Justice Yellim Bogoro of the Federal Excessive Court docket in Lagos has dismissed the go well with filed by a lawyer, Malcolm Omirhobo, difficult the inclusion of Arabic inscriptions on the Nigerian forex Naira.
Justice Bogoro, in a judgment within the go well with, held that Omirhobo failed to supply enough proof to persuade her that the Central Financial institution of Nigeria (CBN) acted in dangerous religion in designing, issuing, printing, and distributing the naira notes with Arabic inscriptions.
The decide, nevertheless, agreed with the plaintiff that Nigeria is a secular state and, as such, no faith is superior to the opposite.
The court docket additionally famous that Nigeria is a multi-ethnic and non secular nation and that no ethnic group or faith is superior to the opposite.
The lawyer had filed the go well with in 2020, arguing that having Arabic inscriptions on the naira notes portrays Nigeria as an Islamic state, opposite to the constitutional standing of a secular state.
Omirhobo had urged the court docket to restrain the CBN from “additional approving, printing and issuing naira notes with Arabic inscriptions, taking into consideration that Nigeria is a secular state.”
Whereas claiming that he doesn’t know what the Arabic inscriptions imply, he requested the court docket to order the CBN to switch them with both English, the nation’s official language, or any of Nigeria’s three predominant indigenous languages—Hausa, Yoruba, or Igbo.
The plaintiff additional submitted that the CBN has been violating sections 10 and 55 of the Nigerian Structure, which make the nation a secular state, by having Arabic inscriptions on the naira observe.
Nonetheless, in a counter-affidavit filed in opposition to the go well with, the CBN insisted that opposite to Omirhobo’s declare, “the Ajami inscriptions on a few of the nation’s currencies don’t connote any non secular statements or Arabian alignment.”
Within the affidavit deposed to by Abiola Lawal, the apex financial institution acknowledged that the inscriptions on the nation’s currencies don’t threaten the secular statehood of the nation and have by no means violated the Structure of Nigeria, as each design and inscription was finalised with the approval of the related authorities our bodies.
Additionally, in opposition to the go well with, the Registered Trustees of Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) had claimed that Omirhobo’s arguments had been motivated by “non secular bigotry, non secular intolerance and outright hatred for Islam.”
MURIC additionally submitted that the structure doesn’t state that Nigeria is a secular state.
The organisation additionally argued that Arabic is only a language and never synonymous with Islam, saying the Bible, which is the Christian holy e-book, is printed within the Arabic language in Israel, Egypt, Palestine, Lybia, Syria and different nations.
It additional acknowledged that if the signal of the cross, synonymous with Christianity, could possibly be used on government-owned hospitals and ambulances, there was no motive why Arabic shouldn’t be permitted on naira notes.