Gunmen attack Father Mbaka: Spokesman

Father Mbaka: attacked by gunmen

Agency Report

A spokesman of Rev. Fr. Ejike Mbaka, has alleged that there was an assassination attempt on the controversial priest in Enugu on Thursday.

The spokesman, Maximus Ugwuoke blamed it all on politics, days after Mbaka publicly declared the Abubakar-Obi ticket doomed.

“It is with rude shock and utter surprise that we received the report of the attempted assassination plot of the Spiritual Director of Adoration Ministry Enugu Nigeria last Thursday evening by some unknown gun men who fired gun shots at him on his way in Enugu.

“This incident has added to several other assassination plots targeted at Fr. Mbaka since after the first plot that was carried out on him on his way from the Bishop’s house where he had gone to answer an impromptu call by his Bishop during the regime of Governor Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu State .

“This assassination plot against Fr. Mbaka is coming barely few days after the 2018 Harvest and Bazaar of the Ministry whereat Fr. Mbaka had come under massive media attack for asking Peter Obi, the PDP Vice Presidential candidate for the 2019 general elections who attended the Bazaar programme, to make public his support or donation for the Church Project of the Ministry.

“Many supporters of Peter Obi and even clergies have misconstrued this as embarrassing to Peter Obi and to the Catholic Church and this has consequently given rise to the statement issued by the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria (CBCN) that same Thursday on the issue.

“The issue had lingered inspite of the apology which Fr. Mbaka in his characteristic humility had tendered at the altar to Peter Obi and anyone who may have, in any way, form or shape been offended at the Bazaar event.

“We have refrained from making any official statement on the ongoing media attack against Fr Mbaka over the Baazar incident because he had held us back from joining issues with the Church clergies and hierarchies on the subject, but we cannot continue to keep silent especially now that the issue is taking the dimension of a plot to terminate his life.

“We recall that the last time Fr. Mbaka raised alarm over threat to exterminate him was in early 2015 when he faced a similar persecution by some church hierarchy and the PDP Government following his 31st December Prophecy of the imminent defeat of former President Goodluck Jonathan led PDP Government by President Mohammadu Buhari at the 2015 general elections.

“Today with the 2019 general elections around the corner, it appears that history is repeating itself.

“The contemporaneousness of the recent attack of Fr. Mbaka by gunmen with the Peter Obi and the CBCN saga leaves us to a safe conclusion that the attack on Fr. Mbaka may have either been politically engineered or ecumenically endorsed, and thus we will not hesitate to call on the security agencies in this country to beam their search lights and leave no stone unturned in getting to the root of this issue.

“Fr Mbaka’s life means so much to us and many poor and voiceless Nigerians for whom he lives and so we cannot be silent on the face of any threat to his life real or perceived”.

Meanwhile, Governor Dave Umahi of Ebonyi State, who was a beneficiary of Mbaka’s blessings last Sunday, has called for investigation of the allegation

Umahi, who spoke as Chairman of the South-East Governors Forum, in a statement, expressed shock over the alleged assassination attempt on Mbaka and called on security agencies to unravel the circumstances surrounding the alleged attack on the Catholic Priest.

The Ebonyi governor, in the statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary, Emmanuel Uzor described the alleged attack on the priest as highest provocation of man against God and called for full scale investigation to unravel those behind the attempted assassination.

He said the attempted assassination of the Catholic priest showed how low men had descended in their inordinate quest for power and to silence the truth, and thanked God for saving the life of Mbaka while calling on the Inspector General of Police to dispatch a crack team to investigate the alleged attack. 

NAN

Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit to hit $878bn by 2040 — SEC

Ms Mary Uduk, Acting Director-General of Securities
and Exchange Commission (SEC) 

Agency Report

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Sunday said that the country’s infrastructure deficit would hit 878 billion dollars by 2040 and called for active utilisation of green bond for infrastructural gap.

Ms Mary Uduk, SEC Acting Director-General, said this at the 2018 annual workshop organised by the Capital Market Correspondents Association of Nigeria (CAMCAN) in Lagos.

She said that Nigeria should tap into green bond opportunities, adding that the commission would continue to promote an active enabling and regulative environment for its issuance.

“The future holds opportunities for renewable energy, energy efficiency, infrastructure, food, agriculture and the task ahead is to ensure funds are channeled to green projects with multiple socio-merits,” Uduk said.

She said there must be more domestic participation in green bonds investment for Nigeria to claw its way out of deficit in infrastructure, power and energy, transportation and eliminating environmental degradation.

Uduk, who was represented by Head, Registration and Market Infrastructure Department, SEC, Mr Emomotimi Agama, said that it was necessary for Nigeria to stand at the fore-front of innovations and initiatives.

She said that the second tranche of green bonds which had been issued, presented an opportunity for the country to solve its infrastructural deficit.

“The biggest opportunity, to my mind, which green bond issuances will present, is the potential to solve Nigeria’s infrastructural deficits, improve agriculture and alleviate poverty while also protecting the environment. – a multi-faceted strategy,” she said.

Also speaking, Mr Bola Onadele, the Managing Director, FMDQ OTC Securities Exchange, said that 155 billion dollars had been realised from the green bonds issuance, thereby gaining attention of investors.

Onadele who was represented by Mr Emmanuel Etaderhi, Senior Vice President, Economic development division at the Exchange, said that
the country’s resources was not growing in tandem with the rising population.

