Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Bishop Matthew Kukah, yesterday, said the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) is entering the 2023 general election on an empty tank of promises. Bishop Kukah., who spoke in an interview with Arise TV on reactions to his Christmas homily on Sunday in which he said that Muhammadu Buhari’s government has left the country worse off, said his assessment of the government flowed from the need for robust engagement with the political class.
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According to him, the political culture of leaders being confronted with their promises should be promoted for the development of the country. His words: “APC is running on an empty tank as far as the election is concerned and almost everything I am saying is verifiable.
“Raji Fashola delivered a lecture at our university, Veritas University, and he said that when a team loses a match, it would say we didn’t lose, we just ran out of time and I think that there is a feeling now that they have run out of time. “I walk across this country and people engage me and they congratulate me and say ‘we thank you for speaking for us and I often say very frankly, please I am not speaking for you, I am speaking for Matthew Kukah. If what I say resonates with you, that’s fine.
“You can see that we don’t have a political culture and what we call political parties don’t really qualify to be called parties because in almost every election people are contesting on changing platforms. Look at all the candidates there is nobody who has not moved to at least three or four different directions to the extent that political parties are just seen as mere vehicles for getting to a destination whatever that destination may be.
“I didn’t ask the APC to make the promises they made. I didn’t ask the APC president to make the promises he made on May 29. I didn’t ask him to make the promise that he is going to keep us safe. I didn’t ask them to make the promise that they were going to bring back our girls. I didn’t ask them to make the promise of giving us power and so on and so forth.
“What is missing in Nigerian politics is not that we are not governed by good men or bad women; it is that we lack the politics of engagement, and engagement is about confronting leadership on their own promises.”
Urging Nigerians to look at the promises politicians are making ahead of the elections, Kukah said that political engagement after swearing in of a president is not about what the president promised but that if the president made the promises, it is the peoples’ responsibility to hold their feet to the fire.
Speaking on attacks on Christians, Kukah said: “The questions Nigerians should ask themselves, what have Christians done that our churches, our properties and our hospitals, which are serving the majority of Muslims have become objects of attacks in Northern Nigeria.
For example, what did the trial of Deborah have to do with the church for young people to start destroying the properties of Christians? “People have been killed across this country and Christians have remained vulnerable and their properties are the object of attacks anytime. You organise beauty contests in Denmark, churches are burned across northern Nigeria, you draw tattoos in Denmark, churches are destroyed in northern Nigeria.
“As I’m talking to you, if the president says he is wishing a happy Christmas as a Christian, I need to hear the president tell me that I can build a church anywhere in Daura if I want. But as I speak to you it is not possible. I need to hear the president say students who are in universities in northern Nigeria can have places of worship.
As I’m talking to you, in most universities in northern Nigeria, the Christian community has no place of worship. I need the president to work on the talk.” But responding, the APC described Kukah’s statement on Buhari as ungodly, coming from a priest.
The party said the president deserves kudos for the achievements he has racked up in his tenure. The Director of Publicity of APC, Bala Ibrahim, said if Kukah should speak, then he should speak with fairness and give credit to Buhari as due. He said: “I hold him (Kukah) in high esteem and respect him because he is a senior brother to a friend.
“Secondly, he is a man of God. But I am sorry to say that sometimes his speeches are ungodly, ungodly in the sense that he does not seem to be objective at times.”
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