More Reactions Trail Attack On Catholic Adoration Priest, Obayi

CYRIACUS IZUEKWE

More reactions have trailed the attack on a Catholic priest, Rev. Fr (Dr.) Paul Obayi, Spiritual Director of the Okunerere  Adoration Ministry over his good intention in bringing developmental projects to Uguru community in Enugu State.

P.M.EXPRESS reports that some miscreants organised themselves into a group and attacked Rev. Obayi over a parcel of land given to him to build a university for development of the area.

The latest reaction against the attack on Fr. Obayi’s reputation was from the members of the Lagos branch of Okunerere Adoration Ministry, who held a meeting over the matter.

At the stakeholders meeting held at the National Stadium in Lagos, the members comprising mainly of the indigenes of the town condemned the action of the faceless group called Concerned Forum aimed at tarnishing the image of the Reverend and retarding development in the community.

In their communique after the meeting held in July and signed by their chairman, Barrister Titus Onuora Odo, it stated that the members had watched with utmost dismay and disgust recent publications that went viral in the social, traditional and electronic media, which were outright falsehood and defamatory statements targeted to malign the reputation of the Spiritual Director, Fr Obayi. And their actions have brought unwarranted ridicule and public odium.

They further stated that they were conscious of the modus operandi of the so-called Concerned Forum and recent events in Nguru community. The members said that the verbal condemnation and vitriolic attacks on the person of Rev. Fr. Obayi should be dismissed as lacking in merit and seriousness on the part of the perpetrators and that the attack on him was most unfortunate.

They further stated that there was more to the attack than meets the eyes. “While we take exceptions to this kind of moral turpitude, witch-hunting exercise and sheer wickedness, we make bold to put the records straight as stated here under seriatim.”

THE FACTS ARE:
No doubt,  Fr. Obayi has been a well known name within and outside the country for the past two decades, for his selfless, patriotic, spiritual and generous personality. He had preached and lived what he preached with an enigmatic personality of ecclesiastical background.

Rev. Fr. Obayi did not neglect anybody after the land was given to him, rather he followed the part of peace despite the fact they called him all sort of names and even reported him to the Bishop and Pope.
He has been busy moving round to satisfy every group and individuals in order not to offend anybody as a priest. And has tried to carry everybody along as much as he knew and could. But all of a sudden, these evil geniuses; two from Lagos and one from Abuja formed a group to kill the dreams.

It must be clarified that Fr. Obayi was called by the community to take the said land for development of any kind. He chose to attract and site a tertiary institution as a gesture of appreciation to the Council of Elders of Nguru community, despite the fact he had a much larger expanse of land in a more
strategic location, but chose to develop his own village as a form of patriotism.
It must be stated that the land was given through a consensus reached by the Council of Elders of Nguru ancient kingdom, comprising two persons from each of the ten clans in Nguru in a plenary session of the Council of Elders. That was done for them to act in representative capacities for their individual clans in respect of the allocation of the said land and an agreement was reached and signed before the people.

Therefore the ‘Concerned Forum’ lacks the moral justification to attack Fr. Obayi, the youths and the elders of the community. It was on record that Concerned Forum had described the youths and the elders as jobless and foolish people respectively for making efforts to take Nguru community out of darkness.
Further inference could reveal that they want a pound of
flesh from our Spiritual Director or better still, they want to
scare him away thereby scuttling his noble intention which depicted sheer jealousy and witchcraft, knowing that the project will attract and create countless employment opportunities to Nguru youths and the entire community.

We wish to declare therefore, that Nguru ancient kingdom will not be a launching pad for self seeking anarchists, who seek to exploit the unity and togetherness of the people to perpetrate anarchy in the name of the so called ‘’Concerned Forum’’. Their actions will adversely affect the livelihood of the people of Nguru and we will stoutly resist any attempt by any individual or group to use Nguru community for any  destructive activities.