Christian Association of Nigeria
(CAN) on Saturday released full text of the speech its President, Rev Dr
Samson Olasupo Ayokunle, read out when the group met President Muhammadu
Buhari on Friday.
Ayokunle led a CAN delegation
to a closed-door meeting with the president at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Issues raised include withdrawal
of Nigeria from religious organizations, issuance of certificate of occupancy
to churches in the North, unpaid workers’ salaries, breakdown of infrastructure
in the nation, revival of Nigerian Inter-religious Council, unemployment and
lopsidedness in appointments
The speech made available by Pastor Bayo Oladeji , spokesman to CAN
president , reads:
"Your Excellency Sir, it was
about two and a half years ago, precisely, July 2015 that we had the intention
of paying this courtesy visit to you to congratulate you for becoming the
President of our great country Nigeria. We however thank God that as Christian
body in Nigeria, we are able to meet with you at last. So, what we intended to
do then when we wrote to pay you courtesy visit, we are doing now by
congratulating you for winning the election and for you to count on the
Association to continue to pray for you for the Spirit of wisdom and
understanding to be able to lead this country in the right direction until we
get to our Promised land.
We wish to seize this opportunity
as well to very much congratulate you for the miraculous recovery from sickness
which took you away from the shores of Nigeria for many days. We as an
Association took time to pray for you like other religious groups in this
nation and we thank God that you are back alive. It was the love of Nigerians
for you that kept all things intact while you were away and the able
lieutenants that God gave to you who held the fort in your absence. May the
affliction never arise again in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour.
We want to advise you to manage
your recovery well and take one step at a time. Delegation would be of help for
you to totally recover and deliver the dividends of democracy to Nigerians.
Please allow us in this visit to
pray for you because that is the major reason we are here today.
Recognition of Achievements
We want to appreciate you in the
areas in which your administration is making giant strides since you came on
board. The first of these is the recognition of corruption as a virus which has
the potential of killing the nation if not stopped. Much more we salute your
courage to confront it headlong as never done by any government in this nation
before to the best of our knowledge and judgement. We do not want you to relent
in doing this. The setbacks not withstanding, accomplishing the goal is the
ultimate. However, we want you to fight corruption without fear or favour
including those around you who may be like the ‘mixed multitude’ who went out
of Egypt with the Israelites but were not Israelis. They caused harm along the
way. Therefore, let there be no untouchable, hand those close to you that may
be corrupt over to law enforcement agents as you have done to others for proper
prosecution.
Secondly we want to commend you
for your commitment to the flushing out of Boko Haram Islamic Fundamentalists
from Nigeria. They had caused deep sorrow and damage to the nation especially
many Christians, churches and facilities in the north - east in particular
and the North in general.
We praise you for the empowerment
of the military to do their work and the courage of the military and dedication
to duty.
We on the other hand observe that
the murderous Fulani Herdsmen who were previously allowed to ply their trade in
many communities in Nigeria have become a menace to many communities. The
Christian communities of Benue State, Southern Kaduna, Enugu and a host of
others have been on the receiving side on this. Recently I went to a village
called Ancha in Bassa Local Government of Plateau State where 21 Christians in
a village were killed overnight by Fulani Herdsmen. My church in that village
lost 20 members out of the 21 and we gave them mass burial. It was a gory sight
to behold. The most painful and baffling thing about it was that after that
attack, they came to the same area again and killed another 24 people with none
of them arrested by the enforcement agents. What a complicity! Why are the
Fulani herdsmen devastating communities without being arrested? Why are they
not prosecuted? Why was the source of their ammunition not investigated? Why do
they roam about with guns without being arrested? All these are begging for the
quick attention of the President so that the people they are attacking also
might not seek self defence which may lead to the breakdown of law and order in
the nation.
Thirdly, we want to commend your
administration for the recovery of some of the kidnapped Chibok girls after
some years of incarceration by the insurgents in the north—east. We are
pleading with you to intensify more efforts to recover the rest who may still
be alive before their lives are completely messed up. Equally, we sent a
special appeal to the government and the Inspector General of Police in
particular to help us recover twenty Borno women that were kidnapped by Boko
Haram while going to bury their relative who died outside Maiduguri. Up till
now, we did not hear anything over the matter from the government neither was
our letter acknowledged. We are renewing our appeal again for the recovery of
those women who were all Christians.