He said that the reason for Nigeria’s woeful performance in the power and energy sector was due to its inability to tap into energy utilisation from the sun like other European countries.

According to him, the challenges affecting green bonds include low level of local participation in green bond verifiers, lack of investible projects, cost of verification and lack of understanding on the part of key investors.

“Green bond investors enjoy waivers relating to tax and in the next 15 years, we will require $7 trillion in investments connecting sustainable finance to capital markets,” he said.

He noted that the FMDQ had set a sustainable finance committee to engage private and public and will engage in training partnership with FSD Africa and Climate Bond Initiative (CBI).

Commenting further, Director, Climate Finance Advisor, CBI, Dr Jubril Adeojo, said that green bonds was made for Africa and with the deficits seen in major sectors of the economy.

Adeojo stated that green bond opportunities were enormous, noting that the nation would focus more on renewable energy, hybrids to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the theme of the workshop was: Exploring Green Bond market for economic growth. (NAN)

Buhari sues for love between Muslims and Christians in Nigeria

President Buhari

Agency Report

President Muhammadu Buhari has extended hands of fellowship to those seeking to divide the country through religion, insisting that Christians and Muslims can flourish together.

He warned against the playing politics with religion.

“As our constitution codifies, politicising religion has no place in Nigeria; for it makes us turn away from one another; it makes us retreat into our communities and walk different paths.

“I believe that there is a better way. To those who seek to divide, I still hold my hand out in brotherhood and forgiveness.

“I ask only that they stop, and instead encourage us to turn towards one another in love and compassion. Nigeria belongs to all of us. This is what I believe.’’

Buhari stated this in an opinion article which featured on Friday on Church Times, UK’s largest Anglican newspaper.

According to his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, President Buhari, in the article, referenced a Biblical verse and stressed that Christians and Muslims share the same root even though their beliefs differ.

In 1844, the Revd Samuel Ajayi Crowther returned home to Yoruba land (now part of modern-day Nigeria).

“Twenty years earlier, he had been kidnapped and sold to European slave traders who were bound for the Americas.

He was freed by an abolitionist naval patrol, and received by the Church Missionary Society. There, he found his calling.

Crowther made his voyage home to establish the first Anglican mission in Yoruba land. He came with the first Bibles translated into Yoruba and Hausa languages.

He opened dialogue and discussion with those of other faiths. And his mission was a success: Crowther later became the first African Anglican bishop in Africa.

Today, Nigeria has the largest Christian population on the continent. The messages and teachings of Christianity are part of the fabric of each person’s life.

“Along with the millions of Christians in Nigeria today, I believe in peace, tolerance, and reconciliation; in the institution of the family, the sanctity of marriage, and the honour of fidelity; in hope, compassion, and divine revelation”, President Buhari wrote.

“Like Bishop Crowther, I am a descendant of Abraham; unlike him, I am a Muslim. I believe our two great religions can not only peacefully coexist but also flourish together. But Muslims and Christians must first turn to one another in compassion. For, as it says in Amos 3.3: “Do two walk together, unless they have agreed to meet?”

“As they are People of the Book, I believe that there is far more that unites Muslims and Christians than divides them. In fact, I believe that the messages of the Bible are universal: available for anyone to exercise, and instructive to all.

“We must resist the temptation to retreat into our communities, because, if we do, we can only look inwards. It is only when we mix that we can reach new and greater possibilities.

“Whichever religion or religious denomination they choose to follow, Nigerians are devout. Anything that Nigerians believe will place impositions on their practice, and belief is therefore sure to cause widespread alarm.

“And, unfortunately, there are those who seek to divide Nigerians — and our two great religions — and to do so for their own advantage.

“I stand accused — paradoxically — of trying to Islamise Nigeria while also being accused by Boko Haram terrorists of being against Islam.

“My Vice-President is a devout man, a Christian pastor. He, too, is accused of selling out his religion, because of his support for me.

“This is not the first time that I — nor, indeed, my Christian-Muslim evenly split cabinet — have been the subject of such nonsense. Fortunately, the facts speak differently from the words of those who seek to divide us from one another.

“Since my administration has been in power, Boko Haram has been significantly and fatally degraded; I have befriended church leaders and church groups both within and outside our country; my Vice-President has addressed and opened dialogue with Muslims up and down our land.

“In all things, we seek that which all well-meaning Christians and well-meaning Muslims must seek: to unite, respect, and never to divide. Does it not say

“There is no compulsion in religion” (Qur’an 2.256)? Does it not say “Forbid him not: for he that is not against us is for us” (Luke 9.50)? This, surely, is the path that followers of both our two great religions must walk.

“UNFORTUNATELY, those who wish us all to walk apart have recently found another focus for their efforts: the tragic clashes between nomadic herdsmen and settled farmers in the central regions of Nigeria.

“For generations, herders have driven their cattle from the north to the centre of our country; they tend to be predominantly Muslim, although not exclusively. The farmers, in certain areas of central Nigeria, are predominantly Christian.

“The causes of this conflict are not religious or theological, but temporal. At the heart of this discord is access to rural land, exacerbated both by climate change and population growth.

“Sadly, there are some who seek to play fast and loose and so make others believe that these are not the facts. When religion is claimed as the cause — and by those who know that it is not — it only makes finding a resolution more difficult.

“The government has taken action to mediate, to bring the two groups together in peace and unity. But we also need all parties to follow the teachings of the scriptures, and encourage reconciliation rather than cause division.

“As it is said: “Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?” (Mark 8.18). (NAN)