News Post

Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, on Thursday evening organised a special Ramadan prayer session for the restoration of peace, stability and economic prosperity of Nigeria. A statement issued by the Special Adviser on Media and Public Affairs to the speaker, Mr. Turaki Hassan, said the prayers were held at the National Assembly complex during Iftar with members from the North West and South East geo-political zones.

Speaking during the prayers, Dogara said  it was necessitated by the fact it is a  holy period; one of abstinence, self denial and sacrifice with holiness which the month calls for. “For us to assemble here in this Holy month and miss the opportunity to call on God to help us with the challenges that we are facing in this nation, would not be right. That was why we deemed it necessary to utilize this opportunity of self denial to call on God to intervene in the affairs of our nation.”

” For every one who is a man or woman of faith, prayer is central. The reason why prayer is necessary is because although we all call on Him via different religions; God is all seeing, God is all powerful, but He will not intervene in spite of His many powers in our affairs, until  we give Him permission to do so.”

“If God can just on His own decide to intervene; there’ll be no need for prayers, why would you pray if you can go directly and get it? He has said that He has put the power in our mouths, that whatever we go through, be it as individuals or a nation, if we can call on Him, He will respond, and I believe that is the essence of prayer.”

Dogara maintained that without prayers, things could have been worse in Nigeria.

“That is why we want to utilize this opportunity and this event to call on God for the affairs of this nation, pray to God to intervene in the land, pray for God to give us wisdom as leaders; from the President, the Vice President, leaders of the National Assembly, even Membership, all of us here, Members of the National Assembly, Governors, State Legislators, Local Government Chairmen, down to Councilors, because we believe that if the leadership does well, the country will do well.”

“If there should be a first level of intervention, it should even be among the leaders, because it is said “any time you see a rotten fish, check the head”. There is no way the head will be alive and the fish will rot, it is not possible, so the first level of intervention that we will ask for is for God to begin to intervene through the leaders in the affairs of the nation.

We will pray for Mr. President, pray for his good health, pray for long life, pray for the Vice President and then all other leaders in the the country, our nation.”

The prayer session was led by Hon. Balarabe Abdullahi Salame from Sokoto State and it will continue next week Tuesday and Wednesday with members from North East, North Central, South West and South South zones.