In a nutshell, the following are
the issues the Christian Association of Nigeria wants Mr. President to address
without delay.
Withdrawal of Nigeria from
Religious Organizations
We call on the Executive and
Legislative arms of government to withdraw Nigeria from the Organisation of
Islamic Cooperation and from other international religious bodies and treaties
Nigeria signed with such religious organizations because it violates the
secular state of the nation as enshrined in the constitution of Nigeria and
further violates government’s non-partisanship in religious matters as
enshrined in the same constitution. The sanctity of the constitution must be
kept for Nigeria to survive as one nation.
Issuance of Certificate of
Occupancy to Churches in the North
We call on the Executive and the
National Assembly to prevail on States in the North to issue Certificate of
Occupancy to churches in the region. Many excuses are presently being given by
State Governments in the North to deny Christians the right of building their
own places of worship. Recently, Jigawa State Government pulled down some
church structures under the guise that they did not have building permit. The
truth of the matter as obtained from the chairman of CAN in the State was that
the churches had applied for permission to build for not less than a year or
more without any response. Do the Christians in the North not have the right to
build their houses of worship and serve God without fear or favour? If Nigeria
is one country, this type of religious discrimination must come to an end.
Lopsidedness in Appointments
CAN equally calls on this
administration to address the lopsidedness in appointments done by this
administration for both ethnic and religious balance for all of us to be able
to do pilgrimage together as a nation. For example, the defence apparatus in
this nation is skewed in favour of one religion. In the recently released
statistics of appointments made by this administration so far by the Media
Adviser to the President, there was apparent lopsidedness because while some
States have over thirty people appointed, others do not have more than three.
How can people from such States with three have the sense of belonging to this
nation and this administration?
Unpaid Salaries and Allowances
and We declare the inability of
the State Governments to pay workers’ salaries and allowances as at when due as
unacceptable and call on the Federal and State Governments to work together to
address this as quick as possible. This would step the tide of crimes and
suicide that are increasing all over the nation.
Breakdown of Infrastructure in
the nation
We further urge your
administration to address the breakdown of infrastructure in the nation such as
road construction, provision of uninterrupted power supply and adequate funding
of health facilities so as to stop the untimely death of our people and medical
tourism abroad.
Unemployment Problem
We call on the Federal Government
to declare a state of emergency on unemployment in the nation and to set up a
machinery towards the provision of employment for graduates. It is a time bomb
that could be devastating if not quickly attended to.
Criminal Activities and the need
for more police
We observe that the criminal
activities that are on the increase in the land should be addressed more
squarely. The police should be more adequately equipped in policing the nation.
More policemen at the same time should be recruited as the present number is
too low to cope with the large population of the country.
Revival of NIREC
Finally, we request for the
revival of the Nigerian Inter-religious Council, (NIREC) which in the past had
fostered interaction and promoted religious harmony between Christian and
Muslim leaders in the country whose meeting logistics were to be provided by
the government. Government’s position that there is no money to facilitate the
convening of the meeting is not good enough. If there is no money to build
peace, we believe that it would be more costly to prosecute war.
We thank Mr. President for
creating time to listen to us and we hope that this type of parley would be
taking place more regularly for the general good of our nation. We believe in
one united Nigeria where there is justice, fairplay and mutual respect.
Thank you. ”
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You could have Call or draw fayose's attention when he makes a move to demolish mosques in Ekiti state, and you have forgotten that Sunday is giving to you free days to go to your church's while Muslim's were denied to allow them Friday to be free working days, also our colonel rulers are Christians and they have make many things even some laws are in favor of Christian, eg our Muslim sisters cannot go to secondary school with HIJAB they cannot go to government working place with their HIJABS. But christian can go with mini skirt and body hooked clothes, if a Muslim is working in some companies NO time for him /her to go and perform the five daily prayers. The insignia on Hospital is Christian logo. Really we have to discuss on many things
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