David Dickson

Political Islam in

Sub-Saharan Africa 

The Need for a New Research 

and Diplomatic Agenda 

Summary

• An understanding of the multifaceted nature of political Islam on the African subcontinent is a precondition for the formulation of an effective U.S. policy toward the 

region. Such a formulation would place political Islam in a historical and contemporary context.

• In East Africa, discrimination against Muslims—which began in colonial mission 

schools and continued in education and employment following independence—

played an important role in the development of political Islam.

• The impact of Saudi-sponsored Wahabism on the radicalization of Muslims in the 

Horn of Africa has been mixed. Its potential impact is most acute in Ethiopia, while 

the radicalization of Islam in Sudan has followed its own independent path.

• Islamic fundamentalism in Nigeria acquired a more pronounced political edge as 

the national fortunes of the governing Muslim national elite declined dramatically 

with the election of Olusegun Obasanjo, a born-again Christian, to the presidency in 

1999. This brand of political Islam was manifested in the adoption of Islamic law in 

one-third of Nigeria’s states and sporadic communal violence between Muslims and 

Christians.

• Senegal stands as an illustration of the reality that political Islam can be a constructive and regime-stabilizing force. Senegal has found a balance between a modernizing, secular state and the Muslim tradition. Democracy co-exists with a religiously 

encouraged grassroots social conservatism.

• The United States should expand its diplomatic presence on the African sub continent, 

accompanied by the deployment of personnel conversant with local languages and 

Islam. Understanding local political and social dynamics is a precondition for sound 

U.S. policy.

www.usip.org

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SPECIAL REPORT 140 MAY 2005

ABOUT THE REPORT

Accelerating with the attacks of September 11, 2001, 

but extending back more than a decade, studies of the 

growth of Islam as a source of political mobilization 

have proliferated, but few have examined political 

Islam on the African subcontinent or broadened the 

approach beyond transnational terrorism. On July 9, 

2004, a conference of Africa experts from academia and 

the U.S. foreign policymaking community convened 

at the United States Institute of Peace to begin an 

examination of this shortcoming and its foreign-policy 

implications. 

Ambassador George Ward, director of the U.S. 

Institute of Peace’s Professional Training Program, 

and Taylor Seybolt, program officer in the Institute’s 

Grant Program, chaired conference panels. Presenters 

included Howard University’s Sulayman Nyang, the 

University of Connecticut’s Lucy Creevey, and George 

Mason University’s John Paden. Additional panelists 

included Malik Chaka, a staff member with the U.S. 

House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa, and 

Ambassador David Shinn, now at George Washington 

University and former ambassador to Ethiopia, and 

John Voll of Georgetown University. David Dickson 

specialist Africa organized the conference and wrote 

the report. Joseph Sany, an assistant in the Research 

and Studies Program, provided advice and assistance 

for the report. Paul Stares, director of Research and 

Studies, and Abdeslam Maghraoui, associate director for 

the Institute’s Muslim World Initiative, supervised the 

drafting of the report. 

The report provides a brief background on Islam in 

sub-Saharan Africa and its policy lessons for East Africa, the 

Horn, Nigeria, and Senegal. A future research agenda for 

policy analysts and overall recommendations for United 

States policy conclude the report.

UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE

SPECIAL REPORT

The views expressed in this report do not necessarily 

reflect the views of the United States Institute of Peace, 

which does not advocate specific policy positions.

CONTENTS

Knowledge: Power for Policy 2 

East Africa 4

The Horn of Africa 5

Nigeria 7

Senegal 9

Looking Forward: Research and Policy Strategies 10
2

• It is important that the United States remain neutral on matters that impinge on the 

religious domain. A perceived tilt toward non-Muslims would do irreparable harm to 

future outreach efforts to a Muslim community already suspicious of U.S. motives. 

This basic guideline applies to East Africa and the Horn, as well as to potentially 

volatile Nigeria.

• Educational and job initiatives targeted at disempowered sectors of the Muslim and 

non-Muslim populations should be supported. Economic opportunity can mitigate 

interreligious tensions.

• Active support of democratic structures, human rights, and liberalization in the 

governmental sector and civil society is necessary. Governmental accountability and 

transparency can discourage extremist-sponsored popular mobilization fostered by 

political marginalization.

• The establishment of a unitary U.S. military and intelligence structure for addressing military and terrorist-related issues on the subcontinent is needed. A coherent 

appraisal of sources of instability and necessary policy responses would follow.

Knowledge: Power for Policy

To examine the nature of political Islam on the African sub continent and to draw lessons for United States policy, both the scholarly and policy communities must assess the 

phenomenon studied widely for other regions but largely neglected in Africa. Scholars and 

policymakers must examine the nature of political Islam in sub-Saharan Africa in order to 

ABOUT THE INSTITUTE

The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, nonpartisan federal institution created 

by Congress to promote the prevention, management, and peaceful resolution of international 

conflicts. Established in 1984, the Institute meets 

its congressional mandate through an array of 

programs, including research grants, fellowships, 

professional training, education programs from 

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and workshops, library services, and publications. 

