Buhari Insensitive to Yearnings of Nigerians – CAN
The leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has condemned in strong terms the failure of President Muhammadu Buhari to be fair to all sections of the country in the three recent appointments.
The President has made three key appointments in the last few days, but none of them comes from the South and none is a Christian! He appointed Yusuf Magaji Bichi, a Muslim, from Kano State to replace Matthew Seiyefa, a Christian from Bayelsa who had been operating in an acting capacity since Lawal Daura was sacked in Buhari’s absence.
Mr Abbas Umar Masanawa was also named the Managing Director of the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company, just as Hajiya Zainab Ahmed was appointed the acting Finance Minister to replace Mrs Kemi Adeosun who resigned as a result of her failure to participate in the NYSC programme and for parading a forged NYSC Certificate of Exemption.
We wish to place on record, once again, the dangerous and religious discrimination and partiality that have characterized the President Buhari-led administration. We believe the marginalisation of the Christians is deliberate to heighten the tension in the land for whatever reasons.
CAN notes with disappointments, shocks and surprises that despite our appeal to President Buhari to break the domination of the country’ security council by people of the same religion and language in a multi-religious and multi-ethnic groups that make up Nigeria, he still derives pleasure in turning a deaf ear to the Voice of Wisdom and Reason as manifested in the three appointments.
As we noted in our January Press Conference, “Under President Buhari, the murderous Fulani herdsmen enjoyed unprecedented protection and favouritism to the extent that the herdsmen treat Nigeria as a conquered territory. Rather than arrest and prosecute the Fulani herdsmen, security forces usually manned by Muslims from the North offer them protection as they unleash terror with impunity on the Nigerian people.
“The bottom line is that President Buhari failed woefully to protect Nigerians. He wilfully permitted the Fulani herdsmen to operate, killing people, destroying communities wholesale, destroying farmlands and turning the entire Middle Belt into “killing fields”, all the while enjoying government protection from counter attack, arrest or prosecution.
“By failing to curb the attacks of the Fulani herdsmen President Buhari has failed to uphold Section 14, Para. 2 (b) in the Constitution that ‘the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government:’
"Through his partial, sectional and discriminatory appointments, particularly in Security and Education, President Buhari violated Section 14, Para. 3 “The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few State or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Government or in any of its agencies.”
The President who at his inauguration three years ago promised to be fair to all has been consistently and persistently discriminating against Christians and Southerners in all his appointments and policies.
CAN is also disappointed with the justification of the illegalities being perpetrated by Buhari in the lopsided appointments by the Presidency including a handful Christians in his government who are doing so primarily to keep their jobs, at the expense of the majority.
For anyone to be asking all well-meaning Nigerians, including some media houses, to stop complaining of the lopsided appointments in the security apparatus of the country is reprehensible, insensitive, and wicked.
Perhaps, if there was no undeclared systematic ethnic cleansing and genocide in the predominant Christian communities in the country, as rightly observed by the likes of Prof Wole Soyinka and General T. Y. Danjuma of recent, we would have turned a blind eye to the unlawful action of the President.
The notorious Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) has been threatening those who condemn their nefarious activities in the Middle belt where thousands of our members are being killed with impunity, yet the association that has a lot of things in common with terrorist organisations are not only being treated with kid gloves by the security agencies, but their aggressive attacks on the innocent people are being justified by the President, the Defence Minister, the Minister of Interior, the Minister of Information and the Inspector General of Police.
The Boko Haram Islamic terrorist organisation has not ceased attacking and killing our people, they are abducting our members on a daily basis and despite all our hues and cries, the Federal Government and the security agencies have refused to liberate Leah Sharibu and others in the enclave of this blood-sucking terrorist group because of their faith.
CAN is fully persuaded beyond any reasonable doubt that it is the lopsided appointments in the security agencies that is largely responsible why Christians have become endangered species in their Fatherland under the leadership of Buhari.
CAN also wishes to observe that the lopsided appointments is a hallmark of the Federal Government in other key ministries like Interior, Defence, Education and Information. We challenge the Federal Ministry of Information and the Presidency to contradict this fact with evidences by publishing names of all heads of the parastatals and agencies including their states of origins and religions.
These are all parts of the gradual and subtle islamisation agenda, but we are sad that those who are benefitting from the existing order, Christians inclusive, have been dismissing this alert with a wave of hands. CAN as the Watchman for the nation will refuse to be cowed or intimidated.
We recalled that the Organisation of Islamic Countries met in London in 1983 with a follow-up meeting in Nigeria in 1989 and had issued a communiqué to Islamize Africa with Nigeria capturing a great attention. This is a public knowledge while facts could be obtained from Wikipedia with links on OIC’s Conference in London, 1983 and Abuja Declaration of 1989.
This is the source of the ongoing systemic Islamisation agenda as member states in Africa were asked to take over key posts in the public service with a view to using them to propagate Islam.
This is what Buhari has been implementing in the last three years. Our fear is if President Buhari, who is pursuing second term, can be discriminating against Christians and the South, we wonder what will become of him if he is re-elected. We call on all well- meaning Nigerians to speak against the ills in the country before it is too late. If the trend continues, the future of this great country looks bleak.
We seek your assistance by publishing this statement in your popular, credible and reliable media.
Thank You for your usual co-operation.
Signed Pastor Adebayo Oladeji, Special Assistant (Media and Communications) to the CAN President, His Eminence, Rev Dr Samson Olasupo Ayokunle.
17th September, 2018.
