The Archbishop Emeritus of the Catholic Archdiocese of Lagos, Anthony Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie, yesterday said Nigeria should avoid the repetition of another civil war.
Cardianal Okogie disclose this yesterday, as Acting President Yemi Osinbajo engaged some Igbo and northern groups in a meetings in Abuja over the October 1 Igbo quit notice issued by some northern youths.
Cardinal Okogie in an event to mark his 81st birthday in Lagos, said, “We in Nigeria once made a mistake, a grave one for that matter, going to war when we could have resolved our differences peacefully.
According to the Cleric to avoid another war is an obligation we all must assume. To avoid going to war is not cowardice. It is to have the courage to subdue our ego and negotiate. To go to war when we could and ought to have avoided it is not courageous but reckless as the scar of the 1967 and 1970 war remains.
The Archbishop Emeritus who blamed the Nigerian political class for failing to see the urgent need for far-reaching constitutional reforms and are pitching the youths against themselves while the elders are stoking the embers of disintegration said “To assume the obligation of avoiding a war, we must refrain from revisionist accounts of the 1967-70 war”.
