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Day of forgiveness: Lalong sets template for peaceful coexistence

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Gov Simon Lalong: setting the template of unity in diversity

Day of forgiveness: Lalong sets template for peaceful coexistence

By Yakubu Dati

As Gov Simon Bako Lalong storms the Centre stage to promote the Tinubu/Shettima APC presidential campaign at the national level, he has succeeded in extinguishing initial doubts being expressed about the likelihood that the high quality of governance which he is known for may suffer due to the demand of his responsibilities as Director General of the campaign council.

The governor has however kept proving over and over again that he is adept at multi tasking when it comes to providing good governance to his people and the nation as well.

Few days ago, the governor took time out from the grueling campaign trail to promote peaceful coexistence in his home state of Plateau by hosting what is now called the ‘Plateau Day and Day of Forgiveness and Reconciliation’ which has come to be celebrated annually since 2018 as part of efforts to sustain peace in the state.

The event which took place at the Rwang Pam Township Stadium Jos also marked the 47th anniversary of the creation of the State.

For Gov Lalong, the push to drive home one of the cardinal objectives of his administration which is to restore lasting peace in his state takes the cake as he understands that no development can take place in a rancorous atmosphere.

Recall that on assumption of office as Governor of Plateau State, Lalong resolved to restore the glory of the state in line with its popular slogan of ‘Home of Peace and Tourism’.

Having inherited a fractured state at the brink of collapse instigated by bloodthirsty warmongers who were exploiting the fault lines of ethnic and religious sensitivities, Gov Lalong initiated policies, programmes and an institutional framework to restore the state back to its lost glory.

Speaking on behalf of Plateau glorious stars, a former DG of the Nigeria Television Authority, NTA, Malam Yakubu Mohammed who was at the occasion, recalled his life while growing up in Jos and said the unfortunate events of the past have been detrimental to the image of the State but expressed delight that the Governor has done well to reverse the situation through inclusive leadership.

The former DG of NTA was not alone in preaching the message of peace as he was supported by various dignitaries who were at the occasion.

They include Sultan of Sokoto Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar who showered praises on Governor Lalong for his passion for peace and reconciliation which has restored calm and progress in Plateau State.

The Sultan said the initiatives put in place by the Governor have galvanised the entire state and brought together people who are no longer looking at one another with suspicion, bitterness and hatred.

Catholic Archbishop of Abuja Most Rev. Ignatius Kaigama on his part said he was happy that the initiative taken many years ago has fully been implemented by the Plateau State Government under the leadership of Governor Lalong.

The Gbong Gwom Jos, Da Jacob Gyang Buba urged the citizens to put the past behind them and look forward to a greater future while Catholic Archbishop of Jos Most Rev. Ishaya Audu appreciated the Plateau State Government for adhering to the yearnings of the people and doing the needful.

Other dignitaries at the occasion include Emir of Askira, Alh. Abdullahi Ibn Askirama II, Emir of Kano Aminu Ado Bayero, former Military Administrator of Plateau State Gen. Lawrence Onoja, former Governor Fidelis Tapgun, CAN General Secretary, PIDAN President, Chairman Inter religious Council Prof. Pandam Yamsat, who all commended the Governor for toeing the path of peace and ensuring that criminals are not allowed to operate with impunity while reconciliation is going on.

Gov Lalong on his part described the day as a forum to appeal to peoples’ conscience and embrace peace.

“Today, the deep-seated level of mutual distrust, suspicion and hate that once characterized social relations between people of different ethno-religious backgrounds across Plateau State has greatly reduced to the barest minimum. This is a result of the hours, days, months and years of work put in by the Plateau Peace Building Agency which we established backed by law, as well as the Inter-Religious Council that was also inaugurated with top leadership of the Christian and Muslim faiths deeply involved”.

The Governor explained that the Government has continued to remove the triggers for conflicts such as those related to farming and grazing and has sent a Bill to the State House of Assembly for the establishment of Ranching which will prohibit open grazing so as to tackle clashes between farmers and herders.

He then took a very significant step that will further guarantee peaceful coexistence in the state with his unveiling of the Gazette for the creation of New Districts and Chiefdoms in the state and the formal handing over of 32 schools established by voluntary organisations back to their original owners.

The occasion attracted advocates of religious, ethnic and traditional inclusion and elicited acclamations from a cross section that yearned for accommodation and inclusion in the scheme of things and the purely non-political occasion has been received with warmth.

It was meant to be devoid of politics, but it nonetheless provided political analysts the opportunity to express their opinions on the impact of the efforts of the Governor towards improving on the lot of the citizens in his state.

