and he is not [the] Prophet. Even if it is Buhari that did wrong we will confront him squarely. Even if it is Buhari that brings this we will fight it; it is wrong.
“Tell them, write it and propagate it through all the means. We don't want it; we don't need it. They should take it somewhere. We will continue to curse people behind this film village. You should campaign against it in WhatsApp, Facebook. If they insist, we have hot spiritual prayers that will bring curse and affliction to anyone. Very hot prayers that will cause blindness and make those involved deaf completely.”
