Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sokoto, Matthew Hassan
Kukah, has warned President Muhammadu Buhari to review his
leadership style, lest the nation plunges into deeper crisis.
Kukah sounded the alarm in his Easter message, yesterday. “Mr.
President, you are too distant from your people.
“There is a sad feeling that you do not share in the pain and
suffering of your people. You must very quickly find a way of
connecting with your people before the devil takes over the space,”
the cleric said in the letter.
Titled, ‘Easter Message To Mr. President And All Nigerians’,
Kukah hinted on the spate of wanton killings across the country,
reinforcing his concerns with the words of Irish poet, Y.B Yeats:
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed
upon the world. The blood-dimmed tide is loosed and everywhere the
ceremony of innocence is drowned.”
The Bishop reminded Buhari: “This is no ordinary Easter, because
these are no ordinary times for our country, Nigeria, over which
you preside.”
He noted that the country “is so split both vertically and
horizontally today that all of us must honestly identify our many
sins of omission and commission, so that we can honestly seek a
solution.”
According to him, “This is a time for us to genuinely face what
looks to me like an impending calamity. The gathering clouds are
clear for us to see. And even those who cannot see can hear the
rumbling and rolling sound of thunder. We ignore them at our own
risk.”
The cleric regretted that although Buhari “rode into town like a
knight in shining armour…the bogeyman of religion, region and
ethnicity, which we thought we had overcome by the sheer nature of
your support base, have come back with a vengeance to haunt and
threaten the very foundation of our existence.”
Kukah told the President: “You have a date with history and
divine judgment.”
He criticised religious leaders for being “as divided as the
people” they lead, saying: “We have been seduced by powerful
politicians and have allowed politics to corrupt the sacred spaces
of religion.
Thus we have lost our voices and no longer seem to have the
capacity to interrogate power, as we are called to do.”
He admonished religious leaders to “avoid the temptation of
being seduced by filthy lucre and power for personal or any other
gain.”
He also urged them to “seek the collective welfare of the people
and develop a culture of neutrality that can inspire the confidence
of our people in the power of religion to change society so that
the common good is always sought and promoted.”
He told governors, legislators, senators, and others: “You do
not seem to be ready to depart from the culture of cronyism,
prebendalism and primitive accumulation.
The result has been ruination and decay.” He appealed: “Please,
abandon the spirit of selfish accumulation and embrace the
principles of integrity and genuine service of our country. Do not
let this country collapse in your hands.”
To political parties, he noted: “There are no parties in
Nigeria. We have only rickety and disposable contraptions put
together for state capture.
No sooner does this happen than the actors go their ways and the
circles of frustration return. This explains the debilitating
culture of political incoherence and dissonance in our country.
“The parties have become notorious conveyor belts and incubators
of hatred, intolerance and corruption of the worst kind, even
against their own members.
For now, the political parties seem determined to rely on both
federal and state governments and Institutions to serve as their
ATM machines. Tragically, this is why politics is toxic and totally
unattractive to people of honour.
“I want to call on parties and their leaders to become true to
their political claims, as expressed in their manifestoes, reduce
the culture of godfatherism, and focus on building the foundation
of a strong political culture.
Political parties must reduce their adversarial proclivities and
focus on patriotic bipartisan areas of co-operation, so as to hold
our country together. Our people are dying daily across party
lines.”
Kukah also has words for ordinary Nigerians, urging them to rise
up and defend their right to food and shelter. He said: “Do not
allow the rich and powerful, who are rich because you are poor, to
divide you.
They have light and water in their high fenced houses not
because they are Muslims or Christians or that they are from this
or that or the other tribe, but simply because they are rich.
You are poor, homeless, have no road, no water, and your
children are sick and illiterate, not because you are Christian or
Muslim or from this tribe or the other, but simply because you are
poor.
“You and your children vote, but their children do not vote
because they are abroad. Your children beg and die on the streets
while their children are abroad fraternising with those they call
infidels.
They give you a fake religion that enslaves you while they give
their own children the religion of education that will liberate
them and make them rule over you.”
Bishop Kukah prayed: “Our daughters in Chibok are still in your
hands as well as our dear daughter Leah. Bring them back home, O
God. Leah has defied the forces of evil and her innocent courage is
a sure sign that our dream for a new dawn is not empty.”
Read Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah’s message
below:
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity…WB Yeats(1865-1939)
This is no ordinary Easter, Mr. President because these are no
ordinary times for our country, Nigeria, over which you
preside.
I know that in your Easter Messages, you, the Senate President,
the Speaker and our Governors, will all exhort Nigerians with the
usual moral platitudes encouraging us to live by the teachings of
Jesus Christ, to love one another, to embrace peace and live in
unity.
Good talk, but, as you must know very well, most ordinary
citizens will say that love, tolerance and a sense of community
seem to be in exile or in suspended animation in Nigeria.
Mr. President, I have decided to speak to a cross section of
Nigerians, beginning with you and going right down to the many
nameless men and women who do not even qualify to be classified as
the ordinary man in the street because they live on water and have
no streets on which to walk.
I believe that this country is so split both vertically and
horizontally today that all of us must honestly identify our many
sins of omission and commission so that we can honestly seek a
solution.
This is a time for us to genuinely face what looks to me like an
impending calamity.
The gathering clouds are clear for us to see and even those who
cannot see can hear the rumbling and rolling sound of thunder. We
ignore them at our own risk. I therefore state as follows:
1. To President Muhammadu Buhari:
You know Sir, that you rode into town like a knight in shining
armour, carrying the joys, pains, anxieties and fears of a people
whose broken dreams had littered and turned the landscape into a
kaleidoscopic scenery of desolation and despair.
In your campaigns, you had promised to restore a sense of
national pride in us by slaying the dragon of corruption, banishing
the retrogressive scourge of Boko Haram, bringing back our
daughters from Chibok and making our country and citizens truly
safe.
We waited in hope right to the end of the first year, but
somehow, amidst some hazy weather, all we heard was the sound of
screeching tyres with the plane carrying our hopes seemingly unable
to take off.
It finally did but we had barely gained altitude when sickness
struck and you spent the better part of a year seeking healing. The
nation prayed for you and miraculously, you recovered. Evidently,
you had been saved for a purpose. Our prayer is that this
realization will help you understand that you have a date with
history and divine judgment.
For now, before your eyes and in your hands, our country, our
communities, our people are all in a state of stupor. We have never
felt so alienated from one another. The bogeyman of religion,
region and ethnicity, which we thought we had overcome by the sheer
nature of your support base, have come back with a vengeance to
haunt and threaten the very foundation of our existence.
Mr. President, you are too distant from your people. There is a
sad feeling that you do not share in the pain and suffering of your
people.
You must very quickly find a way of connecting with your people
before the devil takes over the space. For taking on this challenge
and connecting with Nigerians, happy Easter.
2. To the Political Class:
To Governors, Legislators, Senators, and all who are actively
engaged in Politics: Please recall that Nigerians have over the
years struggled for the building of a democratic, free and
egalitarian society. You who are in politics today are
beneficiaries of the sacrifices of those who have gone before
you.
The nation has not been able to develop a political culture due
to the disruptive nature of the political process marred by
corruption and violence. Years of military rule have diminished our
appreciation of Democracy.
The average age of Governors and Legislators across the country
is 50. These are the years of dreams, maturity, sacrifice,
patriotism and self-giving.
But, sadly, you do not seem to be ready to depart from the
culture of cronyism, prebendalism and primitive accumulation. The
result has been ruination and decay.
I appeal to you to please abandon the spirit of selfish
accumulation and embrace the principles of integrity and genuine
service of our country.
Do not let this country collapse in your hands. For accepting to
make some sacrifice, respect and listen to our people, a happy
Easter.
3. To the Political Parties:
Political parties ought to provide the vital foundation stones and
building blocks for institutions through which political actors
must graduate.
It is here that new entrants learn the fine moral principles and
ideologies that underpin the Parties.
Sadly, there are no Parties in Nigeria. We have only rickety and
disposable contraptions put together for state capture.
No sooner does this happen that the actors go their way and the
circles of frustration return. This explains the debilitating
culture of political incoherence and dissonance in our country.
The Parties have become notorious conveyor belts and incubators
of hatred, intolerance and corruption of the worst kind, even
against their own members.
For now, the political parties seem determined to rely on both
Federal and State Government and Institutions to serve as their ATM
machines. Tragically, this is why politics is toxic and totally
unattractive to people of honour.
I want to call on Parties and their leaders to become true to
their political claims as expressed in their Manifestoes, reduce
the culture of godfatherism, and focus on building the foundation
of a strong political culture.
Political parties must reduce their adversarial proclivities and
focus on patriotic bipartisan areas of co-operation so as to hold
our country together.
Our people are dying daily across party lines. For agreeing to
make Political parties more respectable, a happy Easter.
4. To the Religious Leaders:
We are all custodians of the faith and trust of our people. Sadly,
we have proved to be as divided as the people we are supposed to
lead.
We have been seduced by powerful politicians and have allowed
politics to corrupt the sacred spaces of religion. Thus we have
lost our voices and no longer seem to have the capacity to
interrogate power, as we are called to do.
Religious leaders have fallen to the temptation to present their
Churches and Mosques as platforms for partisanship.
No divinely inspired religion can pretend that there is no
distinction between religion and politics. Unless we are in a
theocracy, no Church or Mosque can have its entire people with the
same political affiliations.
Religious leaders must avoid the temptation of being seduced by
filthy lucre and power for personal or any other gain. We must seek
the collective welfare of our people and develop a culture of
neutrality that can inspire the confidence in our people in the
power of religion to change society so that the common good is
always sought and promoted. For seriously rethinking our role in
moulding our society, a happy Easter.
5. To the Ordinary people of Nigeria:
The men and women in power who pretend to represent you, call you
the masses. The politicians, the business men/women, the religious
leaders, all claim to act on your behalf.
But you yourself, no matter how rich or poor, how educated or
otherwise you are, have a duty to understand that God has plans for
you and for every individual and you have a duty to both yourself
and your neighbour.
You have to defend your personal dignity and seek the
enforcement of your rights to have property and to raise a family
as opposed to waiting for the crumbs from our greedy leaders.
Defend your dignity as human beings and children of God. Do not
allow the rich and powerful, who are rich because you are poor, to
divide you.
They have light and water in their high fenced houses not
because they are Muslims or Christians or that they are from this
or that or the other tribe but simply because they are rich.
You are poor, homeless, have no road, no water, and your
children are sick and illiterate, not because you are Christian or
Muslim or from this tribe or the other, but simply because you are
poor. You and your children vote, but their children do not vote
because they are abroad.
Your children beg and die on the streets while their children
are abroad fraternizing with those they call infidels. They give
you a fake religion that enslaves you while they give their own
children the religion of education that will liberate them and make
them rule over you.
Rise and defend your right to food and shelter because poverty
is not a divine inheritance. Easter teaches us the message of love
and of gentleness and of true strength.
It tells us that to defend oneself does not mean to turn to
violence or to any other misdeed or evil. But it means to recognize
one’s dignity as a child of God and remember that each one is
created and called to enjoy the fullness of life.
Easter means to recognise one’s right to be considered and
respected, it means being determined to stand up for what is right
and just, it means being strong and steadfast, full of hope and
full of love, both for oneself and for others. For deciding today
to shake off the shackles of bondage and free yourselves so as to
secure your future and your family, a happy Easter.
6. To God the creator and maker of the world:
God our Father, creator of Heaven and earth, we thank you for
our dear country Nigeria. You have given us so much, but like
selfish animals in a pool of water, our leaders drink and mess up
the water for those coming behind them. We thank you for the gift
of Easter and other religious feasts.
These feasts have been emptied of their moral content because
our people only see them as dates on their social calendars. Please
forgive us and let us turn to you.
Lord God of Heaven and earth, so many of our children and our
parents have died senseless deaths. Rather than worry that they are
burying their children, our elders are busy with other ideas,
denying sins that they themselves have committed against you and
our dear country.
We beg you to overlook their excesses and grant them
forgiveness. But, please heal our country.
The forces of evil cannot have the last say. Please protect our
country because no human army can do this.
No power on earth can protect us except you. We are sorry for
destroying our country through our collective greed. We stand
before you in sorrow and ask for your mercy and forgiveness. The
ship of our state is being tossed in the winds, but we know you
will save us. Please save our dear country from the grip of evil
forces.
Finally Lord, we commit all our children into your hands. Save
them from the hands of marauders who continue to prey on them.
Help, guide and protect our children, especially our daughters,
who, even in their innocence carry the seeds of the promise of
tomorrow.
Our daughters in Chibok are still in your hands as well as our
dear daughter Leah. Bring them back home, O God. Leah has defied
the forces of evil and her innocent courage is a sure sign that our
dream for a new dawn is not empty.
Raise up more Leahs for us so that our future can be guaranteed.
Thank you, Father, and please forgive us our sins. Show our leaders
the way, convert them to yourself. For a united Nigeria, happy
Easter.
Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sokoto, Matthew Hassan
Kukah, has warned President Muhammadu Buhari to review his
leadership style, lest the nation plunges into deeper
crisis.
Kukah sounded the alarm in his Easter message, yesterday. “Mr.
President, you are too distant from your people.
“There is a sad feeling that you do not share in the pain and
suffering of your people. You must very quickly find a way of
connecting with your people before the devil takes over the space,”
the cleric said in the letter.
Titled, ‘Easter Message To Mr. President And All Nigerians’,
Kukah hinted on the spate of wanton killings across the country,
reinforcing his concerns with the words of Irish poet, Y.B Yeats:
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed
upon the world. The blood-dimmed tide is loosed and everywhere the
ceremony of innocence is drowned.”
The Bishop reminded Buhari: “This is no ordinary Easter, because
these are no ordinary times for our country, Nigeria, over which
you preside.”
He noted that the country “is so split both vertically and
horizontally today that all of us must honestly identify our many
sins of omission and commission, so that we can honestly seek a
solution.”
According to him, “This is a time for us to genuinely face what
looks to me like an impending calamity. The gathering clouds are
clear for us to see. And even those who cannot see can hear the
rumbling and rolling sound of thunder. We ignore them at our own
risk.”
The cleric regretted that although Buhari “rode into town like a
knight in shining armour…the bogeyman of religion, region and
ethnicity, which we thought we had overcome by the sheer nature of
your support base, have come back with a vengeance to haunt and
threaten the very foundation of our existence.”
Kukah told the President: “You have a date with history and
divine judgment.”
He criticised religious leaders for being “as divided as the
people” they lead, saying: “We have been seduced by powerful
politicians and have allowed politics to corrupt the sacred spaces
of religion.
Thus we have lost our voices and no longer seem to have the
capacity to interrogate power, as we are called to do.”
He admonished religious leaders to “avoid the temptation of
being seduced by filthy lucre and power for personal or any other
gain.”
He also urged them to “seek the collective welfare of the people
and develop a culture of neutrality that can inspire the confidence
of our people in the power of religion to change society so that
the common good is always sought and promoted.”
He told governors, legislators, senators, and others: “You do
not seem to be ready to depart from the culture of cronyism,
prebendalism and primitive accumulation.
The result has been ruination and decay.” He appealed: “Please,
abandon the spirit of selfish accumulation and embrace the
principles of integrity and genuine service of our country. Do not
let this country collapse in your hands.”
To political parties, he noted: “There are no parties in
Nigeria. We have only rickety and disposable contraptions put
together for state capture.
No sooner does this happen than the actors go their ways and the
circles of frustration return. This explains the debilitating
culture of political incoherence and dissonance in our country.
“The parties have become notorious conveyor belts and incubators
of hatred, intolerance and corruption of the worst kind, even
against their own members.
For now, the political parties seem determined to rely on both
federal and state governments and Institutions to serve as their
ATM machines. Tragically, this is why politics is toxic and totally
unattractive to people of honour.
“I want to call on parties and their leaders to become true to
their political claims, as expressed in their manifestoes, reduce
the culture of godfatherism, and focus on building the foundation
of a strong political culture.
Political parties must reduce their adversarial proclivities and
focus on patriotic bipartisan areas of co-operation, so as to hold
our country together. Our people are dying daily across party
lines.”
Kukah also has words for ordinary Nigerians, urging them to rise
up and defend their right to food and shelter. He said: “Do not
allow the rich and powerful, who are rich because you are poor, to
divide you.
They have light and water in their high fenced houses not
because they are Muslims or Christians or that they are from this
or that or the other tribe, but simply because they are rich.
You are poor, homeless, have no road, no water, and your
children are sick and illiterate, not because you are Christian or
Muslim or from this tribe or the other, but simply because you are
poor.
“You and your children vote, but their children do not vote
because they are abroad. Your children beg and die on the streets
while their children are abroad fraternising with those they call
infidels.
They give you a fake religion that enslaves you while they give
their own children the religion of education that will liberate
them and make them rule over you.”
Bishop Kukah prayed: “Our daughters in Chibok are still in your
hands as well as our dear daughter Leah. Bring them back home, O
God. Leah has defied the forces of evil and her innocent courage is
a sure sign that our dream for a new dawn is not empty.”
Read Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah’s message
below:
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity…WB Yeats(1865-1939)
This is no ordinary Easter, Mr. President because these are no
ordinary times for our country, Nigeria, over which you
preside.
I know that in your Easter Messages, you, the Senate President,
the Speaker and our Governors, will all exhort Nigerians with the
usual moral platitudes encouraging us to live by the teachings of
Jesus Christ, to love one another, to embrace peace and live in
unity.
Good talk, but, as you must know very well, most ordinary
citizens will say that love, tolerance and a sense of community
seem to be in exile or in suspended animation in Nigeria.
Mr. President, I have decided to speak to a cross section of
Nigerians, beginning with you and going right down to the many
nameless men and women who do not even qualify to be classified as
the ordinary man in the street because they live on water and have
no streets on which to walk.
I believe that this country is so split both vertically and
horizontally today that all of us must honestly identify our many
sins of omission and commission so that we can honestly seek a
solution.
This is a time for us to genuinely face what looks to me like an
impending calamity.
The gathering clouds are clear for us to see and even those who
cannot see can hear the rumbling and rolling sound of thunder. We
ignore them at our own risk. I therefore state as follows:
1. To President Muhammadu Buhari:
You know Sir, that you rode into town like a knight in shining
armour, carrying the joys, pains, anxieties and fears of a people
whose broken dreams had littered and turned the landscape into a
kaleidoscopic scenery of desolation and despair.
In your campaigns, you had promised to restore a sense of
national pride in us by slaying the dragon of corruption, banishing
the retrogressive scourge of Boko Haram, bringing back our
daughters from Chibok and making our country and citizens truly
safe.
We waited in hope right to the end of the first year, but
somehow, amidst some hazy weather, all we heard was the sound of
screeching tyres with the plane carrying our hopes seemingly unable
to take off.
It finally did but we had barely gained altitude when sickness
struck and you spent the better part of a year seeking healing. The
nation prayed for you and miraculously, you recovered. Evidently,
you had been saved for a purpose. Our prayer is that this
realization will help you understand that you have a date with
history and divine judgment.
For now, before your eyes and in your hands, our country, our
communities, our people are all in a state of stupor. We have never
felt so alienated from one another. The bogeyman of religion,
region and ethnicity, which we thought we had overcome by the sheer
nature of your support base, have come back with a vengeance to
haunt and threaten the very foundation of our existence.
Mr. President, you are too distant from your people. There is a
sad feeling that you do not share in the pain and suffering of your
people.
You must very quickly find a way of connecting with your people
before the devil takes over the space. For taking on this challenge
and connecting with Nigerians, happy Easter.
2. To the Political Class:
To Governors, Legislators, Senators, and all who are actively
engaged in Politics: Please recall that Nigerians have over the
years struggled for the building of a democratic, free and
egalitarian society. You who are in politics today are
beneficiaries of the sacrifices of those who have gone before
you.
The nation has not been able to develop a political culture due
to the disruptive nature of the political process marred by
corruption and violence. Years of military rule have diminished our
appreciation of Democracy.
The average age of Governors and Legislators across the country
is 50. These are the years of dreams, maturity, sacrifice,
patriotism and self-giving.
But, sadly, you do not seem to be ready to depart from the
culture of cronyism, prebendalism and primitive accumulation. The
result has been ruination and decay.
I appeal to you to please abandon the spirit of selfish
accumulation and embrace the principles of integrity and genuine
service of our country.
Do not let this country collapse in your hands. For accepting to
make some sacrifice, respect and listen to our people, a happy
Easter.
3. To the Political Parties:
Political parties ought to provide the vital foundation stones and
building blocks for institutions through which political actors
must graduate.
It is here that new entrants learn the fine moral principles and
ideologies that underpin the Parties.
Sadly, there are no Parties in Nigeria. We have only rickety and
disposable contraptions put together for state capture.
No sooner does this happen that the actors go their way and the
circles of frustration return. This explains the debilitating
culture of political incoherence and dissonance in our country.
The Parties have become notorious conveyor belts and incubators
of hatred, intolerance and corruption of the worst kind, even
against their own members.
For now, the political parties seem determined to rely on both
Federal and State Government and Institutions to serve as their ATM
machines. Tragically, this is why politics is toxic and totally
unattractive to people of honour.
I want to call on Parties and their leaders to become true to
their political claims as expressed in their Manifestoes, reduce
the culture of godfatherism, and focus on building the foundation
of a strong political culture.
Political parties must reduce their adversarial proclivities and
focus on patriotic bipartisan areas of co-operation so as to hold
our country together.
Our people are dying daily across party lines. For agreeing to
make Political parties more respectable, a happy Easter.
