The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has reacted to claim by an Islamic organisation, Jama’atu Nasril Islam, led by the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Abubakar Sa’ad III, that the process of selecting delegates to the National Conference was fair and will affect the credibility of its outcome.
The association also threatened to boycott the 2016 population census and subsequent exercises unless they underscore religion.
Secretary-General of JNI, Dr. Khalid Abubakar, had stated: “Christians, who by all acceptable records are not more than 40 per cent of the country’s population ironically constitute 62 per cent of the total delegates.”
But in a statement Saturday in Abuja, the General Secretary of CAN, Dr. Musa Asake, noted that inclusion of religion would correct certain negative impressions and rivalry about which religion has more adherents than others in the country.
He described the claim by JNI as an “unprovoked defamation of Nigerian Christians.”
“CAN may need to remind JNI of the argument and refusal of Muslims to include religion during the last census in Nigeria.
“We appeal to JNI not to use religion as a basis for their reservations about the National Conference. We believe the conference will do Nigeria a lot of good.
“The JNI should come out with the figures that make the Muslim population to be more than that of Christians as we in CAN will boycott future census in Nigeria beginning with the 2016 exercise if they do not include religion. Enough is enough!”
Continuing, “When and how are these figures by the international agencies arrived at? Which of the international agencies have census figures that Nigerians do not have?
“Has there been any census by international agencies in Nigeria? To put forward a suggestion or theory like this one by Khalid for others to consider should have been well thought out.
“In this case, the JNI Secretary-General goofed, having put out insensible arguments and thoughts. We are therefore challenging the Secretary-General of the JNI to make public the source of his population figures which shows that Christians in this country are 40 per cent.”
Asake insisted that if JNI fails to respond to the population issue, and produce their sources, it would use alternative means to ascertain the fact of their publication.
“We cannot continue to allow people like the JNI to be making reckless and false statements, bringing division among Christians and Muslims, when we are busy working hard to see that we live together in peace and harmony.
“The body of rules, ideas, principles and techniques that apply to subjects like census figures must be those matched by empirical evidence. Khalid’s ideas, thoughts and beliefs about 40 per cent Christian population and 62 per cent of delegates being Christians are therefore mere speculation and conjectures to buy in the idea of a region’s reluctance to attend the conference. It is another way of using religion to shoot down the conference,” CAN stated.
No comments:
Post a Comment