The Institute’s Board of Directors is appointed by 

the President of the United States and confirmed 

by the Senate.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

J. Robinson West (Chair), Chairman, PFC Energy, 

Washington, D.C. • María Otero (Vice Chair), President, 

ACCION International, Boston, Mass. • Betty F. Bumpers, 

Founder and former President, Peace Links, Washington, 

D.C. • Holly J. Burkhalter, Advocacy Director, Physicians 

for Human Rights, Washington, D.C. • Chester A. 

Crocker, James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic 

Studies, School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University 

• Laurie S. Fulton, Partner, Williams and Connolly, 

Washington, D.C. • Charles Horner, Senior Fellow, Hudson 

Institute, Washington, D.C. • Seymour Martin Lipset, 

Hazel Professor of Public Policy, George Mason University 

• Mora L. McLean, President, Africa-America Institute, 

New York, N.Y. • Barbara W. Snelling, former State 

Senator and former Lieutenant Governor, Shelburne, Vt.

MEMBERS EX OFFICIO

Arthur E. Dewey, Assistant Secretary of State for Population, 

Refugees, and Migration • Michael M. Dunn, Lieutenant 

General, U.S. Air Force; President, National Defense University • 

Peter W. Rodman, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs • Richard H. Solomon, President, 

United States Institute of Peace (nonvoting)

Perry -Castañeda Library Map Collection, University of Texas at Austin
3

draw lessons for effective United States policy. Political Islam, by definition, is neutral. 

It is any variant of Islam inspiring or serving as a vehicle for political mobilization or 

activity. Productive scholarship and policymaking must reject definitions that categorically treat political Islam as either a malevolent or benevolent force. Political Islam in 

Africa can indeed be manifested in al Qaeda–type terrorism as tragically illustrated by 

the horrific loss of life in the 1998 simultaneous bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania or the 2002 attack on an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombasa, 

Kenya. Another face of political Islam, however, can be found in Senegal, where Sufi 

brotherhoods—religious and social networks with deep historical roots—have bolstered 

a democratic and secular government. The ideological preconceptions of conservative 

traditionalists and liberal revisionists must be cast aside in achieving an understanding of 

political Islam in its many incarnations on a continent where challenges defy easy solutions. A new understanding can help ensure that American policy will contribute to both 

U.S. national interests and to the well-being of the African people.

Islam is the fastest growing religion on the African sub continent and has a significant 

presence in an array of states. While mystical and often syncretic variants of Sufi Islam 

are evident in much of East and West Africa, the austere, illiberal Wahabi sect, coming 

Political Islam, by definition, 

is neutral. It is any variant of 

Islam inspiring or serving as a 

vehicle for political mobilization 

or activity. Productive scholarship 

and policymaking must reject 

definitions that categorically 

treat political Islam as either a 

malevolent or benevolent force.

Regional Muslim and Christian Populations

Approximately 140.3 million Muslims in West Sahel

Country Total 

Population

Muslim Pop. 

in 1000s

% of 

Muslims

% of 

Christians

Benin 7,250,033 1, 450 20 30

Burkina Faso 13,574,820 6, 787 50 10

Chad 9,538,544 4, 864 51 35

Cote d’Ivoire 17,327,724 6,064-6,931 35-40 20-30

Ghana 20,757,032 3, 321 16 63

Rep. of Guinea 9,246,462 7, 852 85 8

Guinea Bissau 1,368, 363 615 45 5

Liberia 3,390,635 678 20 40

Mali 11,956,788 10,761 90 1

Mauritania 2,998,563 2,998 100 0

Niger 11,560,538 9,248 80 -

Nigeria 137,253,133 68,626 50 40

Senegal 10,852,147 10,201 94 5

Sierra Leone 5,883,889 3,530 60 10

Togo 5,556,812 1,111 10 20

Approximately 90.3 million Muslims in the Greater Horn of Africa

Country Total 

Population

Muslim Pop. 

in 1000s

% of 

Muslims

% of 

Christians

Burundi 6,231,221 623 10 67

Djibouti 466,900 438 94 6

Eritrea 4,447,307 – – –

Ethiopia 67,851,281 30,000–33,000 45–50 35–40

Kenya 32,021,856 3,202 10 78

Rwanda 7,954,103 365 4.6 95

Somalia 8,303,601 8,303 100 0

Sudan 39,588,225 27,403 70 5

Tanzania 36,588,225 12,805 35 30

Uganda 26,404,453 4,224 16 66

Source: Central Intelligence Agency, The World Factbook 2004. Online. Available: 

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html (Accessed July 9, 2004.)
4

out of Saudi Arabia, has found a growing audience in these regions and in the Horn. 

