The Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Sokoto, Matthew Kukah, has called on President Bola Tinubu to end the cycle of violence threatening peace and stability in Nigeria.
Mr Kukah expressed his frustrations in an Easter statement addressed to the president and made available to PREMIUM TIMES.
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Symbolising the present situation of Nigerians with the holy Cross, Mr Kukah said many innocent people are being crucified.
“A very happy Easter to you and millions of our countrymen and women,” he felicitated. “For us Christians, this is the most important event in the history of our faith. It is the season of the Cross, the season of Christ’s triumph over death. This triumph was marked by the blind passion of those who crucified innocence.”
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Mr Kukah said he used “the metaphor of the cross to draw attention to the sufferings and afflictions that have befallen our country in the last years.” These sufferings, he lamented, have been marked by a culture of brutality and savagery never “witnessed in the history of our dear country.”
Nigeria has been fighting various terror groups, beginning with the Boko Haram insurgents in the North-east. The Boko Haram war, which primarily threatened stability in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa, has escalated into other states in the North-east region, as well as the North-central and North-west, where bandits wreak havoc on communities.
Recently, armed men launched a campaign of carnage on farming communities in parts of Plateau and Benue states, killing hundreds of locals and destroying their properties.
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This pattern of targeted violence has constantly threatened food security, which Mr Kukah, in his Easter message to President Tinubu, said is a “fundamental human right to all citizens.” He, therefore, urged Mr Tinubu to bring Nigerians down “from this painful cross of hunger.”
Mr Kukah also decried the increasing kidnapping in the country.
“Across the entire country, every day, innocent citizens are kidnapped and held under the most inhuman conditions,” he lamented. “A dark pall of death hangs languidly from north to south. It is impossible to find a home, a family, or a community that has not been caught in the cusp of this savagery. Now, Mr President, Nigeria is reaching a breaking point. The nation is gradually becoming a huge national morgue. Mr President, with a greater sense of urgency, hasten to bring us down from this cross of evil.”
Noting that Mr Tinubu was not the one who inflicted the terror on Nigerians, the cleric said the president needs to rekindle and renew the hope of Nigerians who have lost hope in the restoration of peace to the country.
“With broken navigational aids, our journey to greatness is threatened. Yet, amidst all of this, we Christians are compelled to look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith (Heb. 12:2). In times of deep moral and physical crises, we are often tempted, like the scribes and the elders to ask Jesus to prove himself by coming down from the cross (Matt. 27:40). Yet, we must learn to look up to the cross as the source of our boast (Gal: 14). Therefore, these times of great suffering should be times of hope, hope beyond human imagination, a hope which, as St. Paul assures us, does not disappoint (Rom. 5:5). Mr. President, renew our hope by bringing us down from this cross of brutality and suffering,” Mr Kukah wrote.
“Finally, we are confident that a majority of the citizens of our country want to live in peace with one another. However, allowing this insecurity to persist will undermine all forms of goodwill that this or any government in Nigeria espouses.
“We have all the ingredients to create a toxic mix of violence that can spin out of control. Right now, frustration has penetrated every spectrum of our society especially as the government and its security agencies seem to have largely become spectators in the dance of death that has overtaken our country.
“We are in a dilemma now and the question is simple: is the persistence of the insecurity a statement of the lack of capacity of our men and women in uniform, or is it evidence that those at the top are reaping the fruits of funding their own war machine? In other words, are Nigerians lambs being sacrificed to an unknown god? Mr. President, step up, get to the finishing line and bring us down from this cross of shame,” he added.
Mr Kukah said the resurrection of Jesus equips Christians to face life’s challenges with confidence.
“At Easter, we must remember that the law of the Lord is written in our hearts (Rom2:15). The structural deformities, the iniquities and corruption of our country are not an excuse for us to let down our guard,” he said. “We are the light of the world, a city set on a hill. We are equipped with the light of Christ to drive out the darkness that threatens to engulf our country. Let us collectively renew our commitment and hope for building a society after the mind of our creator.”
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