Press Release: INDEPENDENCE DAY MESSAGE: MURIC DECLARES JIHAD AGAINST CORRUPTION 30th September 2007
The Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) felicitates with fellow Nigerians on the occasion of the 47th anniversary of the nation’s independence. We commend the vision, efforts and sacrifices of those who fought for Nigeria’s freedom from colonial rule. However, we berate the current political culture of violence, winner-takes-all syndrome, greed, avarice and waste. It stands in sharp contrast to the ascetic and patriotic stance of the heroes of our independence: Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello and Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. None of these heroes sucked the people’s blood to enrich their pockets.
This culture of waste explains why a single person uses his public office to acquire 172 buildings. Former General Manager of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) wasted a whopping N250 million staying in an hotel and he had the effrontery to tell Nigerians that he could not live in a house built with that amount! The first president of Senate in December 1999 collected N39 million to celebrate Christmas. His deputy, an Alhaji, collected N19.5 million to buy Sallah ram! This moral decay did not leave the police force untouched. A chief of police stole over N17 billion.
The above are, indubitably, crimes against the toiling masses of this country. In a situation where many sleep under the bridge; where thousands of students can only afford one meal per day; where workers’ take-home-pay cannot take them home; where the average Nigerian lives on less than one dollar per day and the per capita income is less than $300, Nigeria’s culture of waste calls for urgent attention. We have an army of hungry unemployed youth on the streets. Hundreds besiege the dust-bins in search of food. To every working Nigerian, there are an average eleven dependants.
MURIC asserts that the current alarming rise in crime is the direct impact of the grinding poverty brought upon Nigerians by fellow Nigerians, by kleptomaniacs in public office and by a corrupt police force. The crisis in the energy sector, falling education standard, poor health facilities, bad roads, etc are the price Nigerians have to pay for creating an enabling environment for active corruption.
We therefore urge President Umaru Yaradu’a to devote time to the war against corruption. If we can win the war against corruption, every other thing will fall into place. Yaradu’a must ignore those seeking to blackmail the war machinery into silence and inaction. The agencies currently fighting corruption in the country are on course. They are neither selective nor vindictive as agents of subversion have claimed. It is instructive that many of those indicted by Nigeria’s anti-corruption agencies have equally been indicted by British and American authorities. Yaradu’a must therefore give Nuhu Ribadu every necessary support the latter needs to carry the war against corruption to its logical conclusion.
Finally, in view of the fact that the anti-corruption agencies alone cannot effectively wage the war; in view of the need to involve all sectors in the war against corruption and in view of the fact that powerful forces of darkness are out to frustrate the efforts of agencies fighting corruption, MURIC hereby declares JIHAD against corruption.
Beginning from Monday, 1st October 2007, MURIC will open a Transparency Department in all its branches nationwide to monitor, register and transmit corrupt practices committed by Muslims in public office. Such reports will be given to the anti-corruption agencies for necessary action.
We appeal to Muslims who have no access to the anti-corruption agencies to report cases of corrupt Muslims to MURIC branches or directly to our headquarters in Lagos.
Dr. Is-haq Akintola
DIRECTOR |
