Senator Ike Ekweremadu, on Tuesday, stated that no nation can make progress when there is no peace as he sued for calm in Nigeria.
He said this when he spoke as a member representing Nigeria at the International Parliament for Tolerance and Peace at an event marking the International Day of Peace.
Ekweremadu, who is the chairman of the Parliament’s Committee on Judicial and Legal Matters, added that there could not be sustainable peace without justice and, therefore, called for justice and equity at all times.
The former Deputy President of the Nigerian Senate made the call in a statement released in Abuja by his Media Adviser, Mr Uche Anichukwu, to mark the International Day of Peace.
He said: “As the world marks the International Day of Peace, it is an opportunity for all Nigerians to reflect on the values of peace, tolerance, equity, and justice.
“We must discourage ethnoreligious discriminations, intolerance, and exclusionist tendencies that tend to tear the nation apart and instil destructive ideas in the minds of our youth and populations in general. It is time to embrace and promote the humanistic values of compassion, respect for life, acceptance, and tolerance as routes to peace”.
The lawmaker urged Nigerian youths to embrace the virtues of peace and dialogue in seeking redresses to their grievances, emphasising that dialogue was still the best way to go.
He equally enjoined the youths to take advantage of the various post-graduate degree programmes in the areas of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, mediation, and tolerance to be funded by the International Parliament for Tolerance and Peace in universities around the world.
