Ayodele Olalere
Following the recent announcement by the Federal government that religious houses may reopen for worship provided they follow guidelines, there are doubts Lagos State following in the direction.
The doubts were expressed by Lagos State Commissioner for Home Affairs, Anofiu Elegushi, on Tuesday during the 2020 ministerial briefings to mark one year anniversary of Sanwo-Olu’s administration at Alausa, Ikeja.
According to the Commissioner, though the federal government allows religious houses to reopen, yet each state governments has the right to decide what works best for them.
He said several meetings had been held by the state government with religious leaders in the state but none of the leaders gave assurance they would be able to comply with the guidelines provided by the state government such as maintaining the.number of worshippers, social distancing and the rest.
” Before pronouncement by the Federal government, we have been having continuous meetings with religion leaders on the possibility of reopening religious houses. At the meetings, the possibility of reopening religious houses was put off by the leaders. They said they can not take responsibility of having 50 worshippers.
One of the Imams said if he’s leading prayers, he can not be sure or guarantee the number of people that will be at his back joining in the prayers if they will be more than 20. So they ruled out totally the possibility of religious houses until they have a clear coast,’ the commissioner said.
He added: “Though the federal government mentioned reopening but it did not rule out states deciding what is good for them. All states would look at possibility in their respective states.
Lagos State is having more figures which definitely will speak to our decision. However the Incident Commander, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu will give further directives.”
