Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, has faulted criticisms trailing the list of ministerial nominees sent to the Senate by President Muhammadu Buhari.
He described the criticisms as unnecessary.
According to him, what is needed in Nigeria are people, who can bring positive change and not whether the nominees are recycled politicians or old faces.
The cleric said this on the sidelines of a press conference organised by Catholic Caritas Foundation of Nigeria, an agency the Catholic Church, on its fifth anniversary and its plans for Sustainable Development Goals in Nigeria.
Onaiyekan said, “The change I am looking for is a change that will make Nigeria better; a change in which the ways of doing things will be different; and a change that will entail a different way of looking at and handling political power. This change can take place with recycled faces, it can take place with new faces.
“I don’t care what face is up there provided the change comes out very well. By the way, new faces do not necessarily bring change. You can bring new faces who will be happy to repeat what has been happening. So, in this matter, it is good if Nigerians remain better focussed on practical assessment of the reality.
“Is Nigeria getting better? Are we making progress? Does that tell the integrity of our behaviour? Are the services running well and better? I don’t care who the ministers are, provided the improvement is seen. If you ask me whether the improvement has come, the President has already begged us to be patient with him. So we are waiting and we are watching.”
Onaiyekan added that the emergence of the SDGs was premised on the need to get another global agenda.
He recalled that at the just concluded 70th United Nations General Assembly, the 2030 SDGs agenda were adopted, adding that the vision 2030 agenda, as well as the vision of African agenda 2063, could not be achieved solely by the government.
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