A Christian organization today strongly asserted that Nigeria will never become an Islamic State, and called on President Goodluck Jonathan to fire the junior Minister who made the claim.
A Christian organization today strongly asserted that Nigeria will never become an Islamic State, and called on President Goodluck Jonathan to fire the junior Minister who made the claim.
The coordinator of Christian Awareness Initiative of Nigeria (CHAIN), Pastor Caleb Ma’aji, was reacting to a statement credited to the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Dr. Mohammed Nurudeen, who was quoted as saying, “Nigeria is one of the most Christian-populated Islamic nations in the world."
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In an email sent to SaharaReporters, Pastor Ma”aji described the statement as “inciteful.”
He said: “Nigeria is not an Islamic nation and can never be, we also declare that such an individual as Dr. Mohammed Nurudeen is unfit to be a member of the Federal Executive Council in a multi religious and heterogenous secular nation as Nigeria and we hereby call on his boss, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, to sanction him and show him the door out of the federal cabinet.”
He warned that it is comments such as Dr. Nurudeen's that have brought Nigeria to the edge and emboldened hate and terror group to carry out their terrorist activities in the name of Islam, adding that such people feed terror because their words serve the philosophy of hatred that is currently ravaging Northern Nigeria.
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He recalled events in Nigeria’s history that have brought a head-on collision between religion and politics, including the recent statement by Malam Elrufai regarding Boko Haram that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."
“We therefore declare that if the Muslim elite of Nigeria see Boko Haram as "freedom fighters", then we of CHAIN and of the body of Christ in Nigeria declare that if these Muslim elite cannot accommodate other religious faiths in Nigeria then rather than unleash terror on innocent Nigerians, they should call for a Sovereign National Conference where we can redefine the terms of our union rather than live with this deceitful people who cannot co exist in peace with others or tolerate any religion other than their own,” the statement said.
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