BY MAYOWA SAMUEL
Against the backdrop of the recent clamour for the implementation of Sharia in Southern Nigeria, the Catholic Archbishop of Lagos, Rev. Alfred Adewale Martins, has expressed displeasure at the call, advising the powers that be to discountenance the clamour.
Martins disclosed this in Lagos at a media interaction as he marked his 62nd birthday at the Holy Cross Cathedral.
Recall that two groups, The Muslim Congress and the Muslim Lawyers Association of Nigeria, had made the call in Lagos in a memo to the Senate during a zonal public hearing on the ongoing constitutional amendment.
The groups in their proposal for the amendment to the constitution argued that it would serve the interest of Muslims in the region.
However, the Lagos Archbishop berated the groups’ lobby for the introduction and implementation of Sharia law in the South, saying, “The Sharia should not be in the constitution of a country that has declared that it is a secular nation. If Nigeria is indeed one nation, there should be only one law.”
The renowned cleric decried the alarming spate of killings and kidnappings in the country, as he threw his weight behind calls for people to defend themselves, but only when under attack. He also called for a thorough examination of this before putting it to use.
He further frowned on Nigeria’s mounting huge debts, urging the Federal Government to cut down on its wastages and reduce its borrowings. He argued that the country doesn’t need a bi-camera legislature and faulted the executive for engaging so many aides when a few hands can handle the job.
“The two houses of assembly are gulping so much money, the executive itself is gulping so much money with all the different kinds of aides and offices and agencies that are duplicated and multiplied”, he noted.
The cleric advised the government to better manage and control these variants of wastage, as he was of the view that if this was done, “we will not be borrowing as much as we are doing now.”
He doubted the National Assembly’s willingness to restructure the country, create state police and review of the constitution, despite the fact that they are part of President Muhammadu Buhari’s major campaign promises ahead of the 2015 presidential election.
