An Islamic cleric, Hussaini Abubakar-Giro, has charged Nigerian pilgrims to rigorously pray for prevailing peace across the country.

He also urged the pilgrims to pray for Nigerian leaders by seeking divine intervention in the nation’s lingering economic predicament.

Mr Abubakar-Giro, a board member of the Kebbi Pilgrims Welfare Board, gave the charge at a routine enlightenment session shortly after the dawn prayer (Subh) in Makkah, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, on Saturday.

The essence of the enlightenment session is to educate the pilgrims on the rituals of Hajj towards an acceptable Hajj (Hajj Mabrur).

The cleric said, “We must always devote time to seeking divine intervention for God Almighty to fix our major problems of lingering insecurity, as well as economic difficulties.

“We must, therefore, pray for our leaders to be able to tackle these challenges. The more they tackle the challenges, the better for us.

“Since your arrival here in Saudi Arabia, you have never heard of any Imam accusing the leaders, hence the need for us all to emulate and pray for Nigerian leaders to succeed.”

While encouraging the pilgrims to repent to earn Allah’s favour, the cleric said nobody knew when they would answer the call of their creator (die).

Mr Abubakar-Giro also cautioned them against mistrust, backbiting and other forms of sin to scale through peacefully on the day of judgement (Quyama).

(NAN)