Christian Association of Nigeria selling country too cheaply to America – MURIC

*Says Trump least qualified to question President of another sovereign nation

*World sees Trump misrepresenting American nation, citizens say he’s damaged country’s values – Group

*Says men of integrity distancing themselves from US President

*What right, therefore, has Trump to question Buhari? MURIC asks

*As Nigerians back rights group on CAN

By KEMI KASUMU

“CAN is selling Nigeria too cheaply to the US. Worse still, it is using false propaganda to achieve this parochial objective. We have no doubt that the narrative will change if Buhari is succeeded by a Christian president. Why is CAN always determined to give no peace to any Muslim Nigerian president?”

President Muhammadu Buhari Tuesday 8th September, 2020, recalled that President Donald Trump of the United States (US) asked him during his visit to the US in 2018 why he was killing Christians, a recalled that, surprisingly saw Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and a former Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode, jump up exploiting the no longer new “mischievous” question to knock the President.

Reacting to this incident, the Nigerian Muslim rights group, Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC), accused the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) of selling Nigeria to the US.

Speaking via statement by its helmsman, Professor Ishaq Akintola, on Thursday 10th September 2020, MURIC also advised the US leader not to bully the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

“We take serious objection to the language used by President Donald Trump of the US when he spoke with President Muhammadu Buhari. Trump asked Buhari, ‘Why are you killing Christians in Nigeria?’

“That question was based on false and misleading reports which the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has been sending to the outside world. We expect Trump to know better because the killings are not being done by the Nigerian security agencies. How then can the Nigerian president be accused of doing the killings?

“Again, it is not Christians alone that are being killed. Muslims are also victims. This is the same false information that was spread about Boko Haram. People were told that the terrorists were killing Christians only and bombing churches. It was later learnt that Boko Haram is killing emirs, Imams, Islamic scholars and ordinary Muslims too. The violent group was also destroying mosques.

“The crisis is mainly between herders and farmers, not between the government of Muhammadu Buhari and Nigerian Christians. So how can anyone accuse President Buhari of killing Christians? Apart from this, herders-farmers clashes predate Buhari’s administration. It has been occurring for a very long time. It was there in ex-President Jonathan’s period and even in ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo’s days.

“Jonathan and Obasanjo are Christians but the killings also occurred during their regimes. Why is CAN externalizing it and making it look as if a Muslim president is killing Nigerian Christians? CAN is selling Nigeria too cheaply to the US. Worse still, it is using false propaganda to achieve this parochial objective. We have no doubt that the narrative will change if Buhari is succeeded by a Christian president. Why is CAN always determined to give no peace to any Muslim Nigerian president?

“Even the question was in bad taste and the questioner (President Trump) least qualified to interrogate the president of another sovereign nation. The world sees Trump misrepresenting the American nation today. His administration is falling apart. Men of integrity are distancing themselves from him. What right, therefore, has Trump to question Buhari?”

MURIC went on by providing links to reports exposing why US President Trump is not qualified to ask ill-mannered question he put to Buhari, which his own chosen sources of information in Nigeria such as CAN, Femi Fani-Kayode and other members of the opposition have been celebrating since the Nigerian President recalled not new question on Tuesday.

It listed the links and their lead headlines and comments as follows:

“89 former defence officials recently trashed Trump (https://www.businessinsider.com/89-former-defense-officials-speak-out-against-trumps-protest-response-2020-6?IR=T). They accused him of dividing Americans and rubbishing America’s integrity.

“Former security advisers from his Republican party also spoke last week. They alleged that Trump had gravely damaged America’s role as a world leader; that he is unfit to lead during a crisis; that he had failed to stand up for American values; that he had dishonoured the presidency and that he had ‘divided our nation’
(https://www.defendingdemocracytogether.org/national-security/, https://www.illuminateourworld.org/post/over-70-gop-national-security-officials-from-the-reagan-and-bush-years-say-trump-is-unfit-to-lead),” Trump’s disrepute exposed.

The Islamic rights organisation passed his ending comments that, “It is clear from the above that Trump’s administration is scattered like wild oats and resignations occur on a daily basis. How can such a leader play the role of an interrogator? He wants to divide Nigeria the way he divided the US. He lacks the pre-requisites to harness facts and to objectively and independently analyse them. Trump has no locus standi to ask any leader such a question because he himself lacks credibility. Americans have gotten for themselves a president they do not deserve this time around.

“Above all, leaders of CAN should stop peddling lies about the killings in some parts of the country. They are heating up the polity and reasonable Nigerians no longer believe them.

“In a nutshell, Trump should stop breathing down the neck of Buhari. Nigeria is not a satellite of America. Neither is Buhari another Manuel Noriega. Nobody can twist the most credible leader on the African continent around his fingers. Even Panama has wised up.”

It was gathered that CAN President Samson Ayokunle, during the heat of Coronavirus lockdown that he called persecution of the Church of Nigeria by Buhari’s government, had made comments implying that his association is working for the U.S.

Proving this a source said, “While citizens including religious and economic stakeholders in the world blamed their hardships and woes on the pandemic and worked asidously with their respective governments to end it, Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and other affiliated persons like David Oyedepo of Winners’ Chapel in Nigeria were busy flying petitions to Trump, who cannot even help his own country that is worst hit globally by the Coronavirus in terms of infections and deaths and, reporting to him that Buhari was locking down on Churches to persecute the Christians.

Ayokunle however acknowledged that America they used to run to for help was already brought down by Coronavirus pandemic although in his own country he believes the pandemic was Buhari’s making by implication of his statement during his Palm Sunday address at the time.

It is on similarly untoward “mischief” like this passed by Nigeria’s Christian Association, some Nigerians now agree, that America’s President Donald Trump believes and acts against Nigeria – either in the past or present, especially now that the world’s super power has already moved from Washington.