COVID-19: Nigerian Government Asks Churches, Mosques, Others To Submit Guidelines For Reopening

The Federal Government has asked professional groups and faith-based organisations, including churches and mosques, to submit guidelines for reopening to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) to review and advice them.

The Director General of the NCDC, Chikwe Ihekweazu, made the call during a press conference of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 on Thursday.

“This is what we’ve been advising every society, organisation, community, be it faith-based, cultural-based, professionally based, to come up with guidelines for themselves.

“We are happy to advise and engage, but this needs to be led and owned by the leaders of those organisations,” he said.

He also urged other organisations and communities to come up with similar guidelines to expedite the process of safely reopening the economy.

“I was happy yesterday to receive a new set of draft guidelines by the Public Transport Owners of Nigeria Association. Those are people that manage the long-distance buses that travel across the country, what we call ‘luxury’ buses.

“They had drafted their guidelines for reopening safely and sent it to us for review and to advise them on the measures they are now recommending on how to manage their loading centres, buses and engagements with their customers at the point when we may allow them to reopen,” he said.

The NCDC DG added that every stakeholder in society needed to take responsibility for the part it owned and managed.

This is coming barely one week after the Federal Government issued a strong warning to states lifting ban on religious gathering to check the consequences of their decisions.