Nigerians Are Hungry – Cardinal Okogie Tells Buhari

Open Letter To The President

Dear Mr. President,

Last year, when you assumed office, the chant of “Change,” your campaign slogan, ushered you into the Presidential Villa.  Today, cries of “hunger” could be heard across the length and breadth of our vast country.  

*Cardinal Okogie 

Nigerians hunger, not only for food, but also for good leadership, for peace, security, and justice.  This letter is to appeal to you to do something fast, and, if you are already doing something, to redouble your effort. 

May it not be written on the pages of history that Nigerians died of starvation under your watch.   As President, you are the chief servant of the nation.  I, therefore, urge you to live up to the huge expectation of millions of Nigerians.  A stitch in time saves nine. 

This is the second year of your administration.  

You and your party promised to lead the masses to the Promised Land.   It is not an easy task to lead.  But by campaigning for this office, you offered to take the enormous task of leadership upon yourself. Nigerians are waiting for you to fulfill the promises you made during the campaign.  

They voted you into office because of those promises. The introduction of town hall meetings is a commendable idea.  But in practice, you, not just your ministers, must converse with Nigerians.  You are the President. You must be accountable to them.  The buck stops on your desk.  

Even if your administration has no magic wand at least give some words of encouragement.  On this same score, please instruct your ministers, and insist that they be sincere and polite at those town meetings.  Their sophistry will neither serve you nor Nigerians. 

Mr. President, if you want to leave a credible legacy come 2019, in all sincerity, please retool your administration.  Change is desirable.  But it must be a change for the better.  Let this change be real.  Change is not real when old things that we ought to discard refuse to pass away.

You will need to take a critical look at your cabinet, at the policies and programmes of your administration, and at those who help you to formulate and execute them.  You will need to take a critical look at the manner of appointments you have been making.  

It is true that commonsense dictates that you appoint men and women you can trust.  But if most of the people you trust are from one section of the country and practice the same religion, then you and all of us are living in insecurity. The Nigerian economy has never been in a state as terrible as this. 

You as President are like the pilot of an aircraft flying in turbulence.  Turbulent times bring the best or the worst out of a pilot.  We can no longer blame the turbulence on past administrations.  You know quite well that some of the officials of your administration served in previous dispensations. 

Wither Osun State! We Are Watching

By Anthony Okogie

In Nigeria today, Religion is always used for wrong reasons. We witnessed the OIC palaver of 1986 which nearly split our country in two, the religious riots in the old Kaduna State during which a number of churches were set ablaze and innocent lives were lost, the Sharia controversy in some states in the North in 2000 which also led to loss of human lives and harassment of the Christian minority in those states, the subjection of Nigerians to noise pollution issuing from churches and mosques, the exploitation of religious differences by politicians who would do or say anything to get votes, the use of religion to justify the obviously politically motivated Boko Haram insurgency, to mention but these.

*Okogie 

Religion is once again in the news, this time in Osun State on the wearing of HIJAB.  The much publicized hijab controversy in Osun State and the ensuing altercation between Muslims and Christians in the state should make peace-loving Nigerians apprehensive. Osun State is in the South West, a part of Nigeria that is noted and envied for its inter-religious harmony. It is a part of Nigeria where one could find siblings who practice different religions without acrimony. Let it not be that the hijab controversy in Osun State is the beginning of the end of inter-religious harmony in south-western Nigeria.

Osun State Governor (Ogbeni) Rauf Aregbesola has, in some quarters, been accused of instigating the crisis. The governor, for his part, has pro-tested his innocence. He has asked his accusers to provide evidence to prove the accusation. His accusers, for their part, believe rightly or wrongly, that his protestations make him look like the man who, according to a Yoruba allegory, having shot an arrow, now uses a mortar as his helmet. They believe, again rightly or wrongly, that the government he heads comes across as a government of questionable neutrality in this matter.  

But let us identify the real problem in Osun State. It is neither the wearing of hijab nor the wearing of choir robes. The problem of Osun State is the problem of many of the states in the fissiparous federalism Nigeria has been operating. Osun State, like an overwhelming majority of states in Nigeria, has failed to demonstrate that it is economically viable, and there are sufficient indices to back the assertion. The state government has not been able to pay salaries of workers for months. From the uncompleted intersection at Gbongan on the Ibadan-Ife Road, through the entire state, it is clearly evident that roads in Osun State are among the worst in Nigeria. It is hardly possible to drive one kilometer without a pothole, sometimes a crater.

In 2015, Osun State was ranked 29th of the 36 states in performance in the senior secondary school certificate examination. Quality of life in Osun State ranks among the worst in Nigeria. It would therefore amount to a distraction to make wearing a religious garb — whether it is hijab or choir robes— the issue in Osun State. It betrays a depressing lack of focus. This is the time for the governor and the people to live up to their beautiful name, to think and act like omolua-bi, since they call the state Ipinle Omoluabi. The problem of Osun State I dare say is not religion but the scandalous under-development of the state. Why is it that a portion of Nigeria that is so richly endowed is inhabited by impoverished people? The potentials for agriculture, tourism, sports, education in Osun State and the poor living condition of the people of the state raises a big question about quality of governance, past and present, in Ipinle Omoluabi. Instead of quarreling over religion, the people of Osun State would do well to call all its governors, past and present, to explain why, since the creation of the state in 1991, that state has simply failed to take off.

We Are Watching: The Education Curriculum

By Anthony Olubunmi Okogie  

We live in a country where the rumor mills work relentlessly and unceasingly, a land where conspiracy theories are never in short supply. There are rumors in the air that a new curriculum of basic education is either about to be adopted, or has already been adopted by the Federal Ministry of Education, and that it is already being implemented.

*Cardinal Okogie 

It is said that this curriculum, with the stated intention of merging religion and national values, merges subjects like Christian Religious Studies, Islamic Studies, Civic Education, Social Studies, and Security Education into one compulsory subject; that this compulsory subject will be taught to our children from Primary 1 to Junior Secondary School 3; that our young and impressionable minds will be taught in this compulsory subject that Jesus neither died on the cross nor resurrected; that all the children to be taught this subject would be required to memorize and recite the Quran; that they (children) will be taught or are being taught already that they may disobey their parents if they do not allow them to become Muslim.

For the sake of limited comfort, let us be hypothetical and imagine that these rumors emanated from the fertile imagination of idle mischief-makers. That would be a confirmation of the famous dictum that the idle mind is the devil’s workshop. The emergence and increasingly powerful influence of social media clearly and unambiguously demonstrate to us in Nigeria that there is a large population of such minds. Their stock in trade is misinformation for the sake of dissension. They know how to make falsehood appear as truth and, even when they speak the truth, they do so in a way that misleads. Such individuals threaten our peaceful coexistence.

But there is room for another hypothesis, a discomforting one this time. What if such a curriculum exists, with its contents as reported in these rumors? If indeed such a curriculum is being implemented or is about to be implemented then its authors and executors should seriously consider its implications. It would be gravely imprudent to present Islam to a Christian child in ways that devalue Islam. In the same way, it would amount to a grave disservice to interreligious relationship if Christianity were to be presented to a Muslim child in ways that devalue the teachings of Christianity.