The Masses are the cause of Nigeria’s problems – Solomon Dalung accuses Nigerians • Archbishop Onaiyekan disagrees

The Minister of Youth and Sports, Barrister Solomon Dalung and the Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, yesterday sharply disagreed over the causes and those responsible for the nation’s socio-economic problems. Speaking with newsmen at the 2017 annual Friendship and Dialogue Dinner organised by the UFUK Dialogue Foundation, Barrister Dalung said the nation’s problems were caused mainly by people at the lower cadre of society while Cardinal Onaiyekan, who also spoke at the same venue, said it is the elite and the middle class that cause the problems.

“The problem basically is down the social stratum. At the base, we have majority of people who cannot tolerate one another, who cannot appreciate one another and have difficulty in appreciating the faith of others. If we continue to meet at this level we will continue to recycle the same method that has not yielded results. As leaders, we need to move out and engage the people at the bottom of the social stratum,” Dalung said.

“We must take a deliberate step, lest we are consumed. There are already signals of opposing agitations - asking for a republic, quit notice, all these are issued by people who were born after the civil war. We want one united Nigeria,” Dalung added.

But Cardinal Onaiyekan said: “Nigeria likes to dance one step forward, two steps backward, it is a dangerous kind of dance. With regard to peace, sometimes we behave as if we had a choice in the matter, as if we can live in peace if we like, and if we don’t like, we separate.”

The cleric added: “We ought to realize that living in peace is not an option, it is imperative. It costs effort staying together. The cost of staying together is far less than destroying ourselves. The younger people don’t know what happened during Biafra, but we don’t have to go to Biafra, see what is happening in other countries where they have ended up tearing each other apart. Think of what is happening in Syria, Iraq, and Southern Sudan, those things can happen to us anytime if we are not careful. I will never be tired of shouting let us live in peace. You are a Muslim so what? We have one God who is the father of all. If we agree on that a lot of things will be easier.”