Nigeria’s bishops have warned that the country’s health minister is plotting the removal of the century-old abortion law in “collaboration” with foreign non-governmental agencies.
The country’s Catholic bishops issued the communiqué, which also touched on corruption and violence in local elections, after a three-day conference ending last Wednesday.
Signed by Archbishop Gabriel Abegunrin and Bishop Felix Ajakaye, the statement “condemned the recent move by the Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole in collaboration with the foreign agencies to commit the federal government to increasing the culture of contraception and subsequently, abortion among our people.”
It did not name the agencies, but the Nigerian Vanguard newspaper stated that “the crusade to legalize abortion did not start from Nigeria. It remains an imported phenomenon and now propagated by pro-abortion groups like IPPF [International Planned Parenthood Federation], Ipas, Society for Family Health, UNICEF [and] USAID.”
Reports on the number of fatalities annually attributable to unsafe and illegal abortions vary wildly from 20,000 to 44,000 a year, as do the number of abortions from 750,000 to 1.5 million. Abortion is legal when two doctors agree the mother’s life or mental health is at risk — at least in the Christian south of the country. In Muslim areas, an older, stricter law prevails.
The bishops see elimination of the abortion laws as down the road. For now, they are focused on the government’s cooperation with an NGO campaign to push contraceptives. Currently, there is a drive to distribute female condoms widely because, despite the availability of male condoms, male Nigerians do not like to use them.
Source: LifeSiteNews