By Emma Aziken
The Muslim community in Bayero University, Kano, has condoled with the Vice-Chancellor of the university and the university community over last Sunday’s attack on two churches by the Boko Haram group.

The Muslim community, in a letter of condolence to the Vice-Chancellor, said it was sacrilegious for an attack to be made against any place of worship as it claimed that doing so was contrary to the teachings of Islam.

The condolence letter, signed by the leader of the community, the Ameer, Umar Danrimi and Secretary, Usman Shuaib, said the Muslim community valued the sanctity of life as prescribed by the teachings of the Prophet.

The condolence follows last Sunday’s attack on two Christian congregations in the university campus which resulted in the death of 15 worshipers, including two professors.

The condolence letter, dated May 1, read: “With a deep sense of sorrow we write on behalf of the Muslim Forum and the entire Muslim Umah of  Bayero University, Kano, to offer our sincere condolence on the death of Prof. A. Leo Ogboyomi, Prof. I. T. Ayodele, Mr. Sylvester Adah, and Master Essiet, and others who were killed by unknown attackers and as a result of injuries sustained from gunshots inflicted on them on Sunday, April 29, while attending Sunday service at the Sports Complex/Theatre.

“As professional colleagues, friends and neighbours of the deceased, we share with the university management and the BUK Community the untold grief of the irreparable loss.

“As fellow believers, we are guided by Qur`anic injunctions and inspired by the Surah, that is the exemplary practice of our noble prophet, to hold in high reverence and sacredness of all places of worship and strongly disapprove of their desecration.

“Similarly, we value the sanctity of human life and totally disapprove of the unjustified taking of any human life.

“We are warned by the Q’uran to consider that any person who, unjustly or without following the process laid down by the shariah, takes the life of another is deemed to have killed the entire mankind and whoever nurtures and protects a single human life is deemed to have nurtured and sustained mankind.

“We pray to God to bring succour to the entire family of the deceased and help them to bear the loss with fortitude. We pray further that the university will be spared from such horrific experience in the future.”

… as Uzodimma urges Thisday, Sun to remain steadfast
By Evelyn Usman
Chairman, Senate Committee on Aviation, Senator Hope Uzodimma, has urged managements of Thisday and Sun newspapers to remain steadfast in the discharge of robust and balanced journalism despite the recent terrorist attacks on the offices of the two media houses in Kaduna and Abuja.

Commiserating with the two media houses in a statement made available to Vanguard, yesterday, the Senator condemned the rising rate of bomb blasts in the country and urged those behind the dastardly acts to respect the sanctity of human lives.

He said the two newspapers were shinning lights of true journalism in the country which the attacks were intended to weaken.

He added that by targeting the media houses, the perpetrators sought to undermine press freedom and the freedom of expression which were the corner-stones of democracy in the country.

While calling on security agencies to step up their intelligence gathering mechanism to stem the rising spate of terrorist attacks in the country, Uzodimma said: “With intelligence and information gathering and community trust among the people and the security agencies, there will be free flow of information that will expose those behind these dastardly acts.”