Cross-Border Preaching Between Northern Nigeria and Niger: Practices, Actors, and Implications of Wa ’Azi

3 Cross-border preaching between northern Nigeria and Niger: Practices, actors, and implications of wa ’azi Abdoulaye Sounaye Introduction Many scholars of Islam in Africa have drawn attention to the growing significance of preaching in the past twenty years (Miran 2007; Schulz 2012; Gomez-Perez & Madore 2013; Sounaye 2014; Thurston 2016). Among the factors that contributed to this phenomenon are struggles for power and legitimacy that came as a result of the emergence of new actors and currents - such as the Izala movement - as well as the growing mobility and visibility of religious actors, particularly after the 1990’s liberalization (Brigaglia 2007; Holder 2009; Gomez-Perez, LeBlanc & Savadogo 2009; Zakari 2009; LeBlanc 2012; Schulz 2012; Sounaye 2012). In West Africa, this has transformed discursive frameworks and led to new forms of interaction within religious communities and between those communities and the rest of society. These socio-political dynamics have greatly contributed to a restructuring of the religious sphere and its sociabilities; it has also reshaped the mode of circulations of religious ideas. In this context, the importance of sermons - yva’azi in Hausa - has been paramount, particularly in helping rally the masses around the Izala Salafi reform project, its theological, political, and social agendas. To what extent do wa’azi contribute to the dissemination of religious ideas? How do they lend themselves to socio-religious modes of action that transcend national borders? To what extent do they contribute to the circulation of ideas that have gradually revolutionized their socio-political environment? What are the potential outcomes of this circulation at a time when the Salafi issue (Sounaye 2016; Thurston 2016) has become one of the most debated in West Africa?1 1 I use this phrase in reference to the ‘Muslim issue’ (French: la question musulmane), which was a central concern during the colonial period and until the early 1980s. I would argue that this issue has been. 74 Focusing on Niger and Northern Nigeria, this chapter seeks to answer these questions, which are at the heart of the governance of religion in both the region and beyond. The chapter examines also the ways in which religious actors understand and make use of the public sphere. To fully grasp this process, we must look beyond state logics, which focus on violence and disorder while prioritizing a securitization approach to Islam. Drawing on the results of two years of research, I will analyse here the ways in which the wa ’azi have become, in this Nigeria-Niger sociocultural area, one of the instruments that serve the dissemination of religious ideas, the production of norms, as well as social and political values. Furthermore, wa’azi offer a framework for the routinization of a community whose actors are defined today by their cross-border dealings and mobility. As the case of wa’azin kasa2 will show, it is important to approach these actors beyond their national and state markers, as they have become agents whose discourses and actions help them transcend the since the late 1980s and early 1990s, supplanted by the ‘Salafi issue’ (French: la question Salafi'), in a context that has seen what many analysts referred to as an ‘Islamic revival’ (Otayek 2000; Fourchard 2005; Gomez-Perez 2005; Filakota 2009; Zakari 2009; Saint-Lary 2012). 2 A preaching rally that usually lasts several days. See section below. 75 territorial borders of Niger or Nigeria, and offer them a foothold in a religious economy of regional and even global scope. Their ideas circulate particularly through ‘new’ media, which have become popular and accessible to an increasing part of the population. Analysing contemporary Salafi preaching using wa’azi as a point of departure will give us an insight into the dynamics that shape not only discourses in a context of religious liberalism, but also the sociabilities characteristic of contemporary Islam. It appears that in the Sahel today, and due to the violent appropriations of Islam and increasingly divided politics, Salafism has become a major sociopolitical issue that challenges governance at both local and national levels. Obviously, violent jihadism and political conflicts have drawn increased attention to the circulation of religious ideas and the mobility of actors who are committed to a Salafi moral order, especially in a region that must now deal with the consequences of Boko Haram (Pérouse de Montclos 2014; Higazi 2015; Kassim 2015; Voll 2015), the collapse of the Libyan state following the fall of Gaddafi’s regime (Mattes 2014), and ethno-religious struggles in northern Mali (Hemann 2016). On a more theoretical level, in the current context where the Salafi issue affects as much the political field as the everyday life of ordinary citizens, it is important to understand not only discourses and modes of action, but especially the infrastructural frameworks that are intended to promote and strengthen this moral order. In other words, the analysis proposed here accounts for a religious culture whose emergence wa 'azi