The Presidency on Tuesday, finally reacted to insinuations by some Christian leaders that the Companies and Allied Matters Act recently signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari was aimed at stifling the growth and development of churches in Nigeria, describing the claim as false and intelligible.
The Senior Special Assistant to the President on Niger Delta Affairs, Senator Ita Enang, who made the government position known at an interactive session with the leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria in Abuja on Tuesday, described insinuations that CAMA 2020 was against the church and other religious bodies as mischievous and an attempt by the opposition to blackmail the President for political motive.
The meeting, which was organised principally to educate the Christian body over the contentious provisions of the CAMA, saw the Presidential aide swearing to an oath to assure the church that had spoken nothing but the whole truth about the new law and pleaded with the trust the government on the new law.
Senator Enang, however, complained that some politicians, especially those from the opposition, had attempted to paint the CAMA as an anti-religious law geared towards enslaving the church.
He made note of the misconceptions that trailed the Act had found their way in through deliberate misinformation, explaining they were spun to blackmail President Muhmmadu Buhari.
The President, he said, didn’t originate the law and at previous occasions withheld accent when he was not convinced it was good enough for Nigeria.
He said, “For an illustration of this, I present a tabular form of the provisions of the 1990 ACT which came into force on January, 2nd 1990, which after more than 30 years of operation has now been repealed and replaced by CAMA 2020 hereunder are the comparative provisions in the two enactments to show particularly that the 2020 ACT assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari has not introduced any matter oppressive to the Christian Community or any religion nor any matter discriminatory against any class of persons in Nigeria.”
The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), in response, asked President Buhari to suspend the implementation of the new law with immediate effect as it was not in the interest of the people.
The President of the CAN, Reverend Samson Ayokunle, also pleaded with the president to carry out a further appraisal of the legislation in accordance with the provisions of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria (as amended).
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