Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Abuja (Agenzia Fides)- The Catholic Church in Nigerian has sided with transparency and honesty in the management of oil and demands that it be used for the authentic development of the country. Archbishop John Onaiyekan of Abuja said this in an intervention during a 2-3 November meeting of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference in Abuja on the theme “Making Oil and Gas Wealth Serve the Common Good”.
In his intervention, a copy was sent to Fides, the Archbishop said a nation’s greatest resources are the people: “Nigerians are resourceful, highly motivated and can show themselves as brilliant as any group of people can be. This is our greatest wealth”. However this resource is only a potential said Archbishop Onaiyekan, because “In a nation where many young graduates roam the streets unemployed for years or are under-employed, selling phone cards and newspapers, there is something seriously wrong…”. Government and governance has been practically reduced to merely manipulating oil wealth. It seems nobody really cares whether Nigerians have jobs or not. So we spend all our resources buying from all over the world, goods that other people have produced, while our factories are left to rot”.
The importance of human resources is clear. “The example of some countries clearly illustrates the truth that people are the wealth of a nation. Some of the nations that are now in the frontline of the world economy have little or no natural resources. Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong are examples. They have no crude oil, hardly any minerals, and little or no land even to farm on. All they have are people who are educated and prepared to work and who are put in the position to work and to produce. The result is a wealthy and an affluent nation” the Archbishop affirmed.
“There can be no substitute for proper deployment of human resources. Lack of natural resources can be remedied, if the people are resourceful. But no matter how rich a country is in natural resources, if the people are not well managed, little will happen. Our country is a good example”, said Archbishop Onaiyekan. Quoting the The Economist (October 21st-27th 2006), he continued “Despite billions of petrodollars flowing in since the 1970s, Nigerians are considerably worse off today than they were in 1980. About 71% of them live on less than $1 a day, infant mortality is high and the country is unlikely to achieve any of the UN’s millennium development goals by 2015”.
“It is only after we have properly appreciated the importance of our human resources that we can then begin to look at our natural resources, including oil and gas” the Archbishop said recalling that another natural resource is agriculture “the cultivation of cash crops, most of which have in the meantime been totally neglected… Our nation will do well to diversify our sources of mineral wealth by paying greater attention to the different kinds of mineral resources with which our nation has been blessed.”
Mgr Onaiyekan continued: “We have to remember that oil is non renewable. Whatever is taken away now, will not be available for the generations that will follow us. We therefore, have a responsibility to future generations in the way we exploit and extract the oil resources. The least we can do is to use our present oil incomes to put in place structures, services and amenities which will be of lasting value for present and future generations. Obvious areas of concern would include education, health services, housing, transport and communications network”.
“And this leads to the third observation: exploitation of oil at what price? As we seek to make as much money as we can from oil, we need to pay attention to how this is being done. Much of the crisis in the Niger Delta is as a result of a callous and careless exploitation of oil without due regard for the environment today and the consequences for the years to come”.
“Many have referred to our oil boom as an oil doom” the Archbishop concluded stressing the need for a moral effort to have an honest political class willing to protect and promote the common good against exploitation of local oil by foreign companies interested only in making maximum profit. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 13/11/2006 righe 50 parole 650)
