The General Superintendent of Holy Spirit Mission (The Happy Family Church) and founding chairman of the Financial Accountability Commission of the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, Bishop Charles Ighele speak with Adeola Ogunlade on the role the church played in the emergence of President Tinubu and how the administration can make Nigeria great again. Excerpts.
There is a seeming silence among church leaders since the assumption of President Bola Tinubu. Why?
Some people are saying that the Church has been silent since Tinubu became president. Some are also saying that the Church has been silenced by Tinubu’s victory. Those holding these views are completely wrong. Very, very wrong.
It is common knowledge that before, and during elections in Nigeria, the Church, religious groups, pressure groups, political parties and all those seeking political relevance can become very active in the political space. But when elections are over, the voices of these groups are hardly heard.
Instead of the political parties that lost elections to organize, and form shadow cabinets that will keep the ruling party on the right track, they go into hibernation until the next elections.
So, you can see that it is a general culture of silence. The judiciary becomes the centre of the news.
The Church is therefore not silent neither has the Church been silenced.
It is believed in certain quarters that the Church supported a particular candidate during the last presidential elections. What do you have to say about this?
I did not attend any meeting where it was nationally decided that the Church should vote for a particular presidential candidate. Even in 2015 when a notable pastor of the internationally known Redeemed Christian Church of God (Professor Yemi Osinbajo) was nominated by the APC to be Buhari’s vice presidential running mate, there was no meeting I attended where the Church decided that he should be supported.
Most Church leaders were of the view that the national Church going into national politics will polarise the church and make it a punching bag for people who have no fear of God. Many Church leaders did not want the Church drawn into dirty political waters.
But almost all prominent Church leaders welcomed Peter Obi of the Labour Party into their churches and openly campaigned for him.
No. Very few did so and they are entitled to their views. It is supposed to be a democracy, isn’t it? Different churches voted for different candidates. For example, the vice president running for Kwankwanso is a bishop. He certainly did not campaign for Peter Obi. I personally know of at least one bishop in Lagos who supported Kwankwanso because of Kwankwanso’s choice of running mate.
From what the present chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Borno State Chapter Bishop Mohammed Naga (who was a one-time Borno State PFN chairman) told me, I could not see how Borno State CAN and PFN could have voted for Peter Obi or Atiku.
He told me that when the present Vice President Shetima, was the governor of Borno State, he was of help to the churches in Borno State that were destroyed by Boko Haram. The bishop said that Shetima did a lot to help the churches regain their lost grounds in Borno State.
Some churches supported Atiku not just because he picked Okowa, a Christian to be his running mate, but also because they saw that if Atiku could employ Christians and Americans as part of his workers at his university in Yola, he is not likely to Islamise Nigeria if he became president.
There were also many other Christians who supported Bola Tinubu. Their reason is that if in eight years as governor of Lagos State, he did not do any notable thing to Islamise Lagos, he is not likely to Islamise Nigeria.
He did not even Islamise his wife. He allowed her to be ordained as a pastor in the Redeemed Christian Church of God many years ago. Coupled with the fact that Lagos State has produced two Muslim governors and two Christian governors under the political umbrella of Tinubu from 1999 till date, made some Christian leaders think that he is religiously tolerant. Those who supported Peter Obi were very loud about it but those who supported other parties were silent but quietly and effectively pursued their goals.
But CAN and PFN were openly against Tinubu…
They were against the Muslim- Muslim ticket and never against Tinubu, and the Church will continue to be against the Muslim-Muslim ticket. Personally, I am of the view that Tinubu will never want to Islamise Nigeria because he sees religion as more of a personal thing that should not be forced on any person. But my concern and the concern of many Christians is what will happen after Tinubu’s tenure. If APC could not pick a Christian running mate from the North, it is very certain that they will not pick a Christian presidential candidate from the North when Tinubu’s tenure is over. Now, if they pick their presidential candidate from the North what will be the religious stand of such a man? That is the concern of some of us now.
Would the Church have wanted Tinubu to pick his running mate from the Christian community in the north?
Yes. But there are also some politically literate Church leaders who, deeply in their hearts, know that for Tinubu to win, he needed a Muslim running mate from the North.
