WINNING THE WAR AGAINST WOMEN
Parents in Plateau State say their underage daughters were taken to a Bauchi Shariah council and converted to Islam without consent, highlighting long‑standing tensions over child marriage, coercion, and weak enforcement of Nigeria’s Child Rights Act.
By Luka Binniyat
KADUNA, Nigeria — Two Christian families in Zallaki community, Bassa Local Government Area (LGA) of Plateau State, are battling to retrieve their three teen-age daughters after learning that the girls had converted to Islam and were in the custody of an Islamic organization.
Context: Unicef has reported that 12 percent of Nigerian women under 24 were married before their 15th birthday. Many of these marriages were forced upon the girls as they were given the choice to convert to Islam and be wed or to suffer torture and death, according to Persecution.org.
In a report published on October 12, 2026, Light Bearer News reported that the three Plateau State girls, aged 13, 15, and another 15-year-old girl from another family, were converted along with a 23-year-old married Christian woman with three children.
The conversion, according to the report, took place in the Bigura Muslim community, Toro LGA of Bauchi state, which borders Plateau State. Bauchi State has an infamous record for controversial Muslim-on-Christian conversion. Advocus Africa reported in March 2026 that no less than 200 underage Christian girls in Bauchi state have been forcefully converted to Islam between 1999 and 2025.
The recent Light Bearer News report, titled “Plateau Parents Cry Out as Bauchi Shariah Council Holds 4 Girls Over Conversion to Islam”, said the families learned of their daughters’ whereabouts after receiving letters from the Bauchi State Shariah Commission informing them of the conversions.
Today’s Challenge – a Christian publication based in Jos, Plateau State, which also reported the story, said that it had.obtained copies of the letters with reference number: BAS/SC/NCTI/065/VOL.1 dated 29/09/2026 and signed by Muh’d Hadi Aliyu, Acting Director, Da’awah and Islamic Education Department, for the Chairman, Bauchi State Sharia Commission.
One of the letters addressed to the parents and titled “To Whom It May Concern” reads in part: “The bearer (name withheld) brought herself before the Shari’ah Commission through Da’awah Council Committee members reporting her CONVERSION TO ISLAM willingly”
According to Today’s Challenge, the families dispute this account, alleging that their daughters left the community without parental knowledge or consent and were likely deceived or coerced.
Families Question How Girls Left Home
A community leader in Zillaka, identified as Mr Musa, whose name was reportedly withheld for security reasons, told the publication that the community’s paramount ruler informed him of the incident and asked him to intervene.
According to Musa, two young Muslim men allegedly worked with a middle-aged Muslim woman in Bigura, (in Toro Local Government Area), to persuade the girls to embrace Islam.
They girls were said to be attending a nonboarding High School in Bigura at the time.
He said the three girls initially went to the woman’s residence, where they were encouraged to convert. Among them was a 13-year-old and her 15-year-old sister who agreed to be converted.
The youngest, aged 13, reportedly refused and returned home to Zallika with her newly converted elder sister after two days of conversion effort. The report said that she told her mother that she wanted to continue her education and did not want to convert, which would force her to drop out of school and to marry a Muslim man. She also asked help to pay her school fee which was due.
Musa said the girl returned to Bigura with her elder sister after her widowed mother was unable to raise the school fees.
“The sisters then returned and joined another 15-year-old girl and the older married woman and mother of three in Bigura. The Muslim woman and the two men then took them to Gwalfada village in Toro, where their conversion to Islam was confirmed,” the publication cited Musa as saying.
The families of the new converts, according to Musa, maintain that they neither approved the girls’ departure from their homes nor consented to the religious change since they were never informed beforehand.
Musa questioned whether a 13-year-old could make such a decision without adult influence, alleging that deception, threats and manipulation of her mind might have been used to lure the girls into Islam
Girls Affirms Conversion To Islam
The report said a meeting was held at the Bauchi State Shariah Commission on October 7, in Tori town, bringing the girls together with their parents and other concerned persons.
The girls reportedly maintained that they had converted voluntarily and did not wish to return home and to Christianity.
According to Musa, efforts to persuade them to return to their families, even if they wished to continue practising Islam, were unsuccessful. The meeting ended without agreement between the Sharia Council. The families left the meeting traumatised and uncertain about the next steps, according to Musa.
The report also indicated that the matter might be transferred to Jos, Plateau State, following a reported court directive. The directive’s precise terms were not independently verified.
As of the publication’s deadline, the girls were reportedly still in the custody of the Da’awah Council in Toro.
Why Sharia Practicing States Ignore Secular Laws Against Child-Marriage
According to legal scholars, including Tim S. Braimah, and research by Human Rights Watch, the resistance to the Child Rights Act in some Northern Nigerian states is rooted primarily in conflicting interpretations of Islamic personal law, constitutional ambiguities and weak enforcement, rather than the beliefs of all Muslims.
Some state legislators and religious authorities regard the Act as incompatible with Islamic traditions and local customs. Consequently, some states have delayed adopting the law, while others have enacted child-protection legislation containing qualifications that weaken its minimum-age provisions.
Luka Binniyat writes for TruthNigeria on Politics, Conflict and Religion from Kaduna .
