By Abdullahi Alhassan, Kaduna
The Interfaith Mediation Centre has turned to culture, dialogue and the role of women to rebuild trust in Kasuwan Magani, as residents marked the International Day of Peace with shared meals, traditional games and a renewed call for unity across religious and ethnic lines.
The event held on Monday in the volatile Kaduna community was organized by IMC with support from the German Embassy, Abuja, as part of efforts to strengthen local structures working on human rights and sustainable peace. It featured a revival of old practices including the pounding and grinding of guinea corn, cooking of traditional dishes, and communal play aimed at reconnecting young people to their heritage.
Co-Executive Director of IMC, Mr. Samson Auta, said peace cannot grow where people are divided by identity. He argued that misconceptions fester in the absence of interaction, and that development only follows when communities choose to see each other first as human beings.
“If there is peace, there can be development. If there is interaction, there will be understanding,” Auta told participants. “We should look at ourselves as humanity, and in humanity, we need to cherish and to share love among our fellow brothers and women and the children that we have.”
He expressed concern that technology and modern lifestyles were eroding everyday customs and disconnecting the youth from their roots.
“People are not connected to their history, people are not connected to their culture,” he said. “We need to revisit this culture to teach our younger ones so that we just don’t lose our identity. Because when we lose our identity, we don’t know where we are.”
Auta disclosed that similar peace activities are being replicated in Zone 1 and Zone 3 of Kasuwan Magani, and urged residents to sustain the momentum. “We are all together working for peace, and peace is what will keep us together,” he added.
Community leader, Jonathan Peter, said the initiative was deliberately designed to revive values of togetherness that have weakened with overreliance on Western education, by transferring knowledge from elders to the younger generation on peaceful coexistence.
Kasuwan Magani, he noted, is a major market hub that draws people of different ethnicities and faiths, but has also been prone to tragic conflicts that claimed lives, destroyed livelihoods and left deep mistrust. To bridge the gap, he said the community is focusing on activities that strengthen relationships among women, whom he described as critical to child upbringing and to achieving lasting peace.
Peter called on the Federal Government to take deliberate steps to rebuild national trust and bring women fully into peacebuilding. He also urged the Christian Association of Nigeria and the Jama’atu Nasril Islam to work together with sincerity, stressing that “humanity comes before any religion.”
According to him, the most effective way to address Nigeria’s challenges is to return to culture and empower traditional rulers, whose authority he said transcends politics, religion and tribe. “Unlike religious bodies that operate within limited mandates, traditional institutions have no boundaries and remain rooted in the core purpose of uniting people,” he stated.
Also speaking at the event, community member Miss Gift Jerry said Christians and Muslims gathered happily to relive the practices of their forebears. Residents cooked together, played together, laughed and shared stories as part of efforts to restore the spirit of oneness that once defined daily life in the area.
“My call to young ones is for us to reflect on what our olden days parents were doing, because there was no segregation between Christian and Muslim,” Jerry said. “They always do things together, they play together, they come together as one. When we see what our parents have been doing before, we reflect, then we will be able to follow their steps and do more.”
Organizers said the commemoration was part of broader efforts to heal divisions in Kasuwan Magani and entrench peaceful coexistence by drawing strength from cultural values passed down by previous generations.