Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, has
vowed to resign his appointment if the recurrent suspected herdsmen killings in
Benue and other parts of the Northern Nigeria have religious colouration.
Osinbajo stated this while
responding to posers raised by some Christian leaders at the stakeholders a
meeting held at the new Banquet Hall of the Benue State Government House,
Makurdi.
One of the speakers, the Catholic
Bishop of Gboko, His Lordship, Williams Avenya, had reminded Osinbajo of the
then presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Muhammadu
Buhari’s campaign promises that he would not Islamise the country and would
protect the interest of all Nigerians including citizens of minority ethnic
groups if voted into power.
Quoting Buhari, the bishop said,
“My deputy is a Christian and there is no way I will Islamise Nigeria with many
Christians in my team.”
Avenya noted that the killing of
Christians and members of the minority ethnic group particularly in Benue State
had proved that the Federal Government under Buhari was not living up to these
promises.
Facing Osinbajo, the bishop said,
“The point I’m trying to make is that a day is going to come when you, as the
Vice-President, will bear the brunt of that problem of injustices in our land,
especially those perpetrated on smaller ethnic groups that have no one to fight
for them.
“So, as a Christian person,
exonerate yourself from this situation,” the bishop advised the VP.
Responding, the Vice President
said, “My Lord Bishop, you said you are not a politician, I am also not a
politician. As a matter of fact, I’m also a priest and I’m a Christian, a born
again Christian. Because I’m a born again Christian, my destiny is not
determined by any man but by God who I serve.
“Let me assure you that under no
circumstances, none whatsoever, will I give up my faith or refuse to stand up
for my faith.
“You can take that to the bank.
Even the position that I currently occupy, I did not ask for it and I’m
prepared to leave it at a short notice.
“It doesn’t mean anything. I
became a born again Christian after I became a professor, a professor of the
law of evidence, a professor of proof.
“But when the Lord Jesus Christ
met me, He persuaded me by showing me clearly that there is such a thing as the
evidence of things that are not seen.
“It is because of the evidence of
things that are not seen, it is because you can make something out of nothing
that I stand here today as Vice-President.
“How possible can anyone say that
the killing of women and children doesn’t matter because he is Vice-President
or because he is President? How is that possible? Certainly, it cannot be for a
person who is born again. A renewed mind will know that there is justice, there
is consequence even if there is no justice here on earth.”
The Vice-President, while
reacting to the issue raised by another speaker, Dr. Magdalene Dura, that the
invasion of the state was an ethnic agenda, said no one would deliberately kill
his own people.
“I do not accept and I do not
believe that there is an agenda. No one will deliberately kill his own people.
No one will do so. But we cannot bring back the dead but we can make life more
bearable for the living.
“This is why coming here today at the behest
of the President is first, to look at the situation myself, to get a first-hand
view of the situation because the President has mandated me to take this on
board and deal with the issues,” Osinbajo added.
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