FR. EDEH TRUTH



FR. Edeh Founder of Madonna University:
The truth about Him

AGENTS OF CHANGE AND THEIR PAINFUL PRICES
         
          Reality is evidently characterized by opposing forces prominent among which is the opposition between the forces of good and the forces of evil. The perpetual struggle between the two sides underpins change, hence, the veracity of Heraclitean assertion “change is permanent”. More interesting is the fact that both forces have human beings as their agents. Thus agents of positive change are not only saddled with the task of overcoming the force of evil but are constantly faced with the brutality and machinations of evil men.
          In the area of education, the struggle for the triumph of the good manifesting in character formation, instilling of moral values and the holistic up-bringing of the psycho-social aspects of the human person is more complicated. More complicity is involved when the youths (the direct objects of education system) are already attuned to the various ills that bedevil the contemporary education in Nigeria such as cultism, exam malpractice, Sorting, abuse of students’ freedom etc.
 Consequently, to spare the rod entails spoiling the child, but to use the rod equally attracts the wrath and different pranks of the child, just to escape. Within the circle of Nigerian educational system, there is an apparent coven of corruption and a complicated cobweb of mountainous obstacles that educators who refuse to follow the trend have many issues to contend with.
          The above has been the case of Very Rev. Fr. Prof Emmanuel M.P. Edeh CSSP, the founder of Madonna University; a humble Catholic Priest whose three decades of Priestly ministry has been very effective in touching positively the lives of people across the globe.
It is equally interesting to know that Fr. Edeh has established and runs various sensitive religious institutions such as religious Congregations of both male and female extractions. He is also the Founder of a Pilgrimage centre that ranks third to the biggest pilgrimage centres in the world.
 Worthy of note is the fact that these institutions are approved by different panels of competent ecclesiastic authorities from the Vatican made up highly intelligent and uncompromising Priests and Bishops.
For those who are conversant with the Catholic tradition, it is not news that such foundations are only approved by the Church when it is proved beyond any reasonable doubt that the founder is a man of impeccable character and the objective of founding them is to better human life. In all his dealings with people of every calibre, nothing fraudulent, nothing deceptive and nothing criminal has ever been detected of him.
          Given the great feat he has made in religious and people’s spiritual life, he came under pressure by Nigerian parents to save their children from  the Nigerian educational system that was at the very verge of collapsing. Hence, his establishment of various government’s approved educational institutions of different degrees under the watchful eye of both the Church and the government.
 Consequently, Fr. Edeh has received myriads of Local and foreign awards in relation to the debut he has made in rebuilding the education system in Nigeria.
          Prominent among these numerous awards are; the September 11th award as “The Pillar of Education in Nigeria” by the Nigerian Union of Journalists, the 2001 and 2003 honour as ‘the outstanding people of the 21th century” by the international Biography Centre, Cambridge, England. This is documented in the Leading Intellectuals of the world (3rd Edition, Published in 2004). It is on the bases of his contribution to the growth of this country that the late President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, President Omaru Musa Yaradua bestowed on him the title Officer of the Federal Republic (OFR)
 Sequel to this, for a 2nd year University drop-out to write and accuse such a well respected person of fraud and theft is to down-play the intelligence and credibility of the various bodies that supervise and recognize his activities and it is on this ground that we call on every responsible person to take such post as one of those prices that great men pay in their life time. Mandela suffered it, Martin Luther King Junior suffered it, Mahatma Ghandi suffered and so is the story of every other world figure. Fr. Edeh cannot be an exception.
          In sum, Fr. Edeh should be further encouraged and motivated to enable him endure and contain the various unsubstantial criticisms that have trailed him on the account of his refusal to compromise his dignity in running the various educational institutions.
While he himself has refused to be discouraged on the ground of these baseless blackmails, we who have taken our time to explore all his activities stand to say without fear of any contradiction that all the accusations are false, unreliable and misleading and therefore should be discarded by the general public.

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