The Ahmadiyya Movement in Islam

Punjab/British India/Pakistan and Ghana and Nigeria

From the 1920s, Indian Muslim missionaries of the Ahmadiyya sect began to travel to West Africa and with West African Muslims established Ahmadiyya communities in the Gold Coast (later Ghana), Nigeria, Sierra Leone, and The Gambia.

The sect was very involved with building mosques, opening schools, and printing. Pakistani missionary Naseem Saifi, a newspaper editor and writer in Nigeria, accompanied the Nigerian entourage to welcome American hero Muhammad Ali when he visited many African countries in 1964.

In 1970, the Khalifatul Masih, the spiritual head of the Ahmadiyya, conducted a tour of many West African countries, raising funds to build more schools, hospitals, and mosques in the region. This wall mural in Kano, Nigeria, commemorates the expanding presence of the sect in this period.