Dr Abdullah Oyekan, Chairman, Governing Council, University of Ilorin, has urged Muslim faithful to intensify prayers over COVID-19 devastation across the world.
Oyekan who made the call in a special Ramadan Message on Monday, said in these times when unprecedented experiences had become the order of the day, Ramadan 1491 A.H. was to be no exception.
The don said that in this COVID-19 era, Muslims needed to be much closer to Allah, most high, to seek His reversal of the calamitous effects of the pandemic caused by a virus, a creature of His.
He lamented that this virus was so tiny as to be invisible to the naked eye, which had brought the whole world helplessly to its knees.
He observed that virtually all Muslims had never experienced a Friday in which congregational Jumuáh prayer did not hold until recently.
“And now the unthinkable, Ramadan without congregational Tarawih prayers and Tafseer are right before us because of the necessary lockdown.
“For many daily paid workers for whom no work equals no pay, the thought of how to procure regular Sahur and Iftar during Ramadan is most perplexing,” he said.
According to him, the Muslim, who is normally exhorted to be generous during Ramadan, is now required by the compelling pressures of our present circumstances to be extremely generous this Ramadan.
“The Ramadan fast is fundamentally aimed at elevating the believer’s level of Taqwa (piety).
“Our sharing spirit and devotion must be hiked up this Ramadan to meet the demands of these testing times.
“We should take solace in the words of the Holy Prophet, S.A.W., that the reward of the believer is proportional to the level of inconvenience he experiences in carrying out a divine duty,” he said.
