Nigeria: Mixed reactions as Bishop Kukah says coup likely if Buhari isn’t president

Bishop Kukah
Bishop Mathew Kukah (left) during his visit to Prsident Muhammadu Buhari at the presidential villa, Abuja. (File photo)

Mixed reactions have greeted the statement made by Nigeria’s Bishop Mathew Kukah, that there could have been a coup or war in the country over the current state of insecurity.

Bishop Kukah, lamented what he called “nepotism,” which he said had characterised the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari.

As a result, he said there could have been a coup or war in the country if a non-Northern Muslim had been a president and did a fraction of what Buhari did.

The Bishop of Sokoto Catholic Diocese, who disclosed this on Friday, in his 2020 Christmas message entitled: ‘A nation in search of vindication,’ Buhari owes Nigerians an explanation on the current state of the nation, alleging that “he deliberately sacrificed the dreams of those who voted for him to what seemed like a programme to stratify and institutionalise northern hegemony by reducing others in public life to second class status.”

His state read: “This government owes the nation an explanation as to where it is headed as we seem to journey into darkness. The spilling of this blood must be related to a more sinister plot that is beyond our comprehension. Are we going to remain hogtied by these evil men or are they gradually becoming part of a larger plot to seal the fate of our country?

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“President Buhari deliberately sacrificed the dreams of those who voted for him to what seemed like a programme to stratify and institutionalise northern hegemony by reducing others in public life to second class status. He has pursued this self-defeating and alienating policy at the expense of greater national cohesion.

“Every honest Nigerian knows that there is no way any non-Northern Muslim President could have done a fraction of what President Buhari has done by his nepotism and gotten away with it.

“There would have been a military coup a long time ago or we would have been at war. The President may have concluded that Christians will do nothing and will live with these actions.

“He may be right and we Christians cannot feel sorry that we have no pool of violence to draw from or threaten our country. However, God does not sleep. We can see from the inexplicable dilemma of his North.”

It will be recalled that earlier in June, notable socio-cultural leaders from southern and middle-belt Nigeria had sued President Buhari for N50 billion over what the termed “marginalisation of the people of the region in the appointments to security, quasi-security agencies and ‘strategic agencies’ of government.”

Meanwhile, consequent upon Bishop Kukah’s statement, Nigerians have taken to Twitter, expressing mixed reactions over the cleric’s submission.

Their views presented below: