Re: SGF is not a Christian – Northern CAN

According to Charles Caleb Colton “when you have nothing to say, say nothing; a weak defense strengthens your opponent, and silence is less injurious than a weak reply” it is against that background that this writer must admit Lauretta Onochie has not only raised some fundamental issues but has held a mirror for Northern Christians […]

According to Charles Caleb Colton “when you have nothing to say, say nothing; a weak defense strengthens your opponent, and silence is less injurious than a weak reply” it is against that background that this writer must admit Lauretta Onochie has not only raised some fundamental issues but has held a mirror for Northern Christians to seriously cross examine themselves and their role in the polity. That notwithstanding any attempt to depict the multi-religious tapestry of Nigeria like a jigsaw puzzle with perfectly fitting parts will be an exercise in futility not only because there are too many blurred patches but the overall picture itself is overwhelmingly mutated.
This rejoinder is therefore an attempt to expand the discourse rather than to defend in totality the intervention of the Northern CAN and wholesomely rebut the concerns of Ms. Onochie.
The said Vanguard online news item of April 26th 2016 that was only partially quoted by Ms Onochie had its entire context almost spun out of proportion. What was conspicuously left out by the good lady included “Every honest Nigerian knows that the feelers on the ground is that that this administration’s popularity is dwindling rapidly amongst the Nigerian people. It is therefore not advisable to think or plan to arrest former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. Let me warn that such a misadventure will set a wrong precedent and only open the door for mischievous people to set this nation into confusion”.
Northern CAN further put it that if the said arrest of Jonathan was “actualized {it} has the capacity to lead to serious confusion that will affect Nigeria economically and otherwise” concluding that “such an action may spark a chain reaction”. No doubt Onochie is entitled to her own interpretation and is free to make her own conclusions but to say that the Northern CAN is uttering “such unrighteousness” and embarking on “an unholy advocacy” is an overkill and gross distortion. Admittedly the Northern CAN statement was not succinct in supporting the Buhari administration’s current anti-corruption war because one cannot rule out some level political undercurrent as the Northern CAN statement was signed by Revd. John Joseph Hayab, a onetime Adviser on Religious Affairs (Christian) to both late Governor Ibrahim Yakowa and the immediate past Governor Mukhtar Yero of Kaduna state.
This writer however commends her unusual candor which brings us to the satirical title of her article referencing the SGF and where Onochie claims that “it’s therefore sad that if an appointee is a Christian who is not known to Northern CAN his or her Christianity becomes a nullity and of no effect”. That assertion was no doubt consequent upon another more recent Northern CAN statement decrying PMB for “excluding qualified Christians in the appointment into strategic positions by the federal government even with the numerous competent Christians from all the states in the North”. The million Naira question is simply what political appointment could be more strategic for Northern Christians than that of SGF?
If so what then are the current interests of Northern CAN to the extent that they are not appreciative enough of this apparently monumental gesture by PMB? Are they even representative of the broad spectrum of Northern Christians? Or does Ms. Onochie want the Christian north to just without a fight succumb to Jane Carlyle’s dictum of “when one has been threatened with a great injustice, one accepts a smaller one as a favor”.
 With too many questions and few or no answers one thing that can be discerned is that the Northern Christian elite like the current SGF don’t take their purpose and direction from their Church leaders because the Northern CAN like the mainstream CAN is a conglomerate of clergymen- a trade union. And as a group of people with the same relationship to means of production which does not exclude government patronage the cancellation of official sponsorship for Jerusalem pilgrimage and the current parlous state of the state treasury no doubt apparently leaves them between a rock and a hard place.
 Being a Northern Christian is in itself a contradiction of sorts because it is trying to fit into an immediate environment professing the faith of a minority in a society which is principally of another faith of the majority yet Ms Onochie expects “Northern CAN to assume the role in educating southerners with facts with a view to allaying their anxiety occasioned by perceived marginalization”. With that missive Ms Onochie is either very ignorant or being deliberately mischievous, where was she when on 12th December 2012 the then governor of Kaduna died in an aerial mishap and the news of his demise was received with reported widespread jubilation in the streets of Kaduna and Zaria and with apparent glee on social media across the north? What more education do southerners need?
 In addition, Ms Onochie also asserted “CAN in Nigeria in the immediate past became controversial. This led to the Catholic Church in Nigeria withdrawing its membership of the association. The present utterances of the Northern CAN show that they have not repented of their sinful past”. Once again Ms Onochie is guilty of misinterpreting the complex interplay of intercommunal relations in the north. If she can recall it was in 2013 a certain Monsignor Christopher Ajala the Administrator of the Catholic Diocese of Abeokuta that announced the denomination was suspending its activities in the national body of CAN curiously the pronunciation did not come from the most senior Catholic priest in the country John Cardinal Onaiyekan, the chairman of the Conference of Catholic Bishops Right Revd. Ignatius Kaigama nor its ranking intellectual Right Revd. Matthew Hassan Kukah incidentally all northerners. The Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo would equally fall victim to this same kind of misinterpretation of the north probably because of the coziness of Revd. Fr. Mbaka to Aso Rock Villa when he became “visibly transfixed” at the 55th Independence Day anniversary interdenominational Church service homily delivered by the Catholic Bishop of Kafanchan, Right Revd. Joseph Bogobiri when he took a swipe at PMB.
Ms Onochie is probably not even aware that CAN and Northern CAN had long parted ways as far back as 2012 and as Dr. Aliyu Tilde then put in in his Discourse numbered 336 entitled “Jonathan and the security of Nigerian Christians” – “Blaming Jonathan, however, is the last thing that CAN would do. CAN is also quick to come to his rescue on any national issue, no matter how unpopular it may be. Some weeks ago, its chairman tried to rope in the Christian community into accepting the unpopular decision of removing fuel subsidy, saying that CAN was supportive of the move. It took the threat from the northern wing of the organization before he withdrew the statement, claiming he was misquoted”.
In conclusion, one of the founding fathers of Afenifere the late Chief Abraham Adesanya without any sense of contradiction claimed to be an elder statesman but at the same time “an Ijebu first, Yoruba second and thirdly a Nigerian”. If the late chieftain had been a northerner, he would not have been so brazen with appalling irredentism and there lies the dilemma of Ms. Onochie in misinterpreting the north and its peculiarities.

Yahaya-Joe wrote this piece from Wusasa, Zaria