Gov Sani challenge religious leaders to end bloodletting in Kaduna

Governor Uba Sani of Kaduna State has challenged religious leaders to put an end to the menace of bloodletting that has characterised the state for decades.

He added, ‘For decades, our dear state (Kaduna) has been in the news for the wrong reasons.’

He made this known during an interactive meeting with religious leaders in the state at Sir Kashim Ibrahim Government House in Kaduna on Sunday.

The governor noted that ‘Our diversity, which should be our pride and strength, has become the source of hate, acrimony, and sustained bloodletting in some communities.’

‘Conflict entrepreneurs have been having a field day manipulating religion for their selfish ends. The rest of us appear helpless in the face of this assault on our state.

Must we continue to keep silent for fear of being misunderstood? Must we continue to sacrifice the peace and progress of our dear state on the altar of political expediency? Far be it.’

‘The Founding Fathers of Nigeria were people of high moral stature. In our current situation, however, what we see is power without moral capital. We damage our people and communities in pursuit of power.’

‘We forget that power is temporary and that one day we shall face our creator and give an account of our actions. I am conscious of this, hence my resolve to break from the past.’

‘Despite the mounting challenges and collapsed livelihoods in some of our communities, we must pull ourselves together and devise innovative homegrown strategies to stem the current and emerging patterns of conflict and build resistance and resilience against banditry, insurgency, terrorism, kidnapping, and other forms of criminality.’

The governor charged them to be at the forefront of rebuilding trust in our communities. He urged them to step up interfaith dialogue and break down the walls of suspicion among our people.

‘We are one people. We serve one God. We face identical challenges. We are pursuing the same goal using different approaches. We must not allow anti-development elements to deepen divisions in our state.’

To this end, he implored them to collaborate with other stakeholders to set up Peace Committees in our communities, saying the Community Peace Committees will serve as grassroots structures for promoting peacemaking, peacekeeping, peacebuilding, and peace enforcement.

‘This will result in conflict transformation and development in our communities. Without peace, there cannot be development.’

Earlier, the overseer of the state Ministry of Internal Security and Home Affairs, Samuel Aruwan, told the religious leaders that the essence of bringing them together is to build a harmonious relationship among the followers of the two faiths.

Aruwan noted that the menace of banditry, kidnapping, rustling, farmers, and herders clashing, among others, continues to be a threat to our developmental pursuits.

He said that it was based on this premise that the Governor, in his wisdom, decided to call for the meeting to see how peace would return to the state.

Thereafter, the meeting went into closed doors.

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