Catholic Bishops Tell Jonathan Point Blank, All Is Not Well With Nigeria

Catholic bishops in the country, under the aegis of the Catholic
Bishops Conference of Nigeria, visited President Goodluck Jonathan on Thursday
with a clear message: all is not well with the country, Punch reports.

The group’s president, Bishop Ignatius Kaigama, told State
House correspondents, after a closed-door meeting with the president, that that
was their message to the President.

He said, “We feel that things are not right. Territorially,
our land is being taken away; the people we look after are displaced, their
homes, their villages and towns are captured and they are internally displaced,
being refugees in their own land.

“We thought this is not right. We have families that are
just stranded. We thought that the President should know. As Catholics, we have
laid a good structure for relief and taking care of such situation, we want the
government to collaborate with us.”

“We just wanted to remind him of things he already knows,
there was nothing we said that was new, we just wanted to lay emphasis and we
wanted him to know we are concerned.

“The President is already doing his bit; he has assured us
that he is on top of the situation.

“They are reviewing strategies and all that and by the grace
of God this terrorism that we are witnessing will soon be a thing of the past.
This is the assurance we are coming away with,” he stressed.

Kaigama said they told Jonathan to involve them in the
process of registering displaced people based on their knowledge.

He said, “So, we are telling government that we are aware of
the wonderful effort they do, the relief they give through NEMA and other
agencies, the effectiveness of the distribution is our concern.

“We are here with long years of experience, as a Catholic
church we don’t discriminate, in fact 90 per cent of the people we give relief
to are not Christians or even Catholics, so we should be brought on board,” he said.