AGITATIONS: LISTEN TO DISSENTING VOICES, ANGLICAN CHURCH URGES FG

Perhaps, following the various forms of agitations that have rocked the length and breadth of the nation in recent years, the Diocese on the Niger, Anglican Communion, Anambra State, had, while rising from her 2023 Synod, advised the Federal Government to be diligent enough to listen to the divergent dissenting voices.

Of particular concern, according to the church, are agitations of marginalisation of some geopolitical segments of the country, the obvious preferential treatment given to particular individuals of certain ethnic or religious extractions at the expense of others and the apparent lopsided federal appointments.
The church outlined these in a 95-page Presidential Address delivered by the Bishop of the diocese, the Rt Rev Dr Owen Nwokolo, at the Synod held at St John’s Anglican Church, Fegge, Onitsha, between Thursday 8, and Sunday, June 11, 2023.
Other sources of the said raging agitations included what the church laid out as, the dreadful ongoing ethnic cleansing, the fear of alleged religious imposition on the entire country and the continued detention of some Nigerians.

The Synod explained that these, among other pent-up grouses, constituted what it said Nigerians expected the Federal Government to objectively resolve.
On the way forward towards positive management of the said agitations, the Synod appealed to the Federal Government to set up reliable, truth-finding-oriented agencies to look into the remote and immediate causes of the agitations.

The church remarked that taking to her advice was one of the major paths to realising the nation’s orchestrated philosophy of “One Nigeria”.
The church also used the opportunity of the Synod to vent her dissatisfaction with what she described as “unwarranted attacks unleashed on the Igbos in Lagos State in recent months”.
Expressing what she said the Igbos in Lagos experienced in the past few months, the Synod bemoaned, saying, “The lives, properties and business concerns of the Igbos in Lagos have all these past months remained objects of attacks for no just cause”.

According to the church, “Some miscreants have continued to insult Igbos in the state with unacceptable degrees of hate speeches calculated to defame the personalities of the people who live and lawfully go about their businesses in the state”.
While condemning the trend, the Synod sent what it called a “Save our Souls” message to the Lagos State Government, the Federal Government and security agencies appealing to them to come to the aid of Igbos in the state and arrest the situation before it could escalate beyond control.
The body requested that the perpetrators of the said physical and verbal attacks be brought to book, saying that their activities “negate the nation’s constitutional provisions empowering every Nigerian to freely live and do lawful businesses in any part of the country”.
The four-day gathering whose major theme was, “Feed My Lambs”, was attended by no less than 18,000 Anglican and non-Anglican faithful and with over 14 Anglican bishops as guests.