Africa Speaks — Page 14
MORNING POST, Lagos, dated April 14 reported as follows: THE MIND MUST BE WON Gowan The mind has to be won in the process of reconciliation, the Head of State, Major General Yakubu Gowon, said in Lagos yesterday. General Gowan said this while receiving the Supreme Head of Avid Ahmadiyya Muslim Organisation, Hazrat Hafiz Mirza Nasir Ahmad, Khalifatul Masih III, who paid a courtesy call at his Dodan Barracks residence. He told the prominent Muslim Leader that "We in Nigeria are lucky that there is good understanding among various organisations, otherwise we would have had more trouble if we had listened to some overseas religious propaganda. "Thank God, Nigerians were not waylaid to believe this, and our people co-operated regardless of religious groups to which they belong", he declared. The Head of State also told the Muslim leader that the last civil war was the dream of an individual, pointing out that he warned the rebel leader, Ojukwu, and his foreign backers that secession would never succeed. The trends of events after the end of the war, he emphasised, proved that if Ojukwu had been alit of the scene the whole problem could have been solved. During the crisis, he went on, the Federal Government felt innocent victims we¥e misled and "We did not think in terms of our power, because we realised there is One who is more powerful than we are. He is our Creator and we hope our future leaders will continue to think in this way, serve the people faithfully and not think of the people serving them:' He urged all religious bodies to continue to pray "so that God will see us through" On the achievement of the Ahmadiyya Movement in Nigeria, General Gowon expressed appreciation for its contribution to moral, physical and intellectual progress of Nigeria. \. 14