greatly contributed to. Such an approach will highlight the ways in which these religious events and discourses become political acts, but also how power is constructed and religious communities are brought together. In many ways, public preaching and the diverse appropriations of religious discourse led to a redefinition of moral, political, and cultural references. The Islamic activism that started in the 1980s-1990s - just after the Iranian Revolution and the progressive transnationalization of the Izala movement - greatly influenced this dynamic. The materials used for this contribution were collected during two trips to Zaria (in December 2014 and November 2015), Nigeria, and a series of trips to Maradi, Niamey, and Agadez, Niger. As will become apparent, the issue at hand is not only a cross-border one; it also has a transnational dimension insofar as the circulation of ideas is not limited only to the border area. Similarly, the mobility of religious actors and the dissemination of their discourses go beyond Niger and Nigeria and encompass countries such as Cameroon, Ghana, Benin, Burkina Faso, Togo, and Chad. 76 Niger-Nigeria: A shared Islamic public space To Niger, Nigeria is a ‘big brother’ not only in economic, but also in religious terms (Nicolas 1981, 1986; Miles 1994; Souley 2005), as shown by sustained interactions between Nigerian and Nigérien Muslims. This relationship calls for a critical examination of Islam’s trajectories beyond the borders of the postcolonial state, especially with the developments the regional Islamic sphere has experienced in the past three decades. However, we need also to keep in mind the sociohistorical process that made the environment that now spreads over Nigeria and Niger. First, there is the jihad of Usman dan Fodio, which reshaped the political map of the region and led to greater religious integration. Then, the cultivation of Islamic learning linked communities across what was referred to as the western Sudan - for example, through the Qadiriyya and Tijaniyya communities - illustrating both the precolonial and transnational significance of Islam in the area now shared between the two countries. While the ties and exchanges between Muslim actors and communities in the region go back several centuries, it must be noted that colonial rule has significantly affected them, imposing on them a reorganization of communities and a re-articulation of the relations between these communities. In general, the scale of exchange and mobility linked to the major centres of Islamic learning like Maiduguri, Agadez, and Kano, strengthened the role of Islam in the production and maintenance of ideological, political, and cultural references throughout the region (Dewière 2017; Miles 1994). More recently, with the emergence of the Izala movement in the 1980s, and especially in the 1990s (Umar 1993; Loimeier 1997; Kane 2003; Brigaglia 2007; Sounaye 2009), cross-border ties and relations have reinforced the idea that these two countries are part of the same Islamic cultural space (Nicolas 1975, 1980; Miles 1994; Souley 2005; Hamani 2007). Certainly, Niger and Nigeria have had different political trajectories, especially since independence, but with a 1,500- kilometre border, their socio-economic and cultural connections are considerable as can illustrate the numerous Muslim networks between the two countries. With Independence and the subsequent coming to power of national elites, Islam gained even more significance in the political life of both countries (Loimeier 1997; Nouhou 2005; Souley 2005; Zakari 2009). This was particularly the case in the Nigerian context where, prior to Independence, Islamic institutions had a significant role in social and political governance (Kane 1997; Loimeier 1997; Schmitz 2000; Umar 2005). But while the Islamic sphere enjoyed relative freedoms of organization and action in Nigeria, in Niger - due to the republicanism inherited from colonial rule - the central state was rather more controlling of Islam, following a policy inherited from the French colonial system, and later continued 77 by the Nigérien state, especially under Kountché’s military regime (1974-1987). Therefore, unlike in Nigeria, in Niger, governing Islam meant primarily imposing a statist orientation on Muslim actors. This approach led to the institutionalization of the Association Islamique du Niger (AIN), which until 1990 was the only formally recognized Islamic organization in Niger. In Nigeria, the rise of the Izala movement and the first generation of its followers who were locally trained, set in motion what may be called today an Islamic revolution. Fuelled with an anti-Sufi discourse calling for Islamic reform Umar 1993; Loimeier 1997; Kane 2003), this development resulted in a polarization which, to this day, marks the religious sphere in Nigeria and the region. Neman Ilimi (the search for Islamic knowledge, in Hausa)3 and cin rani dry season migration, in Hausa),4 two well-established practices in the region Heiss 2015), combined with various appropriations of Islam to lead to what may be called a public religious sphere shared by both countries.

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