Consequently, the Governor has in several analyses of the event been eulogized as a leader with focus who does not forget his immediate responsibility even while answering a clarion call on behalf of the nation.

Political analysts quickly recall that as chairman of the Northern States Governors Forum, Lalong provided quality leadership to his colleague governors and at the same time served the state well with quality projects and good initiatives.

As the DG of the Tinubu/Shettima Campaign Council, Gov Lalong is working round the clock to deliver on his mandate.

Day of forgiveness: Lalong sets template for peaceful coexistence

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Osama, For Good Governance and Social Justice Through the Radio

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Osama, For Good Governance and Social Justice Through the Radio

By: Balami Lazarus

Osama. Does it ring a bell? Yes, it does on the Plateau. The Osama I am writing about is that individual who is known for his good works for humanity on the radio and outside the studio. Osama is a gentleman but is outspoken and has a mind of his own.

My Osama in this context is a personality, a brand, and a trademark. Osama is a broadcaster, radio presenter, and popular comedian on stage and in the entertainment industry in Jos-Plateau and beyond. Since the writing is sailing, I will later reveal the identity of who this young man is and why he is so passionate about good governance.

The fights for human rights, social justice, and good governance have been the cries and topic of discourse of so many Nigerians, especially good governance. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and human rights activists are the leaders in these struggles, whereby their roles cannot be overemphasized. The quantum of spoken words, public lectures/enlightenment programs, workshops, seminars, etc., has not brought many changes in our systems because there was little or no action by you and me as Nigerians.

I remembered when I was very active in the struggle for human rights and social justice. As Deputy Secretary General (DSG) of Democratic Alternative (DA), we were much concerned with democratic alternative processes and social justice with a whiff of good governance, and this has been the case for some NGOs, as I know.

I came to understand from my experiences that, as a country, we have good public-oriented programs, but our major challenges are implementation and follow-up that come with too many talks but no individual action or collective responsibility because many Nigerians are fearful, and this has made me a one-man advocate/crusader for human rights and social justice. Like the subject of this work.

Now back to the subject. Osama is a brand package, fearless advocate, and mouthpiece for good governance on the Plateau through Town Hall, a popular radio program aired by JFM 101.9 FM. Jos is widely listened to. He was born as Ehis Akugnonu. But Osama has overtaken his certified name. Therefore, my continued use of Osama is justified in this work because I realized that many times your other name (also known as) tends to dominate and overshadow your real name.

Osama is redefining the fight for good governance by personal efforts through follow-up and speaking on them, putting the government on their feet to improve and do better. ‘I am for good governance, and I will continue to speak on this matter.’ He is purposefully driven by his passion for good quality and better systems to have an enabling environment where the systems are working for progress and development.

Balami, a publisher/columnist 08036779290

Osama, For Good Governance and Social Justice Through the Radio

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In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying Ignoring Red Flags and The Panacea (2)

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In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying Ignoring Red Flags and The Panacea (2)

By: Balami Lazarus

I saw it coming. As a writer, my works and I have been verbally attacked several times. I raised an eyebrow at how some readers react by using bad language on issues, opinions, and views. Well, that is their way of expression when they are displeased, but I feel it is grotty.

And here is the conclusion of the “controversial piece,” as one caller puts it. For me, there is nothing controversial about this discourse but the truth of the grotesque happenings in married homes. And the way out, as I earlier wrote, is divorce.

Recently there has been an inflation of brutal murders in marriages; those killed are mostly women and children, and fewer men. What justification does one have to continue in a marriage where there are threats, violence, and unhappiness generated by the presence of either the husband or the wife? And unknowingly one becomes prey hunted by an in-house predator.

Sharks areamong the most intelligent aquatic animals. Their sense of smell is very sharp; they can smell and detect blood or any red object in water from a far distance and come for it at near the speed of light. Therefore, women’s body chemistry is like that of sharks; they sense and notice things easily. But what is wrong with many of them in marriage that they are unable to detect landmines or red flags early in their marriages? Where there is a threat to life with the intention to hurt, harm, and/or cause grievous injury or death, that is when they realize they are living in gross bondage if they are lucky to come out of it alive.

As students at Pluto College Sharam in Kanke-Plateau State, we were told and made to understand as boys to treat our girl students with love and care and be there for them when the need arises. That was one of the lessons that came from the late Dr. Sumaila Ndayako (Rector), as he was known and called. As boys, we dared not humiliate, insult, or threaten them in any way; rather, we were to take them as our sisters by extension. This has taught me to respect and care for the opposite sex.

Moreover, my association, membership, and experience with some human rights organizations have enlightened me with rights, liberties, and freedom garnished by respect for individual differences, rights and privileges, consent, and action. With this knowledge put together, I consider marriage never a do-or-die affair but a privilege with consent to be a husband to a woman who also has rights/consent to be a wife and live in matrimony. Why then humiliation, abuses, and domestic violence?

I have observed in my experience as a married man that if you take away some women from their husbands, they will die, and vice versa. Despite the domestic violence and abuses inflicted on either party, he/she is willing and prefers to die in such gothic marriage situations because one among them has a deep spiritual attachment to the marriage. This is common in Christendom, where “till death do us part.” My question here is, what kind of death? Intentional, accidental, or natural? This created injunction clause does not hold water in life-threatening marriages.

Living in a shark-jaws marriage, I always blamed women who had seen the red flags but refused to leave such marriages and the house-husband (husband). I further came to understand that patience and the pretext that all is well have caused damage to both spouses in terms of emotional and traumatic agonies and some to their graves.

Therefore, spouses that are trapped in this valley of death with its quagmire should know that marriage is a thing of choice. Likewise, divorce is permissible as a panacea for both to be alive to breathe freely.

Balami, a publisher/columnist, 0803677929

In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying Ignoring Red Flags and The Panacea (2)

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In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying, Ignoring Red Flags, and The Panacea (1)

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In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying, Ignoring Red Flags, and The Panacea (1)

By: Balami Lazarus

In the quite beautiful town of Zhimbutu, where men held sway, lording over their wives, some with brutality, few with love,

care and romance others in different ways. While some women are also lords over their husbands with impunity. Fear of getting married gripped young ladies seeing the ways their mothers were being treated and relegated to the background in the affairs of their homes as married women.

The home of Mr. and Mrs. Kwanchinkwalo Xhosa is full of regrets, anger, and bitterness, where Mrs. Xhosa has been treated as an object in the marriage partnership. The red spots were obviously fermented with bubbles ready for brewing.

Similarly, some good number of marriage homes are full of regrets where love, peace, and understanding

and harmony are strangers rejected and kept in a labyrinth of doom where one of the parties is placed in a perpetual tan of unhappiness surrounded by fear in the thickness of smoke, a forced resident.

Long before, now as a young man, a legitimate product of marriage. I took marriage as a mere secular social contract of partnership bounded in love and understanding where two have agreed to live together as husband and wife in matrimony.

However, I have never taken marriage to be a do-or-die affair, which has been the stock of some persons, even when and if the two—husband and wife—can no longer live together, having exhausted reasonable avenues to no avail. Here I am.

for outright divorce as a panacea for the final dissolution of the marriage.

To this day, I have been asking myself, why did I even get married in the first place? For sex, procreation, companionship, norms, tradition, or obligation? While marriage to a larger extent has deprived me and many others of some air of freedom and liberties to do or not to do at any space of time, I suppose. Moreover, the enterprise called marriage has taken away the ‘who’ in many men and

women and made them something else. It has further forcefully taken the lives of many spouses who ignored the red flags and fear of divorce. And besides, many have taken upon themselves to live or die in an unhappy/venomous venture of marriage that is infested with ‘dysentery’ and ‘cholera,’ where death is lurking because husbands or wives lack the guts, will , ability, and/or capacity to invoke the dead-end solution.

Let me now punctuate the work with some questions: Were you forced into it? Was it under duress? Was it at gunpoint? I believed the answers were all no. What will then prevent an individual from liquidating his unprofitable marital interest in such an intense business called marriage to be free from wahala that may likely result in crime?

In such a situation, I advocate for divorce as the only and final panacea, which has a comfortable place as a clause in my dictionary of marriage. Divorce is rarely used in some quarters, no matter what. While my wife and I have sincerely agreed in the course of our marriage journey that at any point in time, with or without any reason/cause, either party can quietly and peacefully walk out of the marriage to avoid who knows what?

In the history of failed marriages and crime findings, it has been shown that one of the parties is forcing his/herself on the other spouse because one of them has a profound and compounded emotional or spiritual attachment to the marriage. The case of the late Mrs. Osinachi Nwachukwu (2023), the gospel singer, was a classical example. Patience and excessive spiritual attachment led to her being killed by her husband, one Mr. Nwachukwu. The same is also applicable to men who fall victim in the hands of their wives. This situation has created two prime suspected killers living in a marriage cocoon.

Balami, a publisher/columnist. 08036779290

In Marriage Nest, Spouses Are Dying, Ignoring Red Flags, and The Panacea (1)

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