1st Annual General Assembly of Catholics in Politics & Catholic Business Leaders – Agora Conference On 28/01/2022

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SPEECH DELIVERED BY HIS EXCELLENCY, PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN, THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA, AT THE FIRST AGORA CONFERENCE, GATHERING OF CATHOLIC POLITICIANS AND BUSINESS LEADERS ON THE 28^TH OF JANUARY, 2022

PROTOCOLS

I am privileged to be here with you at the very first edition of the Agora Conference, this gathering of Catholic politicians and business leaders to devise ways of influencing the course of our society for good, and affirming the imperative that the marketplace and the public square have to be seasoned with the salt of divine values.

By reason of its ministry, the Catholic Church is a force for good. It is probably the largest non-governmental/private stakeholder in our country’s education and health sectors.

Long before the State began to make social investments, the Church was already investing in our communities by establishing schools and hospitals. Millions of Nigerians of diverse faiths were nurtured in Catholic schools. At the clerical level, the Catholic Bishops Conference has a long and distinguished tradition of speaking truth to power and through its measured interventions today, it continues to bring moral clarity to bear upon our efforts to address our national challenges.

We are living in times of unprecedented economic and social upheaval.  This is so not just in our nation but the world over.

Historically in times like these, parochial prejudices are heightened, there is a retreat into ethnic, religious and other nativist camps. Those that do not speak our language or subscribe to our faith are under great suspicion and they soon become scapegoats for all our challenges. This is why I think that the theme of this summit: “The Advancement of the Common Good towards Justice, Unity, Structure and Development of Nigeria” is both timely and relevant.

It is clear that the pursuit of the common good,  the good of all must be the common ground for securing justice, unity, and the development of Nigeria. But by what means do we arrive there? For generations, millions of people all over the world have looked to Catholic Social Teachings as a profoundly powerful tool of social transformation.

These teachings are a body of knowledge around the advancement of social justice, human development and peace, and they speak to issues of inequality, human dignity, civil liberties and economic rights.

In various countries and communities, they have inspired good works, and have also encouraged acts of courageous activism as well as those of mercy and compassion.

The idea of the common good, which is the theme of this conference is the cornerstone of Catholic Social Teachings. The notion of the common good is founded on divine commands. God commands us to seek the common good of everyone. In Jeremiah 29:7, He says:

“Seek the welfare (shalom) of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf; for in its welfare (shalom) you will have welfare (shalom) also.

In Matthew 7:12):

“In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”

In 1st Thessalonians 5:15, “Always seek after that which is good for one another and for all people.”

All of these are the foundations for what we describe as the common good, which as I have said, is the cornerstone of Catholic teachings on social justice.

The Catechism, following Pope John The 23rd in Mater et Magistra and Vatican II, defines the common good as: “the sum total of social conditions which allows people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfilment more fully and more easily.” And I add that of these conditions justice, and peaceful coexistence are key to what we describe as the common good.

It is noteworthy that a number of the ideas in Catholic Social Teachings mirror provisions of our own Constitution, notably, the Directive Principles and Objectives of State Policy conveyed in the Second Chapter of the Constitution, expresses the same words as all of what we describe as the common good in these Catholic teachings I have spoken about.

Our Constitution will immediately recognize the shared emphases on human dignity, the prominence given to social and economic rights as well as civil and political rights, the primacy of justice and human development, the protection of the vulnerable people, primacy of human dignity and the impropriety of concentration of wealth in the hands of a few individuals and groups. All of these are contained in one shape or form in the Directive Principles of State policy which is in our Constitution.

When we talk about these social teachings, Catholic teachings, the common good, we are also talking about matters that have already been addressed in our Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

I would go so far as to say that the second chapter of our Constitution articulates what constitutes the common good as an imperative of public policy and governance. Seen in this light, the challenge of actualizing the common good is the same as the quest to actualize the Directive Principles and Objectives of State Policy. Achieving both requires transformational leadership across all levels and spheres of our society.  This is where the rubber hits the road.

Leadership is not just a force for good but is a force for the common good. Indeed it is the power of conscious individuals who are animated by a higher purpose that will alter the material circumstances of their communities.

Further, we must acknowledge that the question that transformational leadership seeks to answer is that of the purpose of power. It is in response to this question, that we must define transformational leadership as that model of leadership that operates by serving and uplifting others.  It is servant leadership and as advanced by the Gospel it is contrarian in that it says that the purpose of power is service, not domination; it is to uplift and empower others rather than to control or oppress.

This is a model of leadership that is inseparable from our conception of the common good. Transformational leadership is therefore the pursuit of the common good.  But the pursuit of the common good is clearly not as easy as it sounds.  This is especially so where for example, the wounds and enmities of ethnic and religious conflicts are deep. The common type of leadership will seek the path of relevance and popularity within their own ethnic or religious camps by seeking only the good of their own.

The servant-leader however, will serve his people by emphasizing the letter and spirit of the gospel, that even our worst enemies were still made in the image of God, and the pursuit of the common good is the pursuit of the good of those who hate us and hurt us even in the recent past.

Transformational leadership means that we do not mourn and condemn the killing of those who belong to our own tribe or faith alone, or seek justice for ours alone, because all men are equal before God (that is foundational for the concept of the common good), and that the pain and anguish of a mother’s loss of a child is not different from one faith or tongue to the other.

The second point is how do we attain the common good without building credible institutions?  We need to build credible institutions of justice; the rule of law and orderly society are crucial expressions of the pursuit of the common good.