The consequent battle for the heart of African Islam constitutes an important part of 

the African religious landscape, with implications for both internal African politics and 

relations with the United States. 

East Africa

Transnational terrorism demonstrated its ferocity via al Qaeda’s coordinated bombings 

of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar el Salaam, Tanzania on August 7, 1998. 

Two hundred and twenty-four lives were stolen and more than 5,000 people were injured. 

The United States ineffectually responded with missile attacks on an alleged al Qaeda 

chemical weapons factory in Sudan and a training camp in Afghanistan. These attacks 

only served to obscure pertinent issues. 

East Africa—specifically Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda—is an appropriate starting 

point for a survey of the nature of political Islam in Africa and its implications for 

U.S. policy. Among the pertinent issues obscured by the attacks and the U.S. response 

was the emergence and evolution of political Islam in East Africa and across the 

continent. 

Muslims were deeply involved in the anti-colonial nationalist movements in Kenya, 

Tanzania, and Uganda. For instance, Julius Nyerere of Tanzania collaborated with Muslims 

in the early days of the independence movement. “On the East African coast, you find 

groups that clearly identify themselves with Islam, many of whom define themselves 

in terms of their Arab heritage. This, in turn, influences how they respond to political 

Islam,” Sulayman Nyang observed. 

Politicization of Muslims in East Africa must also be seen in terms of their status 

relative to the political governing elite, Malik Chaka believes. Muslims were often discriminated against in the mission schools that educated people for clerical, civil service, 

and teaching positions and produced the core of the emerging African middle class 

during the colonial period. Educational and employment discrimination continued after 

independence. Africans with Arabic, and usually Koranic, education were marginalized 

by Westernized political elites. Whether trained abroad or in Wahabi-financed schools at 

home, many Muslims followed a distinctive path and increasingly assumed the role of a 

regional underclass. 

The spiritual and mystical Sufism that Muslims in the region embraced often gave 

way to Wahabism, especially as seeds were sown for growing tensions with the prevailing power structure. Chaka explained that political Islam became “linked to the agitation of those Africans who felt victimized by the beneficiaries of Western education.” 

In Uganda, a pernicious variant of political Islam emerged, supported by the Sudanese, 

attracting remnants of deposed tyrant Idi Amin’s forces. Tanzanian Muslims charged that 

the ostensibly secular national unity projects of the country’s Catholic founding father, 

Julius Nyerere, were really designed to constrain Muslims, Chaka noted. 

In such a changing politico-religious environment, al Qaeda found it relatively easy to 

build an infrastructure in the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya and along the coast—a situation that seems to have been replicated in Zanzibar, the Comoros Islands, and along the 

Tanzanian coast.1 Deadly results were realized in the 1998 East African embassy attacks 

and, later, in assaults on an Israeli-owned hotel and a passenger plane in Mombasa, 

Kenya in 2002.

Economic, governance, and security challenges in East Africa provide fertile ground 

for the expansion of al Qaeda and its ideological allies. What is to be done? 

First and most fundamentally, a U.S. presence on the ground is vital to engaging 

Africans and formulating policy attuned to indigenous realities. Mombasa, Kenya and 

Zanzibar, Tanzania are crucial examples of areas deserving an American diplomatic presence. Active outreach to Muslim communities must replace the fatalistic acceptance of 

the deepening radicalization of Africans in the region.
5

Second, the United States cannot win hearts and minds simply on the basis of sophisticated public diplomacy. Economic and resource commitments are crucial to this effort. 

The African Growth and Opportunity Act, with its promise of job creation; the Millennium 

Challenge Account, and AIDS funding are a start. In addition, active Wahabi educational 

programs must be offset by support for educational programs fostering tolerance. Job 

opportunities must be promoted for Muslims and non-Muslims alike. The continued 

socio-economic marginalization of Muslims can, in some circumstances, contribute to 

extremism. Economic assistance packages should address this. 

Third, even earnest economic efforts will come to naught without encouraging and 

ultimately institutionalizing good governance in East Africa. Chaka pointed out that the 

United States must “counsel African states to practice good governance and have policies which are inclusive rather than exclusive because divisions based on religion are 

ultimately not in the American interest. There are dark forces which will use them and 

mobilize forces against the United States.” The Tanzanian elections scheduled for late 

2005 are a prime opportunity. The United States should support international observers 

and pay special attention to electoral developments in heavily Muslim Zanzibar, where 

elections in 1995 and 2000 lacked credibility.

Diplomatic, economic, and political initiatives of the United States government in 

East Africa must be coordinated to avert instability and the growth of terrorist cells in 

the region.

