On Sunday, Timothy Yahaya, the Anglican Bishop of Kaduna Diocese, and Mathew Manoso Ndagoso, the Catholic Bishop of Kaduna Diocese, backed the Northern Elders Forum in their request for President Muhammadu Buhari to resign over the country’s insecurity.
It was earlier reported that the NEF had requested president Buhari to resign on Tuesday for allegedly failing to secure the country.
Dr. Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, the forum’s spokesperson, made the demand in a statement. It was unfortunate, it said, that after nearly seven years in office, Buhari still had no answers to the country’s security concerns.
The statement had read in part, “The administration of President Muhammadu Buhari does not appear to have answers to the challenges of security to which we are exposed.
“We cannot continue to live and die under the dictates of killers, kidnappers, rapists, and sundry criminal groups that have deprived us of our rights to live in peace and security.
“Our constitution has provisions for leaders to voluntarily step down if they are challenged by personal reasons or they prove incapable of leading.”
The administration, on the other hand, had responded to the northern elders, characterizing them as failed politicians looking for cheap notoriety.
However, in apparent support of the NEF’s request for Buhari to step down, the bishops of Kaduna said in separate Easter addresses to Nigerians on Sunday that the president should resign over the country’s insecurity.
The correct thing to do for a leader who can’t perform, according to the Anglican Bishop, is to step down.
“I don’t want to join issues with the Northern elders because I am not a politician. But the truth about leadership is that there is morality in leadership. If you cannot deliver as a leader in a civilised clime, the right thing and best thing to do is to bow out,” Yahaya said.
The Catholic Bishop of Kaduna Diocese, for one, stated that it was difficult to dispute with Northern elders’ views on the President.
When scores of Nigerians are killed, wounded, or abducted, all the people get are empty guarantees and reassurances of security from political leaders, according to Ndagoso.
“Given where we are right now in terms of insecurity and the government’s handling of the situation thus far, it is hard for one to disagree with Bulama Bukarti’s assertion that the Buhari government is incompetent, inept, and careless and the Northern Elders’ Forum (NEF) maintains that “his leadership has proven spectacularly incapable of providing security over Nigeria,” he said.
Meanwhile, on the state pardon granted to former governors of Taraba and Plateau States, Jolly Nyame and Joshua Dariye, the Anglican Bishop said, “As Femi Falana said, somebody stole Indomie and you sent him to six months imprisonment, and somebody stole billions of naira you set him free.
“Therefore, let’s go to our prisons and begin to apologise to the prisoners. You cannot set free those who stole patrimony of the people and sent them to prison to languish those who stole five thousand naira or one hundred thousand naira in this country. Are you telling me that what is good for the Goose is not good for the Gander? Are you telling me that it is an animal farm that we have as Nigeria?” he asked.
