Did You Know That Nigeria has a Greater Muslim Population than Saudi Arabia?

Jeremiah Aluwong

3 years ago

Islam is one of the largest religions in Nigeria, existing within the borders of the country since the 11th century. It is one of the two dominant religions practised in Nigeria, the other being Christianity. Nigeria has the largest Muslim population in West Africa. In 2021, the CIA World Factbook estimated that 53.5% of Nigeria’s population is Muslim. In 2007, the BBC estimated that slightly over 50% of the population is Christian. Muslims in Nigeria are predominantly Sunnis of the Maliki school of thought. However, there is a significant Shia minority, primarily in Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Osun, Kwara and Sokoto states. But what is of most interest is the fact that Nigeria has a more Muslim population than Saudi Arabia which is regarded as a purely Islamic state. More so, Saudi Arabia is regarded as the home and birthplace of Islam as well as the home of Islam’s two holiest shrines.

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Saudi Arabia: At a Glance Saudi Arabia is a sovereign country in the Middle East, with a total land area of approximately 2,149,690 sq km. Saudi Arabia is the birthplace of Islam and home to Islam’s two holiest shrines in Mecca and Medina. The king’s official title is the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques. The modern Saudi state was founded in 1932 by ABD AL-AZIZ bin Abd al-Rahman Al SAUD (Ibn Saud) after a 30-year campaign to unify most of the Arabian Peninsula. One of his male descendants rules the country today, as required by the country’s 1992 Basic Law. King ABDALLAH bin Abd al-Aziz ascended to the throne in 2005. Following Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Saudi Arabia accepted the Kuwaiti royal family and 400,000 refugees while allowing Western and Arab troops to deploy on its soil for the liberation of Kuwait the following year. The continuing presence of foreign troops on Saudi soil after the liberation of Kuwait became a source of tension between the royal family and the public until all operational US troops left the country in 2003.

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Islam in Northern Nigeria Islam was introduced to Nigeria through two geographical routes: North Africa and the Senegalese Basin. The origins of Islam in the country are linked with the development of Islam in wider West Africa. Trade was the major connecting link that brought Islam into Nigeria. Islam was first documented in Central Sudan by medieval Islamic historians and geographers such as Al-Bakri, Yaqut al-Hamawi and Al-Maqrizi and later works of Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun offered more notes about Islam in West Africa. Islam grew in North-East Nigeria, in particular, the Kanem Empire as a result of trade between Kanem and Northern African regions of Fezzan, Egypt and Cyrenaica in the eleventh century. Muslim merchants from the North sometimes remained in settlements along trade routes, this merchant class would later preach the message of Islam to their host communities. The first documented conversion of a traditional ruler was in the eleventh century when Mai Ume Jilmi of Kanem was converted by a Muslim scholar whose descendants later held a hereditary title of Chief Imam of Kanem. Reference https://www.mylifeelsewhere.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/ Featured image: Quartz

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