The Horn of Africa

In strict geographic terms the Horn of Africa is defined as Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, 

Somalia, and Sudan. In mainstream political science terms the Horn is also defined by 

the disorder and state breakdown that provide fuel for the most virulent forms of political Islamic radicalism and terrorist activity. A survey of Islam in the Horn illustrates that 

Somalia and Djibouti are overwhelmingly Muslim, while a little less than three-quarters 

of the Sudan and roughly half of Ethiopia and Eritrea are Muslim. Ambassador David 

Shinn explained that Islamic movements challenged Ethiopian Christian hegemony in 

the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries and created obstacles to British rule in Somaliland in the early twentieth century. The Muslim League in Eritrea, following World War II, 

and the Muslim–dominated Eritrean Liberation Front, in the early 1960s, both agitated 

against Ethiopian rule.

Wahabism has had mixed success in radicalizing Muslims in the Horn. In Ethiopia, 

Wahabis have been connected to reported mosque burnings, thereby introducing intraIslamic divisions into an already volatile ethno-religious mix. In Somalia, the fundamentalist al Ittihad al Islami evolved from Wahabi roots. Al Ittihad is a self-described 

Salafist group, however; Salafists seek a return to Muslim orthodoxy of yore. In 2001, 

al Ittihad was designated a terrorist group by the United States government. Although 

Somalia has served as a transit route for terrorists—most visibly al Qaeda—the depth 

of its involvement with terrorists is ironically constrained by the very disorder seen as 

a classical setting for terrorism; it has almost no legitimate terrorist targets, and terrorists themselves can be subject to extortion in a largely lawless setting.2 Hostility from 

indigenous religious authorities has impeded the growth of Wahabism in Djibouti. 

Political Islam—independent of Wahabism—has deep historical roots in Sudan. In 

line with this long tradition, Hassan al-Turabi created the National Islamic Front in 

1985. It was transformed later into the Popular National Congress, but al-Turabi’s political maneuverings, as traced by Shinn, ultimately culminated in his assumption of the 

role of speaker of the National Assembly and power broker in an Islamic fundamentalist 

government. Later, al-Turabi would fall from political grace. 

Meanwhile, Sudan served as a base for Osama bin Laden from 1991 to 1996, and in 

the eyes of some, as an epicenter for international terrorism. Sudan publicly renounced 

Second, the United States cannot 

win hearts and minds simply on 

the basis of sophisticated public 

diplomacy. Economic and resource 

commitments are crucial to this 

effort

Although Somalia has served as a 

transit route for terrorists—most 

visibly al Qaeda—the depth of 

its involvement with terrorists is 

ironically constrained by the very 

disorder seen as a classical setting for terrorism; it has almost 

no legitimate terrorist targets, 

and terrorists themselves can be 

subject to extortion in a largely 

lawless setting.
6

terrorism against the backdrop of a long-running civil war and engaged in revitalized 

efforts to normalize relations with the West beginning in 2000 and accelerating after 

September 11, 2001. These developments should not hide a complicating factor. Radical Islam, as exhibited in the Popular National Congress, remains a potent force in the 

Sudan, Shinn cautioned. 

The multifarious problems of the Horn defy easy solutions. Experienced Africa experts 

have identified promising measures to address the growth of the most insidious variants 

of radical political Islam, while also bettering the lives of the Horn’s people. 

First, Shinn asserts, a serious effort should be made to train a new pool of U.S. 

Foreign Service officers for diplomatic service in the Horn who are conversant in Arabic, 

indigenous languages, and the regionally specific intricacies of Islam. Until now, only 

Khartoum, Sudan has had such a corps, leaving a glaring void of knowledge and analysis 

in an area of growing significance to the United States. This oversight is compounded 

by reluctance on the part of foreign service officers with Arabic and Islamic training to 

serve in Africa. A change in the culture and incentive system of the State Department 

can rectify this problem.

Second, military and anti-terrorist assistance should continue to the Horn, combined 

with a consciousness of human rights realities. It is naive to foreswear military assistance to countries in the Horn that must battle terrorism while transnational groups such 

as al Qaeda use military means. However, such assistance must be linked to sound human 

rights practices and the protection of marginalized groups. Since 2002, the United States 

has deployed 1,800 troops to Djibouti as part of the Combined Joint Task Force–Horn 

of Africa, designed to thwart terrorists in Somalia, Kenya, Yemen, and elsewhere in the 

region. In mid-2003 the Bush administration committed itself to an additional $100 

million to address terrorism in the Horn and East Africa; two-thirds of these funds are 

marked for military support.3 These initiatives are legitimate, but Shinn warned that 

they may alienate the very constituencies that the United States and the West need to 

continue the global War on Terror, particularly if regional states do not adhere scrupulously to human rights standards. 

To achieve tangible long-term success in the Horn and reduce the ranks of terror 

recruits, Western countries must reach ordinary Muslims and non-Muslims by improving health care systems, combating HIV-AIDS, financing secular schools, and boosting 

agriculture. “It would be particularly helpful,” argued Shinn, “if wealthy Arab countries 

joined development efforts in the Horn and Africa at large without linking their aid to 

support for a fundamentalist philosophy. This will require some very frank talk with the 

Saudis and others.”

