Bishop Charles Ighele is the General Superintendent of Holy Spirit Mission Church (aka Happy Family Centre), the church has been in existence since 1974 with over 80 branches; Charles and his wife, Carole are Marriage and Family Intimacy TV Pastors bringing happiness to families across the globe. In this interview with SUCCESS DAMIAN in Egbeda Lagos, he speaks truth to power, extensively x-raying the Moslem/Moslem Ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and passing a verdict that he finds it suffocating. Excerpts:
Your view on Moslem/Moslem ticket by the All Progressives Congress (APC)
I don’t think I and some my colleagues have anything against Bola Ahmed Tinubu, personally I have nothing against him, I know the time he was governor of Lagos State, that time I was still in Benin State before I move to Lagos, when he took over from Colonel Buba Marwa, and Marwa was quite charismatic, he was popular. When Tinubu now took over as Governor of Lagos State, for the first year there was some criticisms, he was not performing well, now he rejigged, and I said on my pulpit in Benin City, I said watch out for this man, he is a strategist. This man will go somewhere high, he is a planner; so that was my impression of him. So I see him do all these I am not surprised. I told my church then, he would go somewhere, not as a prophecy but by seeing how was trying to see how to get Lagos on a developmental process, which I like.
So it is not about Asiwaju Bola Tinubu but my concern is this, and this is what is disturbing me seriously. Now if he wins as president and he serves for two terms of eight years, which means under a Moslem/Moslem ticket, when it now gets back to North, another eight years, they will give it to another northerner, another Moslem/ Moslem will surely have it, and it is quite suffocating. During MKO Abiola; myself and my wife were enthusiastic, we queued up and voted for him, so my concern is what I told you right now. It is suffocating. Is it that there is no competent Christian, but now Buhari eight years, if Tinubu wins Eight years, thatb16 years, and then it goes North again , eight years, that means 24 years, haba! It is suffocating, so that is really my concern.
What is CAN doing to ensure that Christians participate in the forthcoming election?
When Buhari won in the last election, one of the papers interviewed me, the way they placed it, it was two pages, so they said this is the worst election in Nigeria’s history, then one other general, whether Shagaya or so, say this is the best election Nigeria in Nigeria’s history. What I meant was this, in terms of religious content, the election was free and fair, it reflected the will of the people, yes there was rigging here and there, this was the 2015 election that brought Buhari to power, so I like to be as honest as possible, though I didn’t vote for him, my brother Professor Osinbajo, my Christian brother was there but I didn’t vote for because I saw what was going to happen, and leaders of the church in this country they know my stand on that and why I took that stand. And now I am being justified, yes I saw it coming. So the election was generally free and fair. But my religious content was huge, the president then would go to churches, go to crusades and address people and then the Moslems would do their own quietly in the Mosques, and I said this is dangerous, and now it has become more dangerous; Christians brother versus Moslem brother, it has become more dangerous. We have never been as divided as we are right now along religious line. And Northern Moslems, people like Babachair, Dogara, I mean people like Saduana of Sokoto, the premier of the Northern Region, in those days, he tried to how he would bring out one north with the ethnic groups, the people in Southern Kaduna were not being killed, now all that is no more, no more. I really find it shameful to say Christians do this, Moslems do this, but I see that we are in a country where the forces of centripetalism should be at work than those of centrifugalism, we should see how we unite our people; they should not use religion to destroy our people. All our best books I have today is the book written by Emir of Dubai on Development. Development know no religion, the Emir of Dubai has developed Dubai, I like to read about development as a preacher. And when I read that book, my God my vision!
You see at a stage one begins to feel oppressed, and I have never been like this before. This President, this president, this particular President, Muhammadu Buhari, he brought religion to a level, ethnicity to a level, sectionalism to a level, that it is almost destroying the nation, I hold him responsible, he is to be held responsible for anything, because you know, you have followers and these followers they are afraid to talk to you. You know the story of a king who danced naked, yes sir, yes sir, you gas, you gas, the people say yes sir, this your gas can make good perfume, put it in a bottle, sycophants everywhere, but you have to stand as a leader. He has failed woefully. I have no apology about it at all. You see people under him dancing to the bad music he has produced, because there must always be a party. In a party you prepare all the food, isn’t it? Then the music is not okay, people will still dance, he has produced bad music, and good people and bad people are dancing to the bad music.
In the light of the recent attacks in the land, what steps do you think Nigerians should take to protect themselves?
In the Hobbesian world, we talk about society of those days as the state of nature where life was short, brutish and nasty, which we call the Hobbesian state of nature, we have come to that stage. And when things go like that, the national security adviser is telling us to be security conscious, telling us to secure Abuja, so that Abuja does not fall, O God! Where are we? My advice is this, yes we should be security conscious. We are security conscious and then 100 people on bike with guns come to your village, how can you fight back, how can you fight back? We have security forces, many from the army, police, civil defence, 800,000 to 1million armed people in this country, where are they? I can’t blame them, because they are not motivated. The bandits are not more than 100, 000 and our forces are over a million combined, including immigration, customs and the rest who are normally armed. I say sometime age when they say change the service chiefs, I said, well, I have no objection, I said but if you bring American service chiefs to come and be in charge with that kind of leadership we have, things will be the same. Our soldiers are not motivated to fight, the love for their father land is not put in them. Tobi Amusan who won gold some days ago, I mean, I was saying it is her effort. Then when Chioma Ajunwa who won Gold in Long Jump years ago, when they interviewed her, how do you feel over Tobi Amusan, she said that girl she has been suffering, and then she found her way, she is on scholarship in US, our top athletes are there in American Universities, they struggle, then after honour to the nation, you come out to say, our girl, which girl? She is not your girl.
Now for you to go and fight and die you must be motivated, how can I go to fight against a superior weapon, when billions on Naira that was voted to buy weapon. El Rufai has been saying they know where these Boko Haram are, they know where they are, so a leader, a president, a president of a whole country, who enjoys being in power alone, feeling good about being in power, and using power to do good for the common man, no, so that is where the problem is. When Obasanjo was there, the security forces were dealt a blow at Odi and Zaki Biam in Benue State, when Obasanjo descended on them, I am not saying he did it well, he over reacted, but let me tell you, they kept quiet. What are you telling me?
There is this insinuation that the 9th Assembly under Lawan is an appendage of the executive, juxtapose it against the purported plan to impeach the president, what is your thought on this?
I want us to talk about the senate president himself. You see from nowhere, when they were fighting for APC ticket, from nowhere he entered the race, and you could see those behind him, they were the candidates of the APC national Chairman, Adamu Abdullahi, now Adamu Abdullahi was put there by the president, so I said, eh, this must be Buhari’s candidate. So all things being equal he may pick the ticket, now before the governors rose against him, before his fellow Northern rulers would rise up and say not you, then there must be something about him as far as leadership is concern. There is more than we know about the man’s leadership ability. They rose up and they met Buhari and said no way, at that time things got scattered. It was that time they began to think democratically. They were forced to think democratically, and now Asiwaju clinched the ticket with a huge gap.
What I am saying is that a man like the senate president, there is something about him that smells of like of competence, that is why his fellow Northerners said you can’t be president. Now that also is what is coming out right now in the senate. They met in in executive session, in close door session; all senators across party line and said they are going to give him six weeks ultimatum, after that impeach. And then Senate President, I don’t know if he got phone call from somewhere, I don’t know, I am saying there is something and then all other things followed. So I am saying there is something, why would you agree with your fellow senators over what you gonna do and then within two minutes you backslide. You see I like a vibrant senate, when they were there. When Tinubu and his group were there as vibrant opposition I liked it, there should be an opposition, there should be because the masses have been pauperized, dehumanized, they can’t talk again, just give me food and then I will vote for you, but if there is a section of the elite that can criticize, let them talk, like Lord Acton said power corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Under Obasanjo, under Jonathan, the civil society was active, opposition active, politicians active, but when these group came in all these were swallowed; no one talks again. You see how Bukola Saraki Senate tackled Buhari in his first tenure, look at Tambuwal under Jonathan, Obasanjo was served with impeachment notice, isn’t it; he was threatened by PDP. So that is how democracy should be. Politics is not a church, it is not Sunday school; there should be opposition, vibrant one. But this senate has failed to provide vibrant opposition, and I weep for this country.
From the way things are going, is Nigeria a failed country?
Is like asking is a man who has full blown AIDS sick? He has gone above the level of HIV, full blown AIDS on his death bed, whether he is sick. It is like that. Look at the parameters of a failed state. We met all of them. Look at the security, my God, and I say this is one of the worst nations to live on earth. Security, one of the worst. Now look at economy, when I was to buy my first car in the 80s Renaut brand new, N7200, Mecedez Benz car, the price went up to N24,000 for brand new Mezdez Benz car, people were crying, I mean, you go to the US, you do that with a N1000 return ticket, the Naira has completely lost its value, just like the Dutch Mark after the First World War. So in terms of economic development, nothing to write home about, price of foodstuff, nothing to write about, the poor to survive, the poor are going out, many are dying of poverty. As a pastor I know what we are passing through, a lot of our resources go to taking care of the poor. Now that is the economy.
Survival, Unemployment is anyhow. Infrastructure, name them, I am saying that it is a completely failed state. Completely failed state, yes there is some pockets of what you may call development, but what is development, that is another definition entirely, there may be one or two shining light, from perhaps one or two state governments, but I am talking about this federal government and the day, I have said that the day this president will hand over power, that day, whoever wins is not even my concern, that day I will throw a party. I have said it long ago. That is how serious it is, I will throw a party. So, it is a failed state.
In the face of what is happening in the country, do you think it is time for a revolution in this country?
When you talk of revolution, you find out that in Nigeria, they bring religion and ethnic factor to divide the youth. You see, it always comes in. It is what I call DART, divide and rule tactics. So to have that kind of revolution in Nigeria, you see we are socialized by the elites, but like the EndSARS protest that took place, it is something. Now in England of those days, 16 something England, when the people were being pauperized by the ruling elites, the peasants, the poor were really dealt with. Then at a stage some of them came up and revolted, and in that revolt they were almost driving away the leaders from London. Then when the government rose up, the leader was caught and was executed. But now the people say eh, so we can even revolt, before that they didn’t know they even have power to revolt. So after that pockets of revolt started coming up, then government became so sensitive, started responding to their needs. So the reform you see in England today of children without money being able to go to school were because of previous revolts of those days. The government was sensitive, but we have a government here, the EndSARS was a message, but since EndSARS things have not improved at all. A government thinks, when people rise up the way of the EndSARS period will say, what are they saying? Even if they went about it the way you don’t like.
I said wait for Buhari, he never does anything wrong, he is the messiah, he sees himself as the messiah. Can Jesus do something wrong before Peter, Can he? Can Peter teach Jesus? Can Matthew teach Jesus, no, so he is the real messiah, he sees himself as the messiah. So that is where we are right now. He is not a messiah, he is a fellow Nigerian like you and I, I have to believe as such and he has these few months to change, because I have said that this man cannot change, right from the first term, I said watch out, the few thousands of people that we can influence to vote in our ministry, I said vote this way, even if we don’t win, vote this way. This is a government that has put many governors in trouble, but they can’t talk, when you talk they see you as an enemy. I know there many governors in his party who at all