As Christians celebrate Christmas, Mr Olumide Akpata, President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), has urged Nigerians to embrace peaceful coexistence.

Mr Olumide Akpata, the NBA President, said in a Christmas message to Nigerians that the birth of Jesus Christ signified peace, and urged Nigerians to strengthen the nation’s peace.

Dr Rapulu Nduka, the NBA’s National Publicity Secretary, signed the message.

“As we commemorate and celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, it is our collective wish that we, as individuals and as a nation, may experience His peace in these trying times.”

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“On behalf of the Nigerian Bar Association, on the occasion of this year’s Christmas celebrations, the President of the Nigerian Bar Association wishes all members of the legal profession and Nigerians a merry Christmas.”

“May we, in the spirit of the season, ponder the true meaning of Christmas and expound on the virtues of love and peace symbolized by Jesus Christ’s birth in our homes and communities at large,” he said.

At Christmas, Yahaya Bello sends a message to Christians

Gov. Yahaya Bello of Kogi has congratulated Christians in the state and the country as Nigeria prepares to celebrate Christmas with the rest of the world in 2021.

Bello’s Chief Press Secretary, Onogwu Muhammed, wrote in his Christmas message that the season symbolized hope for humanity.

As a result, he urged citizens to maintain hope for a better Nigeria.

Christmas, according to Bello, represents hope and love and is thus a season for Nigerians to remember that the country’s difficult period will not last for long.

During the season, the governor also urged citizens to emulate God’s love for mankind and show it to their neighbors.

Though the season is a good time to spend with family and loved ones sharing joy, Bello believes it should also be a time for sober reflections and prayers for the country’s peace, unity, and togetherness.

He went on to say how happy he was that residents of the state were able to see yet another Christmas season.

Despite numerous challenges faced individually and collectively, the governor stated that God Almighty had never failed to show mankind His boundless mercy and love.

“Due to the administration’s commitments to the security and safety of the citizenry, Kogi State has experienced a high level of peace and tranquillity over the past months, starting from the beginning of the year.”

“Despite setbacks, the government had remained unwavering in its commitment to this cause.”

“In terms of socio-economic growth and infrastructure development, there has been remarkable and notable progress,” he said.

As the year draws to a close, he claims, Christians all over the world celebrate such a significant day with joy and excitement.

“As the New Year approaches, Nigerians should continue to preach the message of peace and good neighborliness.

“Seasons like this should not pass without people making good deeds for the less fortunate.

“By giving gifts and materials to the less fortunate and being kind to everyone around them because such acts promote love and peaceful coexistence,” Bello explained.

Bello, on the other hand, urged citizens to enjoy their holidays in peace, noting that the state had put in place measures to ensure citizens’ safety before, during, and after the holiday season.

He also warned those with bad intentions to stay away from Kogi State, saying it was not a place for criminality.

Christmas: Former Senate President Ebute berates Northern Governors allegedly fuelling insecurity in the country

Third Republic Senate President, Senator Ameh Ebute, has alleged that some serving northern governors are festering insecurity in the region and across the nation.

Th elder statesman lamented that these governors and supposed leaders act as patriots during the day but are bandits and terrorists at night.

Senator Ebute made this strong allegation in his Christmas message today titled ‘The gathering storm must not consume US’.

According to him, the Christmas provides an opportunity for everyone not only to demonstrate love towards their families but to other fellow citizens irrespective of religion or ethnic affiliations.

While calling for caution, Senator Ebute urged stakeholders to make peace building a reality in 2022 and not engage in acts that are capable of destroying the nation.

Read full statement below:

Quite honestly, Nigerians, i am worried! And every patriotic Nigerian should also be nervous at the sustained insecurities in parts of the country which further threatens the prosperity and future of Nigeria. President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, has uncompromisingly done so much to secure the lives and property of Nigerians since the inception of his administration in 2015.

President Buhari has invested so much of public resources in the Nigerian Military in refresher trainings and re-stocking of armories for the Army, Airforce, Navy and other supportive security agencies in the country in the last six years in a genuine efforts to boost the morale of our military and paramilitary agencies and to create a leverage over the miscreants that threatens our very existence.
There are glaring signs that President Buhari has taken issues of insecurities in the country, more committedly and seriously than his predecessors, who also gave their hearts to it. Under Buhari, we can sense a forced break of terrorists of whatever configuration from invading Abuja, and other major cities in Northern Nigeria, as it burdened us before 2015

However, dear compatriots, my heart is not at peace. And I believe, a lot of us are suffering same internal burns when we see our comfort sacrificed in our homes, offices and federal highways, organized and conspiratorial violation of roads by armed gangs, who have deliberately seized our freedoms on the farms, markets, motor parks, roads or shopping malls.

Our mothers, wives and children are kidnapped and raped in the most inhuman manner. I keep wailing every day. Nowhere in Nigeria today is safe for anyone! Our villages are assailed and communities deserted by the force of armed gangs sponsored by desperate politicians’ and power-seekers. The seriousness of the dilemma on our hands today shows how distant some people who gulp wines in secured places and laugh over it are from the realities.

