Wrongful demolition of Catholic Church’s fence by Uchechukwu Emmanuel

Recently, I read a story by one Damola Jenfa concerning Lagos State Government’s explanation of the demolition of a Catholic Church’s fence in Ajao Estate, Lagos.  This was in The Guardian   recently.

Ordinarily, Catholics resist throwing tantrums with anybody, more so government at this period of our Lenten season.  But , it is expedient to explain a few things so that the issue at stake would be better understood.  First is that people in government should know that in exercise of power, legal justice goes hand-in-hand with social or equitable justice and that there is a manner of exercise of rights that mirrors bad blood or cruelty in man.  When government begins to bend the law in favour of a single individual, no matter how highly placed, to the detriment of over 3,000 persons, the rationality of any ensuing action becomes suspicious, even if covered by legal immunity, it is viewed as carried out on sheer impunity.

Lagos State Government has in the past few years deliberately undermined the peace of Ajao Estate.  Cutting through an estate with major roads destroying the privacy and security of the estate without any regards for its residents is a little bit insensitive. The estate has only two access routes through which the government now funnelled traffic to and from Isolo and Ejigbo, making access to homes in the estate a nightmare and dangerous in emergency situations.  Some of the roads were designated “one way” overnight by government fiat thereby making intra estate drive around an odium and creating a harvest farm for LASTMA officials.  The estate has a high density of Okada and Keke Marwa operators, which turn narrow roads into illegal parks and most of the groups are headed by political party chieftains. To think that governments at both state and local levels would reclaim old roads and construct new ones in Mafoluku, Isolo and Ejigbo, all bordering Ajao Estate while neglecting the estate completely suggests a discomforting disposition of government.  The only roads of interest are those that evacuate traffic from Isolo and Ejigbo.  May be our loving governor is oblivious of the fact that the estate is inhabited by predominantly non-indigenes, those whose neglect appears to be patented by various state governments, those who cannot speak the governance language and are only useful for tax extortion. This is the state of despair and hopelessness in which the government has left the residents of Ajao Estate.  A little extra straw is therefore likely to break the camel’s back.

One had thought that the government would have been more circumspect in manifesting an attitude that negatively affects the spiritual life of these residents by going to demolish the fence of their church. Religion is still the opium of the poor and the downtrodden.  The church, I learnt, recognized long ago that the state government planned a passage road along the canal and allowed for it in its development by avoiding any permanent structure on the route. It is suspected that the government suddenly lost the courage and rationality with which it had pulled down all properties on the way at Baale Shekoni Street. This was when it came to an indigene who built a house on the road way by the canal. This house was built after over 25 years of existence of the church premises whose exit gate was facing the end of Johnson Umejei Close. Unless laws changed, such a house would have neither Certificate of Occupancy nor Plan approval to justify its existence.  The government then bent the law, rechanneling the road dangerously to avoid the house and felt more comfortable destroying the serenity of the Catholic Church where over 3,000 mostly non-indigene faithful worship their God. Perhaps the government is unaware that by its action, it desecrated the very character of a Catholic church – an internal private space both for disciplined car parking and for outdoor spiritual activities.  For that very Catholic Church, the proposed new road plan undermines the safety of pedestrian worshippers as well as the traffic logistics for cars moving in and out for daily and Sunday services.  Environmental impact assessment would have shown all these.

The question that is agitating the minds of many is whether the state government would have done the same to any property belonging to some other religious extractions, especially if certain language groups worshipped there.  What made it more unbearable was that the government chose to do its demolition on Ash Wednesday, the start of a 40-day fasting and devotion period in the Catholic faith. Perhaps even Al Qaeda and ISIS would have been less insensitive.  It was as if there are no Catholics or even Christians in that government.  Such a government can even wake up and withdraw the church’s C of O in a power play.  For a state government official to cast aspersion on Rev Fr Paul Anyansi as not being well informed is to insult the Catholic hierarchy because the Catholic Church keeps records better, longer and more safely than the government as the church is not prone to arson and deliberate mutilation of documents.  There is no doubt that the government has the power and right to favour any individual but it also has a concomitant responsibility to be fair to, and equitable with, others.

The only good governance option for Lagos state government is to properly redirect the passage way from Baale Shekoni Street, through Chi-Vita Avenue to Ati Okoye Street and link up with Kolawole Shonibare Street. After all, this new route is wider, obviously less life-threatening and currently in use as the access route by government fiat. To do otherwise is to leave a sour taste in the mouths of all affected Catholics both in Ajao Estate and elsewhere and to send a negative signal to non-indigenes in the state.  Surely, the amiable Lagos State Governor means much more than that to the people.

•Uchechukwu Emmanuel is a Catholic in Ajao Estate.