What 100 religious leaders told Jonathan about fuel subsidy removal – Archbishop Onaiyekan

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Sunday Trust

25 December 2011

What 100 religious leaders told Jonathan about fuel subsidy removal – Archbishop Onaiyekan

The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, His Grace John Onaiyekan spoke in Abuja on many issues affecting Nigeria on this year’s Christmas celebration.

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The new wave of bomb blasts, which started from the very beginning of the year and which continued intermittently and up till now, is still a thing of concern.  What worries me about 2011 is that the kind of insecurity that we have on ground is new. We are not used to suicide bombers. This is the first time we hear about it and we are praying God that it doesn’t become something that we have to live with, like they do in some parts of the world. We hope that it will be just a passing phase.  What is also worrisome is when this kind of thing is given political justification. When you start talking about negotiations, amnesty, it means you are politicising issues of security which have to do with the protection of human life and property. I’m hoping that we will not continue along this line and that when we have a threat on the security of the nation like in Boko Haram, even the Niger Delta militants or the wave of kidnappings, that every political force will join hands to deal with it and not spend the time pointing finger, trading blames—they say this is happening because you didn’t win election properly—because you rigged the election, this is why this is happening. It is sad.

Sometimes, one gets the impression that some of the people who lost out in the political struggles of this year, even if they were not behind this confusion, seem to be standing by and secretly happy—in other words say, “You said you won the election, let’s see how you will rule.” Meanwhile, the country is running down and our reputation abroad is getting more and more tarnished. If we allow that to happen, even if there is another election, when they win, they will still be faced with the problem so they better sort it out now. I don’t have the facts. But we are not getting a coherent, united voice of the political forces and the deeds have proved that I’m not speaking at random.

So you do not support giving amnesty.

It depends!

You supported the one for the Niger Delta?

Well I’m not sure you finished with that one. Only two weeks ago, some of them blocked the Niger bridge. Like I heard people on radio saying, “You  told us to put down our arms and you would give us money. We dropped our arms and you have not paid us.” So this is what amnesty means: you tell people who pick up arms, if you drop your arms, we will give you money. The danger with that is that there are arms all over the place, such that anybody who can pick up arms and start terrorising the environment can then come forward and be settled. This is why some of us are a little bit sceptical. And because of that logic, we hear people who present the same logic for the Boko Haram.

Although I don’t know the Boko Haram, who they are, the Niger Delta, some of them are known people. Boko Haram remains faceless. But there are people who are making a case for them, that just as you are ready to spend money to calm Niger Delta militants, you should spend money to calm Boko Haram instead of sending soldiers to go and deal with them. Once you start something that is not based on good principles, you stand to fail.