By Bridget Ikyado
Abuja – The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Northern chapter, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to summon a northern stakeholders meeting to proffer solutions to the challenges of insecurity in the north.
Rev. Yakubu Pam, Chairman of CAN of 19 northern states including the FCT, made the call while declaring open the association’s 2022 first quarter National Executive Meeting (NEC) on Monday in Abuja.
Pam, who is also the Executive Secretary, Nigeria Christian Pilgrim Commission (NCPC), also urged the president to seek the assistance from former heads of state in addressing the insecurity situation of the region.
He said that there was the need to invite such retired security personnel and some civil men within northern Nigeria who had participated in some of such operations.
He said the veterans should sit down in a closed door and “talk on how we can handle this matter.
“This is because this matter cannot be handled by the government alone; we have people whose brains are being wasted; they are sitting at home because they have not been called to be involved in it.
“It is time to bring them together; we have Generals Yakubu Gowon, Ibrahim Babangida, Theophilus Danjuma and many others who are still alive.
“We have a couple of Northern leaders that have been in the security system who know a lot. I am just trying to say that the brain of one person cannot be enough to solve this problem.
“We need an involvement and it is time; because if we cannot save the people we will all perish; so that is one step.’’
Pam said that prayer could not be underestimated in insecurity situations such as this because God’s intervention is needed.
According to him, prayer is a very big weapon and CAN will continue to promote the power of prayers asking Nigerians to continue to pray as mandated by the Bible.
The Chairman said that another step to be taken to curb insecurity would be to handle the nation’s borders properly because they were too porous.
He said that this was because if the borders were not handled properly, insecurity issues would persist.
He said this was because studies had shown that most of the people perpetuating crimes in Nigeria were foreigners and they involved youths in doing that.
“I have also made it very clear that if the problems of our youth are not being solved, if they are not being involved in governance, we will continue to have this problem.’’
Pam, therefore, said that the involvement and engagement of the youth was paramount.
He also called on youths to be hard working and get something doing in the absence of white collar jobs so they would not be used as tools.
Rev. Fr. Andrew Dodo, Catholic priest of the Archdiocese of Kaduna and the Treasurer, Northern CAN, said that the meeting was aimed at searching for the way forward in ending insecurity.
Dodo said Northern CAN usually met quarterly to respond to some of the things happening in the nation especially in the north and, this time, it was worried about Kaduna state.(NAN/vitalnews)
