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National conference: Our leaders are 95% of our problems – Bishop Adebiyi

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imageThe Bishop of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion), Lagos-West Diocese, Rt. Rev. Peter Adebiyi (retd.) has condemned the plan by President Goodluck Jonathan to send the outcome of the proposed national conference to the National Assembly.

Adebiyi, who stated this while speaking on the state of the nation in Lagos, Tuesday said the federal lawmakers were not capable of addressing the many problems currently confronting the nation.

According to him, those who caused Nigeria’s problems should not be allowed to be part of those finding solution to the problems.

The cleric noted that the resolution of the proposed conference may likely suffer a setback, where the position of the conference was not favourable to those in power.

Adebiyi said, “I know that the National Assembly – the politicians – are 95 per cent part of the problem of this country. And if they are the problem, they cannot solve the problems themselves.

“What if we say this is the way we are going and they know that it cannot augur well with them. Are they not the same set of people who earn a lot of money in the national and state Assemblies but cannot pay N18, 000 (minimum wage) to workers?

“If they know that they are not going to get all these things (allowances) with the kind of structure we want to make, definitely, they will scuttle it. They will not make it work.”

He said the previous conferences failed because the governments that convoked them had ulterior motives.

Adebiyi said, “In 2006, it was the political conference that we had in Abuja. I was a member, representing the whole of Christians in the Western zone. We were there for about six weeks and it ended abruptly, when some agenda were slipped into our rooms.

“We saw the agenda and said ‘this is not part of what we have come to do.’ And then, what we heard the following day was the chairman who announced that the political forum had been adjourned. It was adjourned forever. We were sent home. Till today, there is nothing we have heard about it,” the cleric added