Sharia law should be abolished

I remember my little crimes as a kid- the occasional stealing of a few dollars from my sister´s purse to buy candy, sneaking into my mother´s kitchen to steal pieces of meat from the fridge, and stealing fruit juice only to top it up with water to make it look like it was real juice. I remember my sins as a young man growing up- the endless night-outs at the bar, getting drunk, and messing around a lot with the opposite sex.

I was caught and reprimanded several times. It freaks me out to think that if I was under the Sharia law, by now I might have lost both my arms, had multiple scars on my back and buttocks because I would have been publicly flogged severely and severally. Maybe my Penis might have been cut off for all my messing around with women.

Am I glad that I am not under the Sharia law!

The Sharia law is extremist and should be abolished, or seriously reviewed. Recently, there has been a lot of buzz about Lubna Hussein, a Sudanese woman who stands to be sentenced to 40 lashes, and has been prevented from leaving the country for wearing pants that authorities said ´were too tight´. They termed it, ´indecent dressing.´ She stands to be sentenced to a public flogging courtesy of the Sharia law.

I very well appreciate the fact that Sharia is a religious law. I have no right to tell the muslims how to conduct their lives. And I also appreciate the intentions of the law. I understand that it is supposed to be a means through which debauchery and other immoral behavior is to be curbed and checked on. I love the core idea behind the Sharia law concept, but I agree with how they go about distributing justice.

I think the Sharia law is a barbaric, dehumanizing, and blatant attack on the dignity of human beings, not to mention that it has a flagrant disregard, disrespect and snub of the Universal Human rights. It is almost evil. Very little crimes are given very severe, unreasonable punishment. I remember my kid sister being moved so much to tears when she watched on the news how a 16-year old Nigerian boy had his right arm amputated by Sharia law enforcement personnel. He was just sixteen years old! And his crime was that he stole a bunch of bananas from a retailer. Of course no one approves of what he did. I don´t approve of what he did. But I believe that he could have been better off being in a Juvenile detention camp doing some labor or spending some time at the local prison. But cutting his right hand has made him almost useless for life, and he will never have a right hand again.

Not to mention that many at times, the law in itself is unfair, and tends to be biased towards men in many circumstances. I will never forget the 2002 case of a Nigerian woman- Amina Lawal who was sentenced to death by stoning because she committed adultery, and bore a child out of wedlock. The Sharia law court Judge, whoever he was, actually condemned her to death-while the father of the child was going to walk away scot free-without even a slap on the face, because according to the court, there was no evidence against him. How stupid!

I dare say that if you look very closely and intimately, so many of the Sharia law protectors have so many secret skeletons in their closets. Yet they go about meting out unreasonable punishments for the smallest offences.

And so, I advice that the Sharia law be seriously reviewed, if not abolished, for its flagrant abuse of human rights, its tendency to discriminate against some segments of society, its disregard of human dignity and well, because it is plain evil and barbaric. I think the usual civil courts will always do us fine.

So, NO to Sharia.

Mfonobong Nsehe is a final year Journalism student at Daystar University, Kenya