The United States will need a carefully considered re-engagement plan to build a 

new relationship with strategically located Somalia once a central government emerges 

with at least rudimentary influence in most parts of the country. The formal emergence 

of a largely impotent central government in the latter part of 2004 following clan-based 

negotiations does not yet appear to meet this criterion.4 Before an effective national 

government emerges, informal contacts can and should be cultivated with local authorities, including clan leaders and both religious and secular leaders in the larger civil 

society.5 Such contacts provide insight into political patterns and lay the groundwork 

for more extensive and formal contacts in the future.

In the meantime, U.S. relations with Sudan remain in flux. The consummation of a 

peace deal in January 2005 between the central government and the Sudan People’s 

Liberation Army inspires hope for improved relations. The United States holds out the 

possibility that the agreement will open the door for an accommodation with rebels in 

the troubled Darfur region, where government complicity in genocide is alleged.6 A comprehensive peace throughout Sudan will enhance U.S.-Sudan ties and accelerate Sudan’s 

reintegration into the mainstream international community.

The U.S. approach to the Horn of Africa must be multidimensional, with integrated 

and robust use of the varied instruments of statecraft. One such instrument requires 

It is naive to foreswear military 

assistance to countries in the 

Horn that must battle terrorism 

while transnational groups such 

as al Qaeda use military means. 

However, such assistance must 

be linked to sound human rights 

practices and the protection of 

marginalized groups.

“It would be particularly helpful,” argued Shinn, “if wealthy 

Arab countries joined development efforts in the Horn and 

Africa at large without linking 

their aid to support for a fundamentalist philosophy. This 

will require some very frank talk 

with the Saudis and others.”
7

American efforts to enlist support from European, African, and Muslim state and non state 

actors in promoting stability and prosperity. 

Nigeria

Nigeria is currently experiencing increasingly volatile relations between its Islamic and 

Christian communities. Destabilization of this strategically crucial West African state 

would ripple through the region and beyond if precipitated by new confrontations among 

politicized Muslims and Christians. Economic distress only exacerbates the danger. 

Nigeria must be seen in the regional context of the West Africa region, where roughly 

140 million Muslims live. West Africa is home to three pro-Western democracies: Senegal, 

Mali, and Niger. Further, the region could account for up to a quarter of U.S. oil imports 

by 2015. Although there are only small pockets of support for terrorism regionally, al 

Qaeda has taken advantage of the region’s interlocking conflicts and cases of state 

breakdown to acquire funds through local diamond purchases.7

Nigeria has the largest population in Africa and is the seventh largest oil producer 

in the world. Nigeria has maintained a reputation as a regional peacekeeper in Liberia, 

Sierra Leone, and elsewhere. Yet it has a fragile internal political order. 

Nigeria’s population is almost evenly split between predominately northern Muslims 

and predominately southern Christians. Religious and ethnic divisions raise the prospect 

of further conflict. Prior to the emergence of a legitimate democratic government at the 

end of the 1990s, Nigeria had experienced ethnic tension, civil war, and frequent military 

coups. Its oil wealth was mismanaged, leading to a precipitous decline in living standards 

for the average Nigerian. Expectations rose with President Olesegun Obasanjo’s election 

in 1999, but subsequent ethnic unrest in Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta region, rising religious tensions, and a lack of discernible improvement in the economy soon cast 

a cloud over the democratic experiment. More than 10,000 deaths were recorded from 

ethnic and religious conflicts since the election. Yet even this high number does not 

adequately describe the tenuous nature of the country’s governing institutions.

Political Islam has played an important role in the evolution of Nigeria’s polity, but 

it must be assessed in terms of the daunting political and economic challenges facing 

the country.

Northern Nigeria’s largely Muslim Hausa –Fulani people have long-standing transnational connections to Middle Eastern centers of learning and West African Sufi brotherhoods. British colonialism bolstered northern Nigeria’s control by political Islamists, 

Sulayman Nyang observed. In exchange for support of British rule, Ahmadu Bello was 

able to insist “on the teaching and practice of Islam in this region.” Traditional Islamic 

clans coalesced into a northern party that effectively excluded Westernized intellectuals 

and secularized non-Muslims.

