LAGOS, Nov 28 (AFP) - Nigeria's top Muslim body moved Thursday to calm
tensions fuelled by opposition to the Miss World beauty pageant which have
triggered bloody sectarian riots.
   The Supreme Islamic Council of Nigeria called on Muslims to forgive the
author of an article on the contest which was branded blasphemous and
denounced a "fatwa" calling for her death.
   The council's general secretary, Lateef Adegbite, told AFP that the
Zamfara State government had no right to issue such an order and that
it "should not be followed" by Muslims.
   The deep tensions between Nigeria's Muslim and Christian communities --
which each represent about half of the country's 120 million population --
erupted once more last week.
   More than 220 people were killed and 30,000 driven from their homes in
the northern city of Kaduna after a protest over a newspaper report
triggered three days of sectarian riots.
   The article, which appeared on November 16 in the Nigerian daily This
Day, had defended Miss World from its Muslim critics, suggesting the
Prophet Mohammed might have married a contestant.
   Amid a storm of negative publicity, Miss World organisers abandoned
plans  to hold the show's closing ceremony in the Nigerian capital Lagos,
and shifted it to London.
   But in Nigeria, the controversy raged on.
   On Tuesday, Mamuda Shinkafi, deputy governor of the northern state of
Zamfara, announced a "fatwa" or Islamic legal ruling calling for This Day
fashion writer Isioma Daniel to be killed.
   The call was immediately condemned by Nigeria's federal government,
which does not recognise the Islamic Sharia law code recently reintroduced
in Zamfara and 11 more mainly Muslim states.
   Christian leaders, many of whom fear some Muslims want to "Islamicise"
their shared country, called on the government to defend Nigeria's secular
constitution.
   "All the social unrest and violent upheavals we are witnessing now are
not unconnected with the mindless introduction of Sharia in some northern
states," said Archbishop Ola Makinde of Abuja.
   "We are not an Islamic state. We are not ready to become one," he said,
warning that Christians would take matters into their own hands if the
government could not guarantee their safety.
   Then on Thursday, Nigeria's senior Islamic body moved to calm the
tensions, rejecting Zamfara's fatwa out of hand and calling for forgiveness
for both Daniel and This Day.
   "We don't think that this state has the right to make such
pronouncements," Adegbite said, noting that Daniel's article had been
written outside Zamfara and that she is a Christian.
   "It has always been our position that Sharia can not be extended to
non-Muslims," Adegbite said. "If she has committed a crime she should be
prosecuted by the federal government or the Lagos State government under
general law."
   Adegbite also said that the council had "fully accepted" This Day's
apology and expressed regret that Daniel had left the country, reportedly
to the United States.
   "We are surprised that she fled the country," he said. "She is welcome
to return."
   There was never much danger that Daniel's "death sentence" would be
carried out, her Lagos home is far from Zamfara and she had reportedly
already quit the country when it was announced.
   But the controversy exposed once more the problems surrounding the
bitter row over the Sharia.
   Nigeria's Christian president, Olusegun Obasanjo, publically supports
the right of the 12 mainly Muslim northern states to reintroduce Sharia,
arguing that forcing his diverse country to obey one law code would trigger
rebellions that could destroy it.
   But several recent scandals -- notably the death sentences imposed on
unmarried mothers by several northern courts -- have deeply embarrassed
Nigeria abroad and raised tensions at home.
   Fears that 31-year-old village housewife Amina Lawal might be stoned to
death almost caused a boycott by beauty queens that would have aborted the
Miss World contest before it began.
   Lawal is waiting for an date to appeal her conviction, and Obsanjo has
vowed her sentence will be quashed by a higher court.

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