In his sermon at the closing ceremony of the centenary celebration of the St. Andrew’s Catholic Church, Oro, Kwara State at the weekend, Atoyebi said that proliferation of churches had caused increase in social ills in Nigeria society.
The cleric, who admonished parents to be watchful of their children to address many social challenges in the society, said that get-rich-quick syndrome was prevalent among Nigerian youths.
“There are now many churches and power houses only established to entice people for power and money. And people who want to get money or power at all cost throng the places.
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I call on parents and guardians to check their wards against get-rich-quick attitude and behaviour. Families should be observant of their children and happenings around them,” he said.
Also speaking, the Minister for Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, who is also an indigene of Oro town, said that 100 years of Catholicism anywhere worthed celebrating.
“In Oro, where I come from, the beauty of this celebration is that it is being celebrated by Muslims and Christians. It shows religious tolerance that Oro is noted for. We thank God that we are alive to witness this event,” he said.
Also speaking on activities of insurgents in parts of the country and calls for release of Leah Sharibu in Boko Haram captivity, the minister said that the government was determined to effect release of the little girl and stop insurgency in the country.
“I think, as a country, we get carried away by the moment. We do not reflect much. Four or five years ago, insurgents captured territories and cities, Abuja was not safe from Boko Haram insurgents 2012 to 2014. We all remember sadly, how they came to wreck havoc at the United Nations headquarters, Thisday and police headquarters and various motor parks.
It was during this administration, to the glory of God, that there has not been any single attack in Abuja. We have also forgotten that before now, the territory in North East, was not accessible to Nigerians. 20 out 27 Local Government Area in Borno State alone, were occupied by Boko Haram.
“Today, we do not have a single inch of territory under Boko Haram occupation. This is to say that various strategies put in place by this administration to curtail and contain Boko Haram are working. Anybody, who is conversant with the phenomenon called insurgency, will understand that it is not like a candle which you light and just blow and it will quench. What we have now is what I call ‘cowardly attacks on soft targets’ by the insurgents. But the good news is we are on top of it,” the minister said.
“As par Leah Sharibu, our message to Nigerians is that as far as we are concerned, any of our citizens whether boy or girl, whether Muslim or Christian, is dear to us. We do not look at Leah Sharibu as a Christian. We look at her as a daughter of this country for which we swore to defend every citizen. We are doing our best to ensure the safe release of Leah Sharibu”, he said.
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