The resurgence of Islamic fundamentalism in Nigeria following independence was 

influenced by an infusion of Saudi -educated religiousscholars who challenged less 

austere versions of Islam. That Islamic fundamentalism acquired a more pronounced 

political edge as the national fortunes of the governing Muslim national elite declined 

dramatically with the election of President Obasanjo, a born-again Christian from the 

south. After playing a major, often dominant, role in the government and military for 

almost forty years, northern Muslims felt sidelined. Among the reasons for these feelings was Obasanjo’s removal of politicized military officers, who were disproportionately 

Muslim.8

John Paden described how, in the context of a northern Muslim political decline, a 

gubernatorial candidate in Zamfara state, running on a platform of restoring sharia, or 

Islamic law, won a resounding victory. Very quickly, sharia was introduced in an additional eleven of Nigeria’s thirty-six states. Paden stressed that sharia offered the prospect of law and order to the Muslim masses outraged at how their children “were being 

Political Islam has played an 

important role in the evolution 

of Nigeria’s polity, but it must 

be assessed in terms of the 

daunting political and economic 

challenges facing the country.
8

seduced by siren calls of easy money and lax morals.” To the governing elite, however, 

the spread of sharia was also a byproduct of Nigerian Muslims’ desire to reassert their 

political prerogative in response to what they feared was a newfound southern Christian 

political hegemony. In contrast, many Christians in predominately Muslim and mixed 

religious states view sharia as an alien religious and cultural imposition designed to 

delegitimize both their religion and political standing. The Nigerian electoral process, 

Paden pointed out, with its mandated requirement for cross-religious and cross-regional 

alliances, prevented sharia from achieving a formal national platform, yet it remains a 

potential source of religious and cultural tension and is symptomatic of the depth of 

national religious divisions. Fears of looming communal religious violence in Nigeria 

became a reality in February and May of 2000 in Kaduna City, with at least 2,000 deaths, 

and again in Kaduna in 2002, when a newspaper printed a story deemed an affront to 

the Prophet Mohammed. Kano and Sokoto states, and the cities of Jos, Baluchi, and 

Yelwa, have similarly experienced religious violence. 

It may be premature to characterize clashes between Nigerian police and religious 

students in Yobe state in early 2003 and between security forces and Islamic militants 

in September 2004 as opening skirmishes in a battle with transnational Islamic-inspired 

terrorism, but the conditions for just such a battle may develop.9 Growing economic and 

political marginalization, political mobilization of alienated youth and the intelligentsia, 

and the injection of extremist Islamic ideologies into the body politic are ingredients 

in a volatile recipe. Nigerian history is littered with precedents for the use of violence 

to settle political scores, and those with an interest in Nigeria’s success cannot remain 

sanguine about recent examples and potential hot spots of violence in the country.

Paden’s formula for a sophisticated U.S. response to Nigeria’s complex array of 

issues echoed familiar approaches with some new elements. First, Washington must 

end its policy of neglect toward Nigeria. State failure there will reverberate well beyond 

Nigeria’s borders. A start, Paden asserted, includes full staffing of the embassy in Abuja 

with knowledgeable indigenous-language speakers and reconsidering the closure of 

consulates in Kano and Kaduna states in the north. Northern Nigerians, in particular, 

have borne the brunt of apparent U.S. indifference. The United States must back up its 

expectations that the Nigerian army promote regional stability by offering real training 

opportunities. Announcing a timetable to restore military training programs, contingent 

on achievement of human rights benchmarks, would be helpful.

Second, the United States should support interreligious dialogue without taking a 

stance on Nigeria’s religious division. To Paden, the “key to bilateral relations between 

the United States and Nigeria is to ‘do no harm.’ It is imperative that the U.S. remain 

neutral on matters that impinge on the religious domain.” A perceived tilt toward nonMuslims would do irreparable harm to future outreach efforts to a Muslim community 

already suspicious of U.S. motives. “The United States should resist the temptation to 

lecture Nigerian Muslims on sharia law,” Paden contended. Instead, the United States 

should encourage Nigerian-centered solutions, which may include involvement by its 

supreme court in reviewing decisions reached by the sharia courts. Also, the United 

States should not overreact to Nigerian religious fringe groups but, rather, support conflict resolution by traditional leaders. Indeed, U.S. policy toward Nigeria should promote 

Nigerian solutions for Nigerian problems. The United States should tap its own strengths 

in terms of human and institutional resources and avoid patronizing the Nigerians on 

religious issues.

Third, the United States can best assist Nigeria economically—via debt relief, for 

example—through its influence in international financial institutions. This assistance is 

imperative in light of the magnitude of the Nigeria’s economic crisis, a state of affairs 

reinforcing ethnic and religious divisions. Strengthening the Nigerian educational system should also be a priority, acknowledging the potential destabilization of a surge of 

undereducated and disenfranchised young people.

The “key to bilateral relations 

between the United States 

and Nigeria is to ‘do no harm.’ 

It is imperative that the U.S. 

remain neutral on matters 

that impinge on the religious 

domain.”
9

Fourth, Nigeria can either be a beacon for the expansion of liberal democracy on the 

continent or a catalyst for decline. Paden observed that for the former to be the case, 

the United States must support Nigeria’s federal system “so that local communities have 

more of a stake in the mediation of disputes and economic development.”

Senegal

Senegal is a vivid illustration that political Islam can be a constructive and regime-stabilizing force in a country of almost 11 million people, 94 percent of whom are Muslim. 

Lucy Creevey noted that Senegal has found a “balance between a modernizing and 

secular state and the Muslim tradition.”

The cordiality between the Senegalese state and Muslim leaders is rooted in the 

colonial period. The French, fearing jihad, deferred to these leaders on religious affairs in 

exchange for acceptance of French control of administrative matters, such as taxation.

In the postindependence period and beyond, Creevey explained, Senegal’s Sufi groups 

became pillars for the governing authorities, turning out the vote and extending religious sanction to secular heads of state. Governing leaders, in turn, paid allegiance to 

groups within the Sufi brotherhoods. Creevey added that President Abdoulaye Wade, for 

instance, has “declared himself a Mouride, a politically active reform group within the 

Hizbut Tarquiyyah brotherhood”; he expresses his loyalty to the Mouride leader. The Sufi 

brotherhoods have become less overt in their expression of political sympathies over the 

years, yet they maintain an instrumental role by encouraging popular support for the 

government.

Muslim Groups in Senegal

Sufi Brotherhoods

Tidjaniyya

Muridiyya

Quadriyya

Layenne

Politically Active 

Reform Groups 

within Brotherhoods

Hizbut Tarquiyyah (Mouride)

Moustarchidine wal (Tidjani)

Moustarchidati (Tidjani)

Islamist Groups

Jamatou Ibadou Rahmane 

Associations des Etudiants de l’Universite de Dakar 

Organisation pour l’Action Islamique 

Source: Lucy Creevey, “Muslim Leaders and Politics in Senegal in 2004” (paper 

presented at the conference on “Political Islam on the African Subcontinent: Lessons 

for U.S. Policy,” July 9, 2004, United States Institute of Peace, Washington D.C.).

Senegal is home to a minority of radical Islamist groups and militants who were 

inspired by the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The leaders of these groups are mostly individuals schooled in Arab countries and critical of Westernization. While they remain a minority, 

their opposition to U.S. policy in the Middle East and to the secularization of the country’s 

family code is shared by the Sufi brotherhoods. Only 40 percent of Muslim leaders believe 

that Senegal should be governed by sharia; this is a small number relative to many other 

Muslim states. Moderation within the Senegalese polity and balance between traditional 

Islam and secularism remains the norm, so it is wise for the United States to continue its 

noninvolvement in Senegal’s internal religious debate. More assertive involvement would 

only delegitimize prudent voices within the religious establishment. 

The United States should instead seek to strengthen Senegal’s economy through 

bilateral and multi lateral aid and support its democratic institutions. The future of the 

Senegal is a vivid illustration 

that political Islam can be a 

constructive and regime-stabilizing force in a country of almost 

11 million people, 94 percent of 

whom are Muslim. 
Senegalese secular–religious balance will likely be more profoundly affected by the 

soundness of its economy and the viability of its political institutions than by the rhetorical barbs of a radical Islamic minority.

Senegal may be a model for political modernity on the continent, but in a state 

proud of its Islamic traditions it is best that this model not be trumpeted by an America 

whose standing is low in the Islamic world. The Senegalese model should remain a quiet 

testimony to the potential for states willing to reconcile the best in the Islamic tradition 

with the requirements of modern state building. Its merits must be identified, weighed, 

and selectively adopted by states on their own volition based on their peculiar historical 

and contemporary circumstances.

Looking Forward: Research and Policy Strategies

If there is an overriding lesson to be gleaned from a survey of political Islam on the African subcontinent, it is that current, conventional U.S. policies toward the region neither 

maximize the American national interest nor do justice to Africans in their quest for stability, prosperity, and independent religious and cultural identities. A more sophisticated 

understanding of political Islam should be a precondition for policy formulation. In this 

spirit, certain policy and conceptual questions surface and beg further analysis.

• What are the politically active sectors of the Muslim population on the African subcontinent? How is their activity manifested?

• What is the nexus between Islam, ethnicity, and class in selective African cases?

• Is the conventional dichotomy between moderate and radical Islamists on the subcontinent appropriate? If not, what categorization should be substituted?

• To what extent are radical transnational Islamic movements influencing indigenous 

variants of African Islam? To what extent are they operating independently on the 

subcontinent?

• How can dialogue and understanding be fostered between the United States and 

representatives of Islam on the subcontinent in both government and in the broader 

civil society?

• To what extent does U.S. policy in the Muslim world outside of Africa shape perceptions of the United States in the region?

• How does U.S. policy toward Islam on the subcontinent fit into its global policy, 

including the War on Terror?

Greater understanding of the nuances of political Islam is a prerequisite to the 

delineation of preliminary policy recommendations toward Islamic areas of the African 

subcontinent.

