{Muqaddam of Shaykh Ahmad Hamahullah in Nigeria}
By: Professor Y. A. Quadri (University of Ilorin, Nigeria)
Culled from the Article titled;
The Hamahullah Group: A Sub-Tijaniyyah Movement and its Traces in Nigeria.
Published in:
Islamic Studies Quarterly Journal. Vol. xxiv Summer 1405/1985 No.2. Islamic Research Institute, Islamabad-Pakistan
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..A few followers of the Hamahullah movement have been identified in another part of Nigeria. They are found in Oke-Ode, Igbaja, and Ilorin, all in Kwara State. Some members of this movement are also resident in Lagos.
The leader of the group in Nigeria is one Muqaddam (a sectional leader in the Tijaniyyah) Abubakr Jubillee, a Fulani man who has lived at Oke-Ode for about fifty years.
He was born in Ilorin around 1905 and later moved to settle at Oke-Ode. In about 1950 he met a member of the Hamahullah in Baani, a village near Alapa, via Ilorin. He initiated him into the Tijaniyyah and impressed upon him to visit Nioro, in Mali for further training in the Tijaniyyah.
Five years later he went to Nioro where he spent three years under the leadership of one Muqaddam Muhammad 'Abd al-Rahman who also appointed him a muqaddam.
When muqaddam Abubakr Jublli returned to Nigeria he started to preach the doctrines of his group in his settlement at Jubill, Oke-Ode, near Ilorin.
He became widely known in the area in particular as a mysterious man because he is believed to possess supernatural powers and this attracted many people to him who went to him with their problems for solution. Through this contact he initiated some people into his way.
As we have indicated earlier, the members of the Hamahullah group are not many in Nigeria. A number of factors can be attributed to this. For example, muqaddam Abubakr Jublli is the only authorized leader that can initiate a prospective member known as murid into the group. In effect, it means that such a prospective murid will have to travel to Oke-Ode since there is no other known muqaddam of the Hamahullah outside Oke-Ode.
Further to that muqaddam Jubili in his own case does not embark on recruitment tours to win members for his group. His attitude is in contrast to many other muqaddams of the Tljaniyyah who believe in bringing many people into the Order by extensive touring.
Another factor that is responsible for the paucity of members of the Hamahullah in Nigeria is the strictness of their muqaddam. He does not initiate any body except if he is convinced that such a person actually manifests a sincere interest in the Tljaniyyah and the doctrines of the Hamahullah in particular. He often turns people back and asks them to go and think properly and come back after a month or two if they are still interested.
We will like to observe that the practice of this muqaddam is in conformity with the dictates of the Tljaniyyah which require a life membership of the Order. A muqaddam is expected to explain all the rules and regulations governing the Tijaniyyah to a prospective member and the muqaddam must be convinced that such a person fully accepts them convincingly before he is initiated into the Order (Bughyat al-Mustafld, p. 286).
The absence of such strictness on the part of some muqaddams whereby they initiate people into the Tijaniyyah indiscriminately and recklessly, too, seems to account for the resignation of some members from the Order.
Primary Source of info;
Muqaddam Abubakar Jubillee was interviewed by the writer (Prof. Y. A. Quadri) in October 1980 at Oke-Ode, Kwara State, Nigeria.
