By KEIMI KASUMU
According to the former CAN President, much of the crisis in Nigeria have religious context, as such it is important to mobilise Muslims and Christians to ensure peaceful coexistence, even as he commended the Sultan of Sokoto and leader of the Nigerian Muslim Ummah for his consistent advocacy for peaceful coexistence in the country.
Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN)’s just issuing statement to the Nigerian press, two months after international press had reported the agreement reached at the end of June 28-30 International Religious Freedom Summit 2022 held in Washington D.C., United States of America, is generating suspicions in some quarters.
Traditionally of CAN, we gathered that, each time one religious crisis and controversy appears to be ending and the government of the day is settling down for more business of governance, it goes again to brew another.
According to our findings, it was to be like realisation of religious tension as a major contributor to national crisis especially during electioneering campaigns in Nigeria that leaderships of the two major faith groups in the country, the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) and Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), at the end of the American summit, signed a pact to de-escalate religious tension in Africa’s most populous nation ahead of the 2023 general elections and beyond.
The suspicion sparked because, according to one of the sources who would not want to be mentioned, no local press touched except only The DEFENDER and some international press reported this peace agreement between July 1-4, 2022 under a general headline “Top Nigerian religious leaders sign ‘Declaration for a Peaceful and Secure Nigeria’ at International Religious Freedom Summit 2022”. It was believed that the immediate past CAN President Samson Ayokunle, whose administration of the Christian apex body in the country featured more prominently, favourably and was more rightfully positioned to release the outcome officially to the local press, withheld information until yesterday Wednesday August 10, 2022.
Understandably, CAN, as a result of what happened at the conference from Christian leaders invited from Nigeria, faced serious image crisis with Sultan of Sokoto’s representative at the US meeting, Prof. Usman Yusuf’s revelation of how they and their American fellow conspirators dominated the supposed religious peace meeting to pour venom in attempt to poison the minds of international community against the Muslim Ummah of Nigeria and the Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government of the Federal Republic.
Prof. Yusuf, in his reaction to the summit in USA which was found out to be basically because of the challenges of Nigeria, had frowned against how Christian leaders and some other elements in the country would always choose to take their problem from home to far away America to discuss, noting that for many years Christian lobby groups in Nigeria, their foreign partners had been misrepresenting the Nigerian situation. He had also explained that Nigeria’s problems, which he said were not religion but corruption and bad governance of leaders regardless of faith, can only be solved by Nigerians in Nigeria not in London, Washington DC or anywhere else.
Organisers of the IRF Summit 2022, the Global Peace Foundation, were believed to have compromised because of the lopsided mode of their invitations as per who could attend the International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington D.C. in United States, which saw only one Muslim leader represent the over half of 200 million Nigerian people, who are Muslims, whereas the Nigerian Christian community was made to be represented by several of its leaders including the then CAN President Samson Ayokunle and who used the “unfair” opportunity to tell what Prof. Yusuf and Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) called “the many lies of Nigerian Christian leaders that the Muslims and Nigeria may be seen in bad light of religious intolerance.
The DEFENDER had reported in that July 4 edition that this accord was signed during the summit organised by the Global Peace Foundation and 70 international human rights and religious freedom groups in Washington D.C. The organizers themselves on their website pushed the accord since July 1. Links: The DEFENDER Newspaper Nigeria – https://thedefenderngr.com/top-nigerian-religious-leaders-sign-declaration-for-a-peaceful-and-secure-nigeria-at-international-religious-freedom-summit-2022/ , Businesswire – https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220701005090/en/Top-Nigerian-Religious-Leaders-Sign-%E2%80%98Declaration-for-a-Peaceful-and-Secure-Nigeria%E2%80%99-at-International-Religious-Freedom-Summit-2022 , UK.movies.yahoo.com – https://uk.movies.yahoo.com/top-nigerian-religious-leaders-sign-140000746.html? , Global Peace Foundation – https://www.globalpeace.org/news/nigerian-christian-and-muslim-leaders-warn-existential-threat-extremism-international-religious
Surprisingly, therefore, two months after, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has just made the pact look like an event that just happened in 24 hours ago and our sources sensed that things like that this happen when the Christian religious group plots to create new controversy but they did not give details as to what such controversy would look like, as one of them simply said:
“Just be on the lookout. The media in Nigeria see religion in the light of CAN and, do not be surprised that it took the Nigerian press, who will ordinarily go out of their way to pick stories from the international press when it means negative about their country and their government, but two months after, the pact for peace signed at the International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington did not get to local press except only yours until just yesterday Wednesday August 10, 2022. It is well.
“CAN is always cut out for trouble. Maybe the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) should quit the Nigeria Inter-Religious Council (NIREC) the Federal Government of President Muhammadu Buhari has just reinvigorated to make the two major religions function for peaceful co-existence among people of various ethnic and religious backgrounds for security, unity and development of Nigeria, since CAN, apparently never wanting to see this government of a Northerner in power to succeed, does not want it happen,” he said, adding that he was saying so because he was sure the Christian apex body is up to something again.
In an article he titled, “Message from Washington DC” hailed by some patriotic Nigerians as ‘correction of intentional diabolic negative narrative’ misrepresenting the true situation on ground in Nigeria by some locals working in cahoots with international collaborators, a Nigeria-born Professor of Haematology-Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplantation, Usman Yusuf, had voiced out his concerns about wrongful and dangerous allegations by US Senators against Nigerian Government and Muslim Ummah of the country in their letter of June 29, 2022.
Former Chairman, Nigeria’s National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) and American citizen, Professor Yusuf, who represented the Sultan of Sokoto and Leader of Nigeria Muslim Ummah, His Eminence Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, at the 2nd Annual International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit in Washington DC, United States of America on June 28-30, 2022, said he was shocked to hear top American lawmakers and retired government officials repeatedly mentioning Nigeria in the same league as China, Pakistan and Afghanistan as one of the top violators of religious freedom that persecute Christians and the Church.
Yusuf’s article was coming a day before a “for the record” report by The DEFENDER wondered how some American Senators would rely on misrepresentations they received from Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), terrorist IPOB and some other ethnic groups including Afenifere and individuals known to be at the forefront of anti-Islam/North crusades and struggle, to conclude that a country, where Muslims have largely been at the receiving end of killings by terrorists and deprivations from accessing education, paid jobs and other quality things of life where Christian loyalists of CAN are in charge, can rightfully be said to be at war with Christians.
The DEFENDER reports from statement of the professor that the Washington Summit, which is reported to be the largest in the world, had only Sultan of Sokoto as the only Muslim from Nigeria invited to the meeting whereas, many Christians namely CAN President Samson Olasupo Adeniyi Ayokunle, Bishop Sunday Onuoha, Methodist Bishop and co-chair of Inter-faith Dialogue Forum, John Joseph Hayab, Kaduna State Chairman Christian Association of Nigeria, Ms. Anne Marie Briggs and Ms. Sarafina N’kenta.
Additionally, other Nigerian organisations and private individuals from Nigeria and the United States attended.
In Nigeria, what the CAN and its co-travellers call religious intolerance and lack of freedom of religious practice for Christians has been investigated to mean the difficulty they have in securing Muslims’ approval for them and their children to be imposed Christianity doctrines in schools, hospitals, workplaces and even in their neighbourhood, the report had said. Link: https://thedefenderngr.com/special-report-nigerian-american-professor-corrects-intentional-diabolic-negative-narrative-about-nigeria/
Ayokunle’s old statement just released
The immediate past President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Rev. Samson Ayokunle, issued a statement to the Nigerian press in Abuja on Wednesday, about two months after the news had gone viral in the international press and by only The DEFENDER in Nigeria that the Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) and CAN signed a pact at the International Religious Freedom Summit 2022 in Washington D.C., United States of America.
He said the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, who is the President General of NSCIA, was represented by Prof. Usman Yusuf, former Executive Secretary, National Health Insurance Scheme and who signed the pact on behalf of the NSCIA while, according to him, he (Ayokunle), who was physically present, at the conference as leader of Nigerian Christians, signed on behalf of CAN.
Ayokunle said the two organisations agreed to encourage Muslims and Christians in the country to shun violence, embrace dialogue and remain committed to building resilient communities that are free from fear. He added that the two religious bodies also promised to embrace a vision of common humanity and speak publicly on hope for Nigeria’s peaceful and bright future. Ayokunle said that the pact was part of the determination of religious leaders to work together and lead Nigerians out of all current crises in the country.
According to the former CAN President, much of the crisis in Nigeria have religious context, as such it is important to mobilise Muslims and Christians to ensure peaceful coexistence, even as he commended the Sultan of Sokoto and leader of the Nigerian Muslim Ummah for his consistent advocacy for peaceful coexistence in the country.
According to him, the pact will help to build a stronger Nigeria that is able to tackle its challenges, including lack of security, accountability and corruption, adding that, “The Declaration we signed lays out a number of principles that we believe all Nigerians can readily affirm. It states that all people are endowed by the Creator with inherent value and fundamental rights.
“Regardless of nationality, ethnicity, culture, region or the many other differences that often divide us, and that the essential freedom and dignity of every person must be respected and protected. The Declaration also calls for collaboration amongst the various traditions and faith communities in Nigeria, in order to advance the wellbeing of all and resolve conflicts peacefully.”
He said that both NSCIA and CAN vocally rejected and condemned the use of violence and coercion to spread political or religious views and identities or demean ethnic, regional, or tribal affiliation. Ayokunle added that the pact demanded for peaceful, free and fair elections in 2023. He added that both religious bodies agreed to push for more judicial integrity and fairness and engage leaders to tackle insecurity, reprisal attacks, kidnapping, sexual violence and organised crime.
Other areas of concern, according to him, include food security, education, sustainable livestock production, hostile business environment and unemployment.
“Certainly, individuals will have different opinions as to the causes of and solutions to all of these problems. But far more importantly, we must share a fundamental commitment to the unity of Nigeria and to work collaboratively toward solutions through peaceful and respectful means,” he added.
Ayokunle said that religious leaders have a duty to shepherd their communities in a way that promotes peace. “We call upon all religious and political leaders and all people of faith to develop and promote solutions that are grounded in the shared values of our common humanity,” he added.