• The United States should formulate and implement a coherent and integrated African 

and antiterrorist policy incorporating the diplomatic, economic, and military instruments of statecraft. Africa's peripheral status in the hierarchy of American foreign 

policy priorities must be altered.

• The United States should expand its diplomatic presence in the subcontinent, accompanied by the deployment of personnel conversant with local languages and Islam. 

Arbitrary bureaucratic distinctions between North African and sub-Saharan divisions 

in the State Department and elsewhere must be discarded to facilitate such expansion. The importance of sub -Saharan African appointments must be reinforced.

• The United States should also encourage greater investments in all facets of economic 

development and the promotion of enhanced investment and trade ties, building 

upon the Millennium Challenge Account and the African Growth and Opportunity Act. 

Educational and job initiatives targeted at disempowered sectors of the Muslim and 

non-Muslim populations must be supported.

10

The Senegalese model should 

remain a quiet testimony to the 

potential for states willing to 

reconcile the best in the Islamic 

tradition with the requirements of modern state building. 

Its merits must be identified, weighed, and selectively 

adopted by states on their own 

volition based on their peculiar 

historical and contemporary 

circumstances.
• The active support of democratic structures, human rights, and liberalization in the 

governmental sector and civil society must be a central pillar in U.S. policy toward 

the region. A linkage must be made between state behavior in this realm and assistance.

• There should be outreach to Muslim leaders and opinion makers in the governmental 

and non governmental sectors, as well as to students.

• The United States should adopt a laissez-faire approach to matters of mosque and 

state, as well as to matters of church and state, which are better left to Africans to 

address. Support for interfaith dialogue remains a worthy pursuit, however.

• The United States should establish a unitary military and intelligence structure for 

addressing military and terrorist-related issues on the subcontinent. 

• The United States should also deny financial resource networks to al Qaeda and 

other radical groups through participation in multilateral arrangements such as the 

“Kimberly Process” for labeling diamonds and removing unauthorized diamonds from 

circulation.

There can be no illusion that U.S. policy on the African subcontinent can be dramatically and quickly altered. Nor can the damage rendered by the pervasive perception that 

the United States is hostile toward global Islamic interests be erased in the near term. 

Qualified, informed staff on the ground; advice on and monitoring issues of governance 

and human rights; and substantive gestures of goodwill in military training, social development, and economic assistance are the crucial components in the U.S. diplomatic 

arsenal that should be deployed on the African continent. Steps can be taken to incrementally establish the foundation for a more constructive and beneficial relationship 

between the United States and members of the Muslim and non-Muslim communities 

in Africa.

NOTES

1. Princeton Lyman and J. Stephen Morrison, “The Terrorist Threat in Africa,” Foreign Affairs, January/February 2004, 77.

2. Ken Menkhaus, Somalia: State Collapse and the Threat of Terrorism. Adelphi Paper 364 (New York: 

Oxford University Press, March 2004), 66–75.

3. Lyman and Morrison, “The Terrorist Threat in Africa,” 77.

4. “Ex-Soldier Chosen as Somali President,” Washington Post, October 10, 2004, A17.

5. Menkhaus, Somalia, 83–84.

6. Wangui Kanina, “Sudanese Leaders, Southern Rebels Finish Peace Deal,” Washington Post, January 

1, 2005, A1; Colum Lynch,”UN Official Blames Sudan For Violence,” Washington Post, May 8, 2004, A11; 

Glenn Kessler and Colum Lynch, “U.S. Calls Killings in Sudan Genocide,” Washington Post, September 

10, 2004, A1; and Colum Lynch, “U.S., Europe Debate Venue for Darfur Trials,” Washington Post, January 

21, 2005, A11.

7. Lyman and Morrison, “The Terrorist Threat in Africa,” 83–84.

8. Ibid., 79.

9. Washington Post, September 25, 2004, A18.

11
Of Related Interest

A number of other publications from the United States Institute of Peace examine issues 

related to Africa and political Islam. 

Recent Institute reports include:

• Terrorism in the Horn of Africa. (Special Report, January 2004)

• U.S. Human Rights Policy towards Africa. (Special Report, August 2001)

• Can Nigeria Make a Peaceful Transition to Democratic Governance? (Special Report, 

December 1997)

To obtain an Institute report (available free of charge), write United States Institute of 

Peace, 1200 17th Street NW, Suite 200, Washington DC 20036-3011; call (202) 429-3832; 

fax (202) 429-6063; or e-mail: usip_requests@usip.org.

Recent books from USIP Press include:

Federalism and Ethnic Conflict in Nigeria, by Rotimi Suberu (2001)

For book sales and order information, call (800) 868-8064 (U.S. toll-free only) or (703) 

661-1590, or fax (703) 661-1501.

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Washington, DC 20036

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An online edition of this report can be 

found at our website (www.usip.org), 

together with additional information 

on the subject.