Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria, Chima Nweze has said that if the constitutional provisions dealing with disqualification for elective offices is properly utilised, the number of hoodlums vying for political offices in Nigeria.
Justice Nweze stated this during the inaugural ceremony of Old Seminarians Association of Nigeria (OSAN) at the weekend in Abuja.
Nweze while delivering a keynote address titled, ‘Age Quod Agis: the Route to National Cohesion and Integration’ said that the constitutional provision had already exposed sundry miscreants vying for political offices noting that enforcement was lacking.
He said Priests and other Christian organizations must stand up to the task of appointing credible leaders worthy of emulation in political offices.
According to Justice Nweze Christians must no longer remain aloof and indifferent to corrupt leadership which have inflicted so much pain on the people which has divided the people along ethnic, religious, political and ideological lines.
He said “the division came had come with serious suspicion, distrust, and hatred among the diverse citizens”
Nweze noted that efforts towards national integration as national interest and project in Nigeria was challenged by corruption, baseless party politics and worst of all, insecurity, and that teh citizens needed to think beyond primordia interests.
Instead, what was required of the citizens, was to think beyond those differences and focus on things that could propel the nation into maximising its potentials towards to greatness.
He noted that without love encapsulated in good neighbourliness being imbibed by the citizens, the different components that made up the country would persist as dividing factors .
He also called on the Nigerian Church to espouse what she said a theologian once called “the evangelisation of human structures”. which according to him, referred to a new approach which should confront the injustices ravaging the economic, social and political lives of the people.
“The question now is: how can the Nigerian Church achieve this without embarking on political activism.
” As we noted elsewhere, political philosophers have identified corrupt political leadership as the ultimate albatross of political life in Nigeria,” he said.
Meanwhile the President of the Association (OSAN) Chinedu Akubueze while congratulating members at the inaugural ceremony, admonished the Old Seminarians to continue to use their God given gift to affect lives positively and contribute their quota to nation development especially in the political scene.
He said “we are going to harness the potentials from this varied and various Nigerians from diverse parts of the country who are catholics and who are old seminarians to attempt at making some impact in the Scenerio that is presently playing out in the Nigerian Political and Social sphere”.
On his part, human rights lawyer, Femi Falana said the security challenges facing the country had shown that the federal government lacked the capacity to police the country.
The human rights lawyer said he supported state and local government policing, saying that that was the way to go.
He noted that the country needed 500,000 police personnel to be able to police the country effectively, whereas the position on ground was that no less than a million police personnel, well-equipped to man the security of that these needed to be well equipped.
Also the Chairman of the Mobilization Committee Ugo Jim Nwoko is optimistic that the calibre of Old seminarians in the Association will go a long way in putting heads to together to proffer solutions in different sectors of the economy
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