Very sadly Nigerians, during the 2019 electioneering campaigns when Nigeria’s PDP presidential candidate, former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the “Turakin Adamawa” sought to wrestle power from incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, he threatened fire. Alhaji Atiku Abubakar threatened Nigerians that if they fail to vote him as President of Nigeria, herdsmen killings and other bloodsheds would never end in the country.

Whether the statement was a campaign slogan or fluke, Nigeria has known no peace since President Buhari defeated Alhaji Atiku Abubakar in the free, fair and transparent election of election of 2019. It was an election, globally applauded by even Foreign Election Observer Missions in Nigeria, with Britain lauding Nigeria’s proximity to a perfect democracy and leadership recruitment.

Nigerians, I am now disgusted. If Atiku Abubakar were my divinator, I would have celebrated and visited him with a Sallah gift for the truism of his predictions. Nigeria now knows no peace from Northeast, Northwest, Southeast and Northcentral. We are goaded to shed blood so aimlessly. Human lives are now of little or no values to many Nigerians.

My parents gave birth to me, nurtured and honed me under a peaceful Nigeria. Today as adults and elder statesmen of our beloved country, the legacy of mindlessly orchestrated and consuming insecurities is the treasure we are now supervising to bequeath to our children and generations of posterity for the sake of lust for power?

My heart is weighed in sorrows! That I look behind the scenes and discover that even some serving Northern Governors are the forces backing festering insecurities in the region. What do we intend to gain from this ferocious wickedness of bloodletting of compatriots? Why are some Governors acting scripts of patriots during the day, but wear the dangerous mask of bandits at nights? If our leaders turn to betray us in bloodshed, we should be worried as a nation.

I have stopped buying national daily newspapers or watching TV stations for news. And the reason is that once you submit to these home media, 80% of the news contents are about violence and killings in Nigeria. Even Somalia, Sudan, Syria and even Middle East countries are not so afflicted. Recent media reports have raised a lot of dusts on plots by some Northern Governors to destabilize the country.

Initially, it sounded like a joke or journalists flair for news scooping, until I bent down to decode what is happening to us in dark places. My phobia was sealed with intelligence reports fingering some Northern Governors as planning to destabilize the country, with the weapons of terrorists, bandits and herdsmen mercenary killers for the sake of national power.

It is the vested political interests of these partisan actors to discredit President Buhari that has further escalated insecurities around parts of the Northeast, notably Adamawa and Bauchi states which have become the new havens of Boko Haram and ISWAP terrorists. I know, these political saboteurs’ have vowed that Buhari would not earn any credit on security in Nigeria. So, the fire is pushed beyond reasonable limits, far outstretching the Nigerian Military.

We are dumbfounded and shocked to the marrow that Sokoto state, in the Northwest and the revered seat of the Caliphate is now brazenly violated by religious fanatics because of the Presidential ambitions and leadership quests of a few individuals. This perfidious path will not reward anyone of us!

I whine unto Nigerians in pleadings and I wail to the International Community. Nigerians and the rest of the world must now wake up to the realities of what is happening to us in the country. Let’s task our religious conscience. It’s now time for us to collectively cry out for the world to know that our troubles in the country are the creation of few individuals who want to destabilize the nation in active alliance with some foreign traitors or turncoats.

As an elder myself, I hate belittling any elderly person, much more, someone such as ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo. Quite unfortunately, Chief Obasanjo has been parroting lately like someone who has never governed this country. His malice against President Buhari is deep-seated. Whilst i would not want to mix-up issues of national security with Obasanjo, he must be reminded that ex-leaders of Nigeria restrain from his public noisiness on security matters.

Ex-President Obasanjo has over-coated himself in partisan politics in his voyage of attempts to address security issues affecting the country from a mindset. That Obasanjo referred to President Buhari on security in Nigeria in his recent outing as “beating a dead horse to wake up” is obviously to avoid the core issues, but to play to the gallery.

Chief Obasanjo, my leader, if today Nigeria is grappling with Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists, banditry, herdsmen atrocities, Niger Delta militancy, Southeast’s violent campaigns for a sovereign state, this venerated stateman planted these seeds and nourished them to flourish as the democratic President of Nigeria for eight years.

Nigerians, why must it be the same Obasanjo, blaming President Buhari today, our patriotic leader who is trying to uproot the entrenched roots of terrorism violence, kidnappings and bloodshed in parts of the country? Did Obasanjo plan for his successors to fail in order to laugh at them?

Chief Obasanjo is very dishonest with himself. Therefore, I pick no quarrel with him. But let him learn to carve a niche for himself like other former leaders of Nigeria, such as Gen. Yakubu Gowon (rtd), Gen. Ibrahim Babangida (rtd), Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar (rtd), Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, and until his death recently, former President Shehu Shagari, where dignity and sense of patriotism befitting of his former office applies to his actions and inactions.

I thank every Nigerian who has spared time in this busy season to read and reason with the rest of us. Its time for armistice for peace to reign in Nigeria and it is now!. Again, seasonal greetings to everyone!