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Education, short road to peace, freedom—NIREC
The Nigeria Inter-Religious Council (NIREC) affirms that education is one of the shortest ways to sustain peace and freedom in the country.
According to it, with sound education of the people, many of the socially induced crises that bedevil the society, such as religious upheavals that lead to human carnage, will not arise.
NIREC’s Executive Secretary, Rev. Fr. Cornelius Afebu-Omonokhua, who doubles as the Secretary-General of West Africa Inter-Religious Council, made the assertion in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos.
He spoke against the backdrop of intermittent religious induced crises in the country.
According to him, education enables the mammal in humans to be controlled and conquered while the fruit of ignorance result to crisis and conflicts.
He said that religious teachers are expected to assist the child to grow in vertical relationship with God and horizontal relationship with fellow human beings.
Afebu-Omonokhua, who faulted the subsisting education system in the country, said that the undoings of system were hurting the society in every facet.
“If the youths are well trained and informed, they will be conscious of human rights.
“They will resist those who employ them to fight unjustly and conflict profiteers who finance violence.
“They will know that peace is a virtue that is deeply entrenched in Christianity and Islam.
“A well-educated person with a reasonable job will promote nation building because he has something to look up to.
“An enlightened person in religion and society is aware that it is God who fights for human beings and not the other way round.”
He called for religious re-education, de-radicalisation and re-orientation to pave a short road to peaceful coexistence and a healthy society.
He urged authorities to provide functional and affordable educational system that is functional enough to provide the ideal person with admirable content of character.
“If you train the child well, you develop the nation.
“The essence of education is success and happiness,” he said. (NAN)
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