Anglican Diocesan Bishop of Lagos, Rt. Rev. Humphrey Olumakaiye

The Lagos Diocese of the Anglican Church said it would soon embark on the construction of a N5 billion Centenary City to address the housing needs of low income members of the church.

The Anglican Diocesan Bishop of Lagos, Rt. Rev. Humphrey Olumakaiye, disclosed this on Wednesday in Lagos at a news conference to herald the year-long centenary celebration of the church.

He said that the Centenary City would have low income housing estate, rehabilitation and youth development centre, convention ground and women empowerment centre.

Olumakaiye said that the church has acquired large expanse of land on the Lekki-Ibeju-Epe axis of Lagos for the construction of the low income housing estate.

“When we have this low income estate and we see those people that are in dire need of shelter, then we can now give them the opportunity of having some of these houses. We have widows amongst us that are seriously suffering, our duty is to take care of them and it is a city for all,” he said.

According to the Anglican Bishop, the church is already raising funds internally among church members to finance the housing project.

“People have been contributing greatly to the development of this church and it is high time we give something solid back to them. We need to give something back to the next generation that will forever be cherished, and to make our environment worth living, we have decided to build a centenary city between Lekki-Ibeju-Epe axis.”

“The bible says that we will always have the poor among us; it is the duty of the church to take care of the poor people,” Olumakaiye said.

He said that the church had been providing accommodation to less-privileged church members and giving scholarships to students without making noise.

“We will continue to make impact on the society and to cooperate with the government in making life worth living for the people,” the Anglican Bishop said.

On the forthcoming general elections, Olumakaiye called on voters to make wise decisions by voting in credible leaders that would move Nigeria forward.

He said, “We have embarked on sensitisation and mobilisation efforts toward educating our members on their rights and the right attitude and procedures to adopt”.

“We as clerics are fathers of all, as such we are not to endorse anybody, we pray that the forthcoming elections in Nigeria will be peaceful and credible leaders will be elected,’’ he said.

(NAN)