The Kano State Shari’ah Commission has said that Facebook courtship and marriage s against the Sharia.
As a result, anyone found indulging in it will be prosecuted.
According to the Spokesperson of the commission, Sanusi Muhammad, a couple who recently declared that they met on Facebook would be arrested and prosecuted.
Muhammad said, “What they did is against the dictates of Shari’ah and the next line of action after their arrest is to arraign them before a court of law for prosecution.”
The couple, Sanusi abdullah’s and his wife, had told BBC Hausa the story of there marriage and ordeals: “We were just chatting on a Facebook page with other group members when the girl proposed that I should marry her and I accepted, after a while she sent in another message that she had got a Wali (representative of her parents) that would give her out in marriage, and a friend of mine said he would be my representative. We agreed on a N20,000 dowry, and then the Islamic legal marital agreement was entered into by our representatives.”
“We made some inquiries and some ulamas confirmed the marriage, saying all the prerequisites of marriage were fulfilled. But when we contacted Sheikh Ibrahim Daurawa, he said the marriage was invalid since there was no consent of parents of the bride,” he added.
Ironically, Facebook and some other online platforms have become a major meeting point for lovers.
While a rising number of such encounters have translated into marriages, others have fallen flat or led to other forms of relationships.
In some cases, they have also resulted in crimes ranging from fraud to murder.
Some of the marriages also don’t last perhaps due to the lovers’ inability to physically experience one another for a reasonable time before saying, ‘ I do.’
It will be recalled that a popular Christian leader, Pastor E. A. Adeboye of the Redeemed Christian Church of God also once decried such online courtships, due to the fact that the partners may not be able to pass through necessary Christian tests.
