Deborah Yakubu: Catholic Bishop Says Religious Leaders ‘Must Not Be Ambivalent’ In Condemning Evil

Dr Godfrey Igwebuike Onah, the Catholic bishop of Nsukka Diocese, Enugu State, has ‘wept’ for Nigeria and its failed leaders over the murder of Deborah Samuel, a 200-level student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto, by her fellow students over an alleged blasphemy.

Bishop Onah, in a sermon at Nsukka, stated that, “I would have preferred to lock myself up in my chapel before God alone to weep and pray for my nation, where darkness has descended; and to weep and pray for my church that is being stifled out of existence in the at and in Nigeria.

“To weep and pray for Deborah Samuel, who was killed because she found herself in a part of Nigeria she thought was home, but it wasn’t; and to weep and pray for my brother and friend, Bishop Matthew Hassan Kuka, the world-acclaimed voice of the voiceless, who has become the soft target for those same voiceless people who see him as part of their problem rather than as part of the solution.”

He described the killers of Deborah as ‘miserable murderers left uneducated and unemployed deliberately so that they can be manipulated, brainwashed and instrumentalised for political ends by religious bigots and political egoists’.

He also blamed religious leaders for ‘being ambivalent in the condemnation of evil when it is perpetrated by one of them’, adding that, “I weep and pray for our political leaders under whose watch this nation has crumbled, and they keep looking for whom to blame for the mess they have put all of us.”
Bishop Onah said the theme of his liturgy was love, but preaching love under the present circumstances had become paradoxical.

Quoting him, “How can you preach love in Nigeria where violence has become a rule? Where hatred and intolerance have become norms rather than exception, and where corruption has become a culture and tradition, and impunity has become law?”

He recalled the helplessness of Nigeria when vice-president Prof Yemi Osibanjo addressed Catholic Bishops of West Africa in a meeting in Abuja two weeks ago. Bishop Onah said, “And you wonder how will the Presidency publicly admit that they have lost control; that they have left ground so free and the country so lawless and stateless that non-state actors now take over the entire country!

“How can you preach love in Nigeria where those that want to follow the rule of law are regarded by the rest as weak? How can you preach love in a country that claims not to have any state religion, but constantly places religion in an unhealthy advantage of others? How can you preach love in Nigeria where a few people have collected what belongs to everybody, and they are doing with it whatever they please?”

He blamed the All Progressives Congress and the Academic Staff Union of Universities for the current state of the nation. Quoting him, “How can I tell Nigerian students to love their neighbours, leaders and country when their parents had paid their school fees, and they are sitting at home? In a country where the ruling party, within a space of less than two weeks, can rake in N26.3bn from 27 persons as fees for presidential nomination forms, and the same ruling party is unable to finance our education properly, such that our teachers are at home and our students are roaming the street?

“How can you preach love in Nigeria, where members of ASUU have collaborated with the Independent National Electoral Commission to install misfits in power because they have collected money? All the electoral officers, who installed the present ruling class in Nigeria, are professors of our universities and members of ASUU. INEC chairmen for many decades have been members of ASUU.

“This is a country where, when you bring light, you are accused of exposing darkness. In a country where when you love, you are seen as being stupid. I weep for this country.”