4. To the Religious Leaders:
We are all custodians of the faith and trust of our people. Sadly,
we have proved to be as divided as the people we are supposed to
lead.
We have been seduced by powerful politicians and have allowed
politics to corrupt the sacred spaces of religion. Thus we have
lost our voices and no longer seem to have the capacity to
interrogate power, as we are called to do.
Religious leaders have fallen to the temptation to present their
Churches and Mosques as platforms for partisanship.
No divinely inspired religion can pretend that there is no
distinction between religion and politics. Unless we are in a
theocracy, no Church or Mosque can have its entire people with the
same political affiliations.
Religious leaders must avoid the temptation of being seduced by
filthy lucre and power for personal or any other gain. We must seek
the collective welfare of our people and develop a culture of
neutrality that can inspire the confidence in our people in the
power of religion to change society so that the common good is
always sought and promoted. For seriously rethinking our role in
moulding our society, a happy Easter.
5. To the Ordinary people of Nigeria:
The men and women in power who pretend to represent you, call you
the masses. The politicians, the business men/women, the religious
leaders, all claim to act on your behalf.
But you yourself, no matter how rich or poor, how educated or
otherwise you are, have a duty to understand that God has plans for
you and for every individual and you have a duty to both yourself
and your neighbour.
You have to defend your personal dignity and seek the
enforcement of your rights to have property and to raise a family
as opposed to waiting for the crumbs from our greedy leaders.
Defend your dignity as human beings and children of God. Do not
allow the rich and powerful, who are rich because you are poor, to
divide you.
They have light and water in their high fenced houses not
because they are Muslims or Christians or that they are from this
or that or the other tribe but simply because they are rich.
You are poor, homeless, have no road, no water, and your
children are sick and illiterate, not because you are Christian or
Muslim or from this tribe or the other, but simply because you are
poor. You and your children vote, but their children do not vote
because they are abroad.
Your children beg and die on the streets while their children
are abroad fraternizing with those they call infidels. They give
you a fake religion that enslaves you while they give their own
children the religion of education that will liberate them and make
them rule over you.
Rise and defend your right to food and shelter because poverty
is not a divine inheritance. Easter teaches us the message of love
and of gentleness and of true strength.
It tells us that to defend oneself does not mean to turn to
violence or to any other misdeed or evil. But it means to recognize
one’s dignity as a child of God and remember that each one is
created and called to enjoy the fullness of life.
Easter means to recognise one’s right to be considered and
respected, it means being determined to stand up for what is right
and just, it means being strong and steadfast, full of hope and
full of love, both for oneself and for others. For deciding today
to shake off the shackles of bondage and free yourselves so as to
secure your future and your family, a happy Easter.
6. To God the creator and maker of the world:
God our Father, creator of Heaven and earth, we thank you for
our dear country Nigeria. You have given us so much, but like
selfish animals in a pool of water, our leaders drink and mess up
the water for those coming behind them. We thank you for the gift
of Easter and other religious feasts.
These feasts have been emptied of their moral content because
our people only see them as dates on their social calendars. Please
forgive us and let us turn to you.
Lord God of Heaven and earth, so many of our children and our
parents have died senseless deaths. Rather than worry that they are
burying their children, our elders are busy with other ideas,
denying sins that they themselves have committed against you and
our dear country.
We beg you to overlook their excesses and grant them
forgiveness. But, please heal our country.
The forces of evil cannot have the last say. Please protect our
country because no human army can do this.
No power on earth can protect us except you. We are sorry for
destroying our country through our collective greed. We stand
before you in sorrow and ask for your mercy and forgiveness. The
ship of our state is being tossed in the winds, but we know you
will save us. Please save our dear country from the grip of evil
forces.
Finally Lord, we commit all our children into your hands. Save
them from the hands of marauders who continue to prey on them.
Help, guide and protect our children, especially our daughters,
who, even in their innocence carry the seeds of the promise of
tomorrow.
Our daughters in Chibok are still in your hands as well as our
dear daughter Leah. Bring them back home, O God. Leah has defied
the forces of evil and her innocent courage is a sure sign that our
dream for a new dawn is not empty.
Raise up more Leahs for us so that our future can be guaranteed.
Thank you, Father, and please forgive us our sins. Show our leaders
the way, convert them to yourself. For a united Nigeria, happy
Easter.
Read more https://nairalaw.com/bishop-kukah-warns-president-buhari-over-leadership-style/