The most progressive expressions of faith are concerned with justice and justice is impossible without taking the institutions that govern public life into account. In this sense, the purpose of governance and public policy is to establish a paradigm of justice which is measured by how well society treats its most vulnerable members, settles disputes fairly and speedily, and how it metes out punishment to violators of law without bias or fear.

Our courts of law must be courts of justice. It means that we must pay attention to the quality and calibre of the men and women who are appointed judges. We must be concerned with their remuneration, and welfare. We must be unrelenting in insisting on their integrity.  The cancer of governments anywhere is corruption. When public officials, (be they high or low in the executive, legislature or judiciary) are tollgates for the extortion of the populace, seeking government dispensations if government officials have mounted a tollgate the common good, happy and prosperous lives for the people is impossible. The pursuit of the common good then must involve a relentless pursuit of integrity and transparency of public officers. We must think through the systems that will reduce human discretion in public-facing institutions. So we must, especially as a collective, condemn and call out corruption and corrupt practices.

Today it is possible for a person to argue that because “I belong to a particular faith or ethnic group, I am more or less immune from corruption charges.” We find people defending people of their faith or ethnic group who are accused of corruption or misdeed purely on the basis of those parochial considerations. People hide under all manner of parochial affiliations to be able to dodge justice in one shape or form of the other.

It is important for us as men and women of faith that justice must be balanced and equal; we must call out Catholics, or Protestants, or Pentecostals, or whoever they are, as well as we call out Muslims when they are corrupt or when they violate the laws of our land. When they act improperly, it is our duty to point out to everyone that they have acted improperly. We must be watchful, otherwise, our society cannot thrive on the pretence of the pursuit of a common good.

This is why active participation in the political and economic life of our country cannot be an accidental or a tangential interest for people of faith.  It is an obligation, a bounden duty.  Men and women of faith must consider politics, the economy of our country as their duty to participate.

Achieving the objectives of the common good is not a task for a few gifted individuals, but something that all people of faith, the entirety of the lay faithful should engage in as a civic duty.

Pursuing the common good in a diverse society demands those of us in the public square and in the marketplace translate our goals into a universal language that can be understood by all including those that do not share our confessional allegiances.

I am in agreement with Father George Ehusani when he says in his work “the Prophetic Church” that the Nigerian Christian elite must be ready to commit to “pulling down walls of hatred and building bridges across rivers of ethnic, religious and social hostilities.” He was making an important point; that is, we cannot speak of ourselves as believing in the common good as Christians when we are not prepared to break down the walls of prejudice, hatred so that we build platforms not just within Christianity but outside the faith. We build platforms with Muslims and those who even say there is no God because the question of the common good is relevant to us all. In any event, God created us in His image and He loves all men and women.

This matters because our future will be shaped by how well we make common g with other citizens of progressive persuasions to transform our communities. How do we forge collaborative partnerships not only within ourselves but with other forces which are committed to the common good to positively impact our society?

Fulfilling the immense promise of our nation requires men and women of goodwill from various communities and faiths to collaborate in advancing the common good. This is all more important because it is such coalitions that can heal society of the wounds inflicted by the crude identity politics of religion and ethnicity.

The case for engagement is best encapsulated by the famous dictum put forward by Edmund Burke: “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing.”

History teaches us that everywhere there has been a national transformation, it has been brought about by public-spirited men and women of goodwill who, inspired by their belief in a higher purpose than their own profit, have entered the public square to champion the common good.

Let me conclude by recalling the words of His Holiness Pope John Paul II on his visit to Nigeria in 1982 in an address at the State House in Lagos. On that occasion, His Holiness said, “Yours is a land of promise, a land of hope. In its efforts to develop, it is bound to suffer the pressures that so often arise from conflicting demands and from the sheer magnitude of the task. Only the spirited efforts of all the citizens under enlightened leadership can overcome difficulties such as this.  Only the harnessing of all the forces for the common good, in true respect of the supreme values of the spirit, will make a nation great and a happy dwelling place for its people. The glory of the Government is the wellbeing, the peace and the joy of the governed.”

If I may dwell briefly on the idea that our country is a land of promise and hope, then I would submit that our greatest adversary in our task of national renewal is a feeling of hopelessness – a sense of futility that seems almost overwhelming. However, we cannot afford to even indulge in such despondency and despair.

There is hope and there is much work to be done. Contrary to opinion in some quarters, this house will not fall. It is being built and needs yet many more people to commit to building the sort of nation that we want. The throes and pangs of birth must not be interpreted as the pains of impending death. We are by the grace of God more than able to overcome our present difficulties and we will overcome them.

I know that Professor Pat Utomi frequently invokes the imagery of Nehemiah, the biblical hero who led the effort to rebuild his country and I think that this is an entirely appropriate metaphor for the necessity of constructing our nation. Our nation also needs construction and can be constructed, men and women of goodwill just like Nehemiah, calling on people to arise and build our nation. I call upon you also, let us arise and build our nation! Our nation can be built. Why are we men and women of faith if we give up so easily and despair? We are a nation of men and women of hope and we must be able to say that this nation can be built and we will build it.

Before I close let me offer my felicitations to a builder,  His Eminence, Cardinal John Onaiyekan on the occasion of his birthday which I understand comes up tomorrow. I join you in celebrating a leader whose contributions to the growth of the faith and the development of the nation are indelible.

I commend the organizers – Catholic Action Nigeria and Catholic Politicians and Business Leaders – for putting together this very important forum. It is my prayer that the mission to which you have been called will result in the enthronement of the common good in every area of our national life.

Thank you very much for listening.