Saying Buhari Is Sleeping On Duty As President Is Unfair – Garba Shehu

The Presidency has revealed that it was not fair for Catholic Bishop of Yola Diocese, Rt. Rev. Fr. Stephen Mamza to say Buhari was ”sleeping on duty as Commander-in-Chief.”

Buhari’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu reacted to this in Abuja two days ago.

He said it was wrong for a religious leader like Rev Stephen to engage ”in an action that broke the old tradition of staying above politics”.

His words, ”In an action that broke the old tradition of staying above politics, the Catholic Bishop of Yola Diocese, Rt. Rev. Fr. Stephen Mamza delivered a homily in which he spoke angrily against President Muhammadu Buhari, whom he described as ‘sleeping on duty as Commander-in-Chief.’

”This is not a fair comment.

”There is so much that has changed in the past three to four years in and around Yola, and the Catholic Church in particular that a true assessment would show that but for the Change Administration of President Buhari, things would have continued the way they were, or even get worse. These could not have happened if a Commander-in- Chief was asleep.”

”Bishop Mamza was, and is still a strong member of the Adamawa Peace Initiative (API), composed of religious and community leaders which did the lovely work housing and feeding 400,000 displaced people from Northern Adamawa and Borno States in 2015.

”The API also did the extraordinary work of easing tensions between Muslims and Christians during that period and ensured that both groups did not turn on one another based on suspicion.

”As widely reported by the local and international press, in the premises of St. Theresa’s Cathedral where Rev. Mamza ministered, there were more than 1,500 IDPs, mostly women and children on whom the church administered food rations and issued bags of maize, cooking oil and seasoning.

”We are truly touched and very grateful for the work that the Bishop and the others had done in that difficult period.”