The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Imo State Chapter, has felicitated with the government and people of Nigeria and Imo state in particular on the occasion of this year’s *Democracy Day* celebration.
In a statement signed by its Chairman, Rev. Dr. Eches Divine Eches (PhD), CAN said that this Silver Jubilee anniversary of Nigeria’s democracy is a significant milestone worthy of celebration, the nation’s diverse and daunting challenges notwithstanding.
“Every subsequent anniversary of this day supplies an additional strand of strength to the cord of Nigeria’s democratic experience, to her sense of unity and common destiny, and to her hope of emergence as a regional, continental and global force worthy of reckon.”, it said.
The statement added: “CAN Imo State seizes the unique opportunity of this Democracy Day to call on the different arms and levels of government, religious and traditional institutions, the political class, civil society organizations, the various other stakeholders in the Nigerian Project, and the general public to reach deep within for the spirit of patriotism and nationalism without which the nation’s great potentials will remain unrealized. We must resolutely rise above the characterization of national values through prisms of ethnicity, religion, political party affiliation and petty cronyism. Mediocrity must begin to make way for merit!
“CAN Imo State especially calls on the government and the organized labour to have the posterity of the nation as their common focus as they continue to negotiate the national minimum wage, and by implication, the general living conditions of the ordinary citizen.
“They must not lose sight of the fact that the figures being contested in their face-off are not mere statistical entries, but the vital life signs of the common man. All ego must therefore be eschewed as they work out mutual compromises for the greatest good of the most people.
God bless Nigeria!
God bless Imo State!”