Personally, I will never support a Muslim- Muslim ticket but I also know that politics is not a Sunday school class. It is about using any legitimate means to get power. Some are therefore not angry with Tinubu for a Muslim- Muslim ticket.
But Christians in Lagos State voted against Tinubu. They voted for Peter Obi. How can you explain that?
Let me tell you this. Some Lagos-based election monitors who are Yorubas told me that younger Yorubas in Lagos voted for Peter Obi while a majority of the older Yorubas voted for Tinubu because he is Yoruba. The younger Ibo people voted for Peter Obi while the older Ibo people voted for Peter Obi because he is Ibo.
Remember that in Okowa’s own state of Delta, Peter Obi’s popularity swept over the terrain despite the fact that he was a vice presidential candidate. Peter Obi appealed more to the younger people, such that many who would not have wanted to vote came out to vote for the first time in their lives.
The huge number of the younger people who voted outnumbered the political structure of Tinubu and many other top politicians. What happened to Tinubu in Lagos happened in many parts of the country. It was a political tsunami which any wise politician should not ignore.
What should Tinubu do concerning these young people?
In their heart of hearts, younger people do not want to Jakpa. They do not want to make a living in other nations. They want the quality of primary schools, secondary schools, universities and other tertiary institutions in Nigeria to be of the same quality that our political leaders send their children abroad.
They also want to attend such schools and have access to such health care here. They want the poor to be alive. They want to be of value in the national and international labour market and not to be “hewers of wood and drawers of water ” at home and abroad.
They want free quality education at the primary and secondary school levels and access to funding for higher education.
The younger people want the middle class restored to its pride of place. Today, a medical officer or lawyer can only manage to stay in a one-room apartment in Lagos. The middle class has no access to car loans and a better life. Crime seems to pay better. Even if the system enriches the lawless, let it also enrich the law-abiding people. Let them know that they can have a good life after acquiring quality education or skills.
Let them have hope as we had hope when we were youths when we looked on having our personal brand new cars six months after graduating from university and living in averagely decent neighbourhoods.
Tinubu should give them hope. He should give them their life. He should win them over, if not something worse than ENDSARS will take place.
When the Peasants Revolt took place in England hundreds of years ago, it was quelled just as ENDSARS was quelled. But the ruling English monarchy was wise enough to start a reformation process that gave birth to the England of today in terms of political, educational, economic, land, financial, welfare and all changes.
For me, the four factors that determine the wealth of nations are access to land by all, access to capital by all, access to be part of high-quality labour force by all, and access to the entrepreneurial class by all, should be the goal of this government and all governments whether headed by a Christian president or a Muslim president.
As to whether the mainstream church as represented by CAN and PFN will cooperate with Tinubu in building a better Nigeria?
The Bible tells us to seek the peace of wherever we are living. CAN will cooperate. PFN under the past president, Dr Felix Omobude did not declare war on Buhari. The current president of PFN, Bishop Wale Oke will certainly not declare war on President Bola Tinubu.
The Nigerian mainstream church should cooperate with presidents that do not declare war against the church and I do not see Bola Tinubu declaring war against the church when he has not declared war against his wife and the Lagos State governor who is a Christian.
Once the president has the interest of Nigeria and the church at heart, the mainstream Church will make sure that there is a religious tension-free atmosphere for him to make Nigeria better.
As to whether he will succeed as president, I think he can succeed if he decides to be in charge of his government and does not also allow his mind to be swayed against enemies or perceived enemies. Instead of fighting enemies the way Robert Mugabe fought his white-coloured enemies and became globally unpopular, he should try to win over or peacefully tolerate them the way Nelson Mandela gained global applause by the way he loved and treated the very white-coloured people who unjustly imprisoned him. Little men are vindictive. Great men are not vindictive. Under Buhari, the forces of centrifugalism were literally unleashed on Nigeria to the extent that Nigeria became more disunited since the end of the civil war. His appointments disunited Nigeria. His utterances disunited Nigeria. His economic policies further pauperized Nigerians to the point of transferring the aggression to fight themselves. Nigerians having been traumatized into frustration and attendant unreasonable ag
