THE Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Bishop Matthew Kukah, has advised
President Muhammadu Buhari to fix the wrongs of past administrations in
the country and stop complaining or heaping blames.
Bishop Kukah, who stated this during a dinner organised by the Ondo State
government, after the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigerian (CBCN) 2016
held in Akure, said “Nigerians didn’t vote a government to complain about
yesterday, if we wanted yesterday, the new government would not be there.”
The cleric, who urged the present administration to stop the blame game,
said “the previous government did not only do bad things, but did a lot of
good things.
“I think the business of government is not our business; our business is,
if the previous government did bad, that is why we voted a new government.
“It is really about taking responsibility. No matter how much you praise
or abuse Jonathan, he is not the president of Nigeria. I think that people
must understand, you take power to solve problems not to agonise.
“As the head of a family, no matter how bad things are— no food in the
house, you as a father can’t enter the house crying.
“It is the question of developing the mechanism; you can’t solve the
problem. Even my best friends in the All Progressives Congress (APC) now
realise that nobody can sing the song about Jonathan being responsible for
the problems we are in.
“We are not asking you to change the whole world, but Jonathan created
problems – we are now riding a train between Abuja and Kaduna now, the
train wasn’t there before. Things that Jonathan did that can help Nigeria,
let’s continue with them. The bad things that Jonathan did and those who
deserve to go to prison should go to prison.
“But sending people to prison will only be useful if it puts bread on the
table of people.”
Speaking on the anti-corruption crusade, the bishop noted that the war
could only be won if the present administration applied right measures,
saying “I have always said, you can’t cure malaria by just providing
tablets; you might provide tablets to cure malaria, but you have to look
at the cause of malaria.
“As long as dirty waters and mosquitoes are around, there will still be
the disease. My argument has always been that if we are really fighting
corruption, we started off with the assumption that corruption is all
about people stealing money.
“But stealing money is actually the other end of corruption. The reason we
don’t seem to make much progress is based on the kind of diagnosis; how we
diagnose the problem.
“I still believe that unless we get to the root cause of poverty,
inequality, which is really the evidence and symptom of corruption; you
can talk of fighting corruption all the rest of your life and very little
is going to happen.”
“I think that the extremes are very difficult, but Nigeria is a hell of a
country and Nigerians are a hell of a people. These are trying times and
they can actually help to bring out the best in us.
“And I think that really, it bears no repeating that I think the challenge
government is facing this— just to be able to explain to people that this
suffering has something redemptive about it, because if you know that at
the end of this suffering, something good is going to happen, people will
be ready to live with the consequences.
“But so far, I don’t think government is communicating effectively with
ordinary Nigerians, to know where we are and the state of things. So, this
is why you increasingly have a situation where people are not willing to
make sacrifices because they still believe that their obligation is to
protect themselves.
“I think unless government openly explains and engage people very
constructively, what you are going to face is a situation where ordinary
citizens will keep finding the best ways to protect and defend
themselves.”