The proposed holding of the Miss world contest and the Arrival of the beauty queens in Nigeria as well as the Violent protests which followed the contest have revealed deep cleavages which if not properly managed could lead to a permanent split in the West African country. When the Miss World contest was first broached, the predominant Muslim North was against it as it felt the event was not a priority to the Nigerian economy and that the spectacle of girls parading themselves in semi nude attires and prancing to an ogling audience is against the tenets of Islam.

Alhaji Lateef Adegbite, the Secretary General of the Nigerian Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs (SCIA) has another reason for the Muslim opposition to the contest when he said it was an affront to Nigerian Muslims for the contest to hold in the month of Ramadan.

Other Muslims were not for it because Amina Lawal, the young woman slated
to be stoned to death for having a child out of wedlock, was supported by
a number of the beauty queens who vowed non-participation in Nigeria if
Amina was executed. Says Ibrahim Khamil, an unemployed youth in Kaduna,
scene of the scene of riots when informed about the comments of the
queens: "To hell with the contest. Nigeria does not need it. And we will
make sure it does not hold here." But for the predominant Christian South
the event was an opportunity to showcase the tourism potentials of Nigeria
and to enjoy some benefits through improved infrastructure, massive hotel
revenues, television coverage etc. For instance, Rivers State, a co-host
of the event, spent the sum of four million dollars on logistics while it
lost the sum of seven hundred million dollars from the rescheduling of the
event to London.

Contractors, understandably, were enthusiastic about the event
as many supplied various items booked for the pageant and lost
millions more as a result of the transfer of the contest to
England. Cross Rivers State, another co-host, was happy at
putting its internationally famous Obudu Cattle Ranch in top
condition but lost all its investment and expected revenue as
a result of the shifting of the event. Investigations revealed
that prior to the hurried departure of the beauty queens from
Nigeria all the top hotels in Abuja, Nigeria's capital city,
had been fully booked in anticipation of the beauty festival
taking place in the most populous country in Africa.

The shifting of the contest, sparked off by a bloody riot over
a report in the Nigerian daily, Thisday, deeply grieved the
Christian South which expected another Nigerian success
following on the heels of that of Agbani Darego, the immediate
past Miss World. The riot spread from Kaduna to Abuja and led
to the burning of houses, shops, the vandalization and burning
of vehicles, the breaking of curfews imposed by authorities
and the murder of people suspected to be Southern Christians.
Investigation revealed that over two hundred and fifty people
Died as a result of the riots, three thousand five hundred
wounded and over a thousand people arrested over the issue.
 
The writer of the Thisday report, Miss Isioma Daniels, the
publisher of the newspaper, Nduka Obiagbena, as well as the
editor, Eniola Bello, had the fatwa put on them by Zamfara
State, the first Nigerian state to adopt sharia in the advent
of the new Nigerian democracy. Reports have it that the
state's acting Governor, Alhaji Mamudu Shinkafi, declared on
November 25 at a frenzied rally in Gusau, the state's capital,
that the writer of the purported blasphemous article as well as  
her editor and publisher should be beheaded. Isioma Daniels had
to flee Nigeria for the United States while Mr Obiagbena had to
resort to a series of daily apologies to Northern Muslims in the
hope that the fatwa will be lifted. However, the action of
Muslims have angered the Christian South and there are talks here
that there should be a national conference which will serve as a
basis for the future essence of the country.

Tired of the violence on the South by the Muslims Christians in
states such as Abia, Imo, Anambra and Enugu protested and
contemplated reprisals until they were stopped by security agencies.
They were following Northern Christians in Kaduna neighborhoods such
as Murmin, Gwari, Nasarawa, Trikaniya, Gori, Gora and Sabon Tasheb
who attacked the Muslims as a reaction to being killed over the years
by Islamic fundamentalists.

Says John Olatunde, a statistics student at the Yaba College of
Technology in Lagos: "This country does not belong to Muslims alone.
What is happening is that the Muslims are infringing on the other Nigerians.
The people in power are not capable of putting their house in order. If you
don't stop them now they will tell you the clothes to wear in public." For the
Afenifere, a South West socio-political group, "the incidence of the riot is
deep as it borders on the unity of the country and the sustenance of
democratic practise in Nigeria." The Islamic fundamentalists have had their
way in shifting the Miss World from Nigeria to London, but could this have
been Achieved by widening the already deep cleavages in Nigeria? Events in
the coming weeks and months will tell.