Abuja, March 19: Nigeria on Thursday recalled its ambassador to Tripoli after Libyan leader Moamer Gathafi’s “irresponsible” suggestion that the country be partitioned between Muslims and Christians.
Abuja said it had recalled the ambassador over Gathafi’s “irresponsible utterances” which had made a mockery of his calls for African integration and unity.
“Our ambassador in Tripoli has been recalled for urgent consultations,” said foreign ministry spokesman Ozo Nwobu.
The veteran Libyan leader’s comments had “diminished his status and credibility,” Nwobu said, reading from a strongly worded statement which expressed the government’s “very serious concern”.
The statement also accused Gathafi of “theatrics and grandstanding at every auspicious occasion”.
Gathafi, until recently the chairman of the African Union, proposed this week that Nigeria follow the partition model of Pakistan as a way of ending repeated bouts of inter-religious violence.
Pakistan was formed in 1947 after the Muslim minority of predominantly Hindu India founded their own homeland.
Gathafi suggested that a Christian homeland in the south could have Lagos as its capital while a Muslim homeland in the north would have Abuja as its principal city, while the two communities should peacefully agree to share Nigeria’s huge oil and mineral wealth.
Hundreds of people were killed in the latest outbreak of sectarian violence in central Plateau State last week.
The state, with Jos as its capital, is the de facto buffer between the predominantly Muslim north and the largely Christian and animist south.
“His comment on the crisis in Jos, Plateau State, are most unacceptable and unbecoming of any leader who claimed to advocate and champion the cause of African integration and unity,” the ministry statement said.
Nigeria’s 140 million population is almost equally divided between Muslims and Christians.
Gathafi, in a speech to African student leaders, some of them Nigerian, said “the only thing that could put an end to the bloodshed … is the appearance of another Mohammed Ali Jinnah (Pakistan’s founder) who established a state for the Muslims and another for the Christians.”
The president of Nigeria’s senate, David Mark, earlier described Gathafi as “mad”.
Responding on Wednesday to a lawmaker in the upper house of parliament, Mark said that Gathafi’s comments were hardly worth dignifying with a response.
“With all due respect, why do you want to give a mad man that level of publicity?” Mark was quoted as saying in several local dailies on Thursday.
The foreign ministry statement said Abuja welcomes “well-meaning comments from concerned members of the international community” but the “sovereignty and territorial integrity of Nigeria are sacrosanct and non-negotiable.”
Parliament meanwhile urged the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, to order Gathafi to desist from calling for the break-up of Nigeria along religious lines.
In a resolution, parliament also asked the African Union to order an investigation into Gathafi’s motives.
The probe should in particular assess if there was a link with the comment and “infiltrators who come to fight Nigerians in their homeland,” it said, without giving details.
Nwobu said the recall of the ambassador did not mean that ties between the countries had been severed but was intended to show Abuja’s displeasure.
“A lot of things are at stake. We have bilateral cooperation…multilateral cooperations and a whole gamut of cooperation which falls within our diplomatic engagement with Libya,” Nwobu told reporters.
—Agencies