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Tag: John Cardinal Onaiyekan

  • Onaiyekan blames defective security architecture for increased kidnapping, killings

    The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, His Eminence John Cardinal Onaiyekan on Saturday expressed concerns over the rate of kidnapping and killings along Abuja/Kaduna expressway.

    He declared something must be wrong with the nation’s security architecture for such criminalities to have taken place in the expressway without checks.

    The clergy man said it is sad that Nigerians at the mercy of kidnappers who operate nefarious without fear.

    He spoke while briefing reporters on a conference scheduled to hold next week in Abuja on irregular migration of Nigerians.

    He accused government of not doing enough to tackle the menace, declaring “Government should work hard on the wellbeing of Nigerians. We just have to admit that we have not done well for ourselves, which is why our home (Nigeria) is no longer our home.

    “I think it is a shame, we have 200 million people and we are being neglected. This is what we have when we neglect education. Our leaders are only taking care of themselves and their children.

    “If you have no idea of how to make Nigeria develop though education, security amongst others then do not go into politics. “Unfortunately I cannot say that they should not ask for my vote because they now do not ask for my vote they take it by force. Politics is for people who will organize things for us all.

    “This kidnapping issue happened on Kabba road some years back. I could not travel then. I could not understand that 30 kilometers of road cannot be policed.

    “And they are small boys. When government decided to do something then especially when many of the big men were kidnapped, they tackled the menace.

    “The government and police have told us several times that they have put up high level security checks and that they have cleared Abuja/Kaduna road and they boys have come up and said that they are still operating on the road.

    “But why is that possible because there is something wrong with the security apparatus of this country. It should not happen that kidnapping has now become a regular buisness on our high ways. It doesn’t happen in any civilised country.

    “It is sad that the kidnappers operate regularly on the high way and demand ransom and not only that they go to the extent of collecting the ransom.

    “And in all these process there is a government that is not able to do something. We just can’t understand.

    “It just gives you the very sad impression that we are really at the mercy of the criminals. So you get ready to pay them to beg them. This is not the way to live.  “

    He went on: “Must we wait till kidnapers kidnap President Muhammadu Buhari before we know there is a problem? This is serious. What government is doing is not enough and it may be in the wrong direction.”

  • Religious tolerance, key to Nigeria’s lasting peace – Cardinal Onaiyekan

    His Eminence, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, President of Cardinal Onaiyekan Foundation for Peace (COFP) says tolerance is imperative among religions for lasting peace and unity in Nigeria.

    Onaiyekan stated this on Saturday, at the finals of the second edition of the Interfaith Youth Football Competition (IYFC) sponsored by his foundation in Abuja.

    He stressed the need for interfaith relations, which he described as paramount to sustaining peaceful coexistence in spite of Nigeria’s socio-cultural diversity.

    “We as a people must begin to accept our linguistic, religious and cultural differences as strong bonds for our unity.

    Read also: Three killed in fresh Kaduna attacks

    “The purpose of this football competition is to bring every Nigerian together as one, irrespective of tribe or religion,” he said.

    Babayaro FC of Gwagwalada won the trophy by beating defending champions, Solace FC of Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) 4-3 on penalties.

    The match ended 1-1 at full time with different chances missed by either side to carry the day.

    Solace FC had opened scoring at the 28th minute through Moses Fidelis, but Maxwell Dangana equalised at the 69th minute.

    However, the match ended in penalties which saw Solace FC missing two chances and giving Babayaro FC of Gwagwalada an edge.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the competition is geared towards promoting peace and unity among Nigerians, especially youths. (NAN)

  • Pope appoints Archbishop Kaigama as Bishop of Abuja

    His Holiness, Pope Francis, has appointed His Grace, Archbishop Ignatius Ayau Kaigama as the Archbishop of Abuja.

    Pope Francis, who was represented by Apostolic Nuncio to Nigeria, His Grace, Archbishop Antonio Guido Filipazzi, made the announcement during the opening ceremony of the first plenary meeting of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Nigeria (CBCN), on Monday in Abuja.

    Kaigama would take over from His Eminence, John Cardinal Onaiyekan who clocked the retirement age of 75 on January 29, 2019.

    He is currently the Apostolic Administrator of the Archdiocese of Jos and immediate past President of the CBCN, is a priest of Jukun origin from Taraba State.

    “We congratulate and pray for Archbishop Kaigama. I know that it is not easy for him. But I told him like Abraham, go out of your land in the land God will show you and God will bless you and make you the father of many people,” Filipazzi said.

    Read Also: Catholic Bishop lauds violence-free polls in Edo

    Born on July 31, 1958, Kaigama studied for the priesthood at St. Augustine’s Major Seminary in Jos, and Rome respectively.

    Kaigama was ordained on June 6, 1981, and was appointed Bishop of Jalingo by Pope John Paul II, now Saint Pope John Paul. Kaigama was consecrated as bishop on April 23, 1995.

    In 2000, Kaigama was again appointed by Pope John Paul II to succeed the late Archbishop Gabriel Ganaka as Archbishop of Jos.

  • 2019: learn from consequences of 1966 civil war – Onaiyekan

    *Blood of every Nigerian is precious, don’t allow it to be spilled – Onaiyekan

    *Boko Haram: Don’t sweep causes of soldiers death under the carpet – Onaiyekan

     

    With the February general elections fast approaching, the Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, on Sunday warned that Nigeria should learn from the lessons and consequences of the 1966 civil war.

    He gave the warning while delivering the message during the Interdenominational Church Service for the 2019 Armed Forces Remembrance Day Celebration in Abuja.

    January 15th every year is marked as Armed Forces Remembrance Day to honour fallen heroes and the living soldiers.

    Onaiyekan also pointed out that the blood of every Nigerian is precious and should not be allowed to be spilled even as the February general elections draw near.

    He said “Today, we cannot forget that so many have died in our series of self-inflicted killings, in the shameful chain of coups and counter coups. This seems to be the case of the untenable moral lie that might is right. In the logic of these often gory events, those who succeed rule, and grab the highest national honours.

    “Those who fail face the firing squad, after secret trials. The issue of right or wrong intentions is conveniently swept aside. We hope we have by now learned our lesson and that we will no longer allow such misuse of our Armed Forces and our military resources.

    “I do not know why January 15th has been chosen as the Armed Forces Remembrance Day. But to many people like me, it brings strong memories of that critical day, January 15th, 1966. We must learn lessons from that historic event which marked the beginning of military rule in our country.

    “We are still to fully assess, judge and comprehend its deep meaning and consequences for our nation. It started a chain of dramatic events, including the three years civil war which wasted the lives of millions of Nigerians, combatants and non-combatants, men, women and children.

    “January 15th should remind us of many pertinent lessons for our present and for our future. Perhaps, the greatest of these lessons is that morally, the end does not justify a wrong means. A good end must be pursued by a good means.” he said

    He went on “We cannot undertake a national revolution by murdering unarmed persons in their beds at night. We cannot successfully prosecute a ‘war against indiscipline’ by locking up innocent people for months in dungeons without legal recourse.

    “For the same reason, we cannot hope to win the ‘war against corruption’ by ignoring or bye passing basic human rights to the rule of law.

    “Furthermore, we must imbibe the lessons of the instability of injustice, the futility of violence, and the imperative of personal conversion and social moral revolution.” he stated

    Onaiyekan also warned the security agencies not to put their powers behind injustices and bad governance.

    He noted that the responsibility of the Armed Forces is to protect the nation and not to attack anybody.

    According to him, keeping an army is not the best defense for any nation, but maintaining good governance and justice.

    Read Also: Armed Forces Remembrance Day: IBB tasks Military to evolve New Combat Strategy

    He said “Our Armed Forces are under the Ministry of Defence. It is important to note that our Armed Forces are not under the Ministry of Aggression. Therefore, our soldiers have volunteered to defend the nation and not to attack anyone or oppress anybody.”

    Onaiyekan also called on the Federal Government not to sweep the causes of the killings of soldiers in the war against Boko Haram under the carpet.

    “We remember especially those who have died in the present on-going conflict in the northeast, whether they perished in combat or in an ambush, or as a result of alleged inadequate arms or culpable poor military tactics.

    “Complaints in this regard are rife, and they should not be silenced or swept under the carpet. Rather all such complaints ought to be properly investigated and everyone found responsible held accountable, no matter how high up in rank and position. The blood of every Nigerian is precious and must not be carelessly wasted.”

    Stressing that Nigerian Armed Forces have been actively involved in promoting world peace, he said that Nigeria’s responsibility for world peace should start from ‘around us.”

    While calling for good remuneration for the Armed Forces so that they can perform their responsibilities better, he also urged the government to timely pay the full pensions of retired security personnel.

    The failure to pay the pensions of the security personnel, he said, was a national shame that should never have been allowed to occur.

  • 2019: Onaiyakan cautions FG against using security agents to intimidate voters

    The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan has advised the Federal Government to ensure proper use of security agents during the election to avoid intimidation of electorate.

    Onaiyakan gave the advise in Abuja on Tuesday while celebrating the New Year mass at SS Peter and Paul Catholic Church, Nyanya.

    He said President Muhammadu Buhari had promised to ensure free and fair election and so prayed for God’s intervention to make it come true.

    “It is the government that is responsible for free and fair election in any country, the government has all the necessary things to make it free and fair,” he said.

    “The use of security agents should be handled properly to ensure that voters are not intimidated during election,” Onaiyakan said.

    He prayed that Nigerians would elect good leaders in the coming election that would address the challenges of the country.

    Onaiyakan said that the country was faced with corruption, unemployment and poor infrastructure.

    Read also: Ambode assures of greater benefits for Lagosians in 2019

    “Nigeria need leaders that will carry everybody along to make the country a better place,” he said.

    According to him, other African countries have moved ahead leaving the giant “Nigeria” behind.

    The Cardinal said that most countries suffer from national disaster while Nigeria was faced with human disasters and urged Nigerians to serve God more than ever before.

    He further called on Nigerians to pray that peace, progress and unity would pervade the length and breadth of the country.

    Onaiyakan said  that great exploits would only be achieved through unity of purpose, brotherhood and peace.

    “We should do all we can to realise that we are all children of the same God irrespective of our difference in religion, language or ethnic background,” he said.

    Commenting  on the Pope’s new year message, he said that it should be practice in Nigeria  during the election.

    “Political office and political responsibility thus constantly challenge those called to the service of their country to make every effort to protect those who live there and to create the conditions for a worthy and just future.

    “If exercised with basic respect for the life, freedom and dignity of persons, political life can indeed become an outstanding form of charity,” he quoted the Pope.

    He further admonished  politicians not to practice “do or die” politics.

    He advised those that would eventually emerge winners in the election to have a sincere and honest  mind in order to serve the country better.(NAN)

  • Places of worship will be protected – Osinbajo

    Places of worship will be protected – Osinbajo

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Monday assured that the Federal Government would protect Nigerians at their various places of worship.

    He gave the assurance during the Service of Nine Lessons Christmas Carol, tagged: “Celebrating Jesus, The Light” taken from the book of John Chapter 1 Verses 1 to 5.

    The Christian Carol took place at the Christian Centre, Abuja.

    He said the federal government would continue to work hard to restore what the country had lost over the years.

    Osinbajo said, “On the part of the government, you have our assurance that we shall continue to live by example, working hard and diligently every day to restore the years that the cankerworms have eaten.

    “Government will continue to dutifully protect lives and property with all the means of the disposal while also protecting the life of every Nigerian to freely worship in their chosen faith.

    “We shall continue to pursue dialogue, reconciliation and nation building as we continue to focus on some of the areas of divergence and differences in our national lives.

    “When we live in love and we live in peace, we live in prosperity and so we should love our nation enough to serve it with diligence and upright awe.’’

    The vice president  said with God and the unrelenting determination by the government to resolve the problems facing the country, better days are ahead of Nigeria.

    He reminded Christians to practice love, service to the Lord and exemplary characters as Christmas was just around the corner.

     

  • Onaiyekan urges FG to partner private varsities

    Catholic Archbishop of Abuja and Chancellor of Veritas University Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, has urged the federal government to stretch out hands of partnership to private universities to enable them succeed.

    The Cardinal said that access to some of the facilities by private universities is a matter of justice for the students, who have as much right to government support as their counterparts in state universities.

    He spoke last week during in Abuja at the second and third convocation ceremony of the institution.

    Onaiyekan said: “”We raise our eyes up to our government to stretch out to us much needed hand of fellowship and partnership.”

  • 2015: Some Nigerians will be disenfranchised – Onaiyekan

    Following the state of insecurity in the northeast and the shoddy distribution of the Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs) by the Independent National Electoral Commission, the Catholic

    Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, has said some Nigerians may be disenfranchised in the forthcoming elections.

    Onaiyekan, who spoke at the interfaith initiative for peace meeting with journalists in Abuja, Monday, Abuja said unless drastic measures are immediately put in place, the credibility of the elections will be in doubt.

    He urged the Federal Government and the INEC to ensure free, fair and credible elections by doing avoiding bias for or against anyone.

    Onaiyekan, who implored the government to seek ways of stabilizing the northeast before the elections, said some Nigerians may be denied the chance to take part in the exercise.

    On the Internally displaced persons, Onaiyekan urged INEC to put in place appropriate measures that will properly integrate them into the electoral process.

    Also speaking with journalists, the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, urged Nigerians not to vote based on religion.

     

  • John Cardinal Onaiyekan

    John Cardinal Onaiyekan

    •The priest as model of moderation in a nation embroiled in needless crisis

    The papal elevation of Dr. John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan, Archbishop of the Catholic Diocese of Abuja, into the conclave of cardinals, may well be recognition of Dr. Onaiyekan’s excellence in priestly, public and private lives.

    But coming at this time when Nigeria is captive to insane fundamentalist shedding of innocent blood, which feigns religiosity but has nothing to do with any faith, it is papal medallion for the imperative of the priest as a moderating influence, even when everyone else is losing his head. Pope Benedict XVI’s creation of Dr. Onaiyekan as cardinal, taking effect from November 24, could not therefore have come at a better time.

    All through his priestly career, Dr. Onaiyekan has been brilliant at his theological studies and outstanding as a practising priest. Those who know him personally have testified to his sense of pious rectitude, his devotion to the highest good in secular society and his ability to to draw a line between sectarian fidelity and the need to work together with other faiths for the collective sanity of the country. He loved his faith without zealotry.

    But all these previous traits have only come to reinforce Dr. Onaiyekan’s excellent ecumenical credentials, at a time his country, goaded down the road of religious infamy by a few murderous malcontents and anarchists, needs such traits most.

    That also must have driven his joint nomination, with the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar III, for the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize, for somewhat trying to maintain some Christian-Muslim detente, in the face of terrible odds and unprovoked intra, and inter-religious killings by Boko Haram. The Nobel nomination and now this cardinal elevation just show, through the noble deeds of likes of Dr. Onaiyekan, both the secular and spiritual globe are not ready to give up on Nigeria just yet. That is salutary.

    But even before this dire religious crossroads, the cardinal-designate has earned a reputation of speaking truth to power, in his own inimitable non-shrill but nevertheless clear manner, a trait Dr. Onaiyekan shares with his illustrious predecessor in the College of Cardinals, Anthony Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie, retired Archbishop of Lagos Catholic Metropolitan See, even if Cardinal Okogie was a shade more combatant.

    When at the brazen steal that was the 2007 general elections when much of Nigerian Christendom was given to cant, perhaps on account of the religious bent of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, then outgoing president, Dr. Onaiyekan cut through the double talk and told the world how brazen that electoral heist was.

    That not only consolidated the Nigerian Catholic Church’s record of robust engagement of secular authorities on issues of public importance, as already laid down by the likes of Cardinal Okogie, it also reverberated well with the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) rank-and-file.

    An indignant CAN therefore voted out its sitting president, then Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) Primate, Peter Gasper Akinola, who had prevaricated over the electoral mess and voted in Dr. Onaiyekan. That was in the best tradition of the Church as societal conscience in troubled times.

    In the new Cardinal Onaiyekan, Nigerians should realise anew the immense talent this country harbours and how we can leverage these talents to lift our country. John Cardinal Onaiyekan, after his consecration on November 24, would be Nigeria’s fourth cardinal: after Cardinals Dominic Ekanem, Francis Arinze and Okogie. With all the chaos and crisis of 52 years of independence, Nigeria has produced a Nobel Laureate in Prof. Wole Soyinka and Africa’s most popular novelist in Prof. Chinua Achebe, among other illustrious sons and daughters that are the envy of the world.

    With right leadership and motivation, Nigeria can hold its own among other nations. Let this common national pride in Dr. Onaiyekan’s elevation then trigger a common purpose in making our country great.