TONY JOHN, Port Harcourt
Muslim fateful of the Trans-Amadi Central Mosque, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, have appealed to the state Governor, Nyesom Wike, the look into the demolition of their worship centre by agents of the government.
Chief Imam of the Mosque, Alhaji Haroon Muhammed, made the appeal yesterday, on behalf of the fateful shortly after the Jumaa’t prayers at the demolished site.
Muhammed, who had urged the Muslim community in the area to sustain their peaceful co-existence, begged Wike, to use his good office, as a people-friendly governor, to allow them continue their occupation of the land having obtained the land legally.
He stressed that the Trans-Amadi Central Mosque had come under demolition thrice, noting that they had spent millions of naira on the ongoing construction before the recent attack, which was not commendable.
The cleric expressed: “To be frank with you, we don’t know the offence we have committed, because, when we bought this land during Amaechi’s administration, after building, they came and destroyed it.
“When we could not settle it, we went to court and, on November 2, 2017, court gave judgement that we are the owners of the land. I cannot tell you specifically as an Imam, this is the problem. The only thing they said is that we had not revalidated our documents”.
He alleged that after leadership of the Trans-Amadi Central Mosque had visited the Permanent Secretary adding that the people responsible for attending to them for revalidation refused to attend to them.
“No notice was given to us before they came for demolition on Tuesday, August 20. We don’t really know what is the problem. Nobody has talked to us. We don’t know what offence we have committed.
Similarly, Secretary of Central Mosque, Alhaji Aliyu Sadiq, noted that they had passed through challenges in the last 10 years since occupying the land, and urged the governor to allow them to continue using the land as Nigerians.
“We are still appealing to him and beg God Almighty to touch his inner mind to live the place for us for the purpose of worshipping God Almighty. God created all of us, Muslims or non-Muslims, Christians or pagans. Everybody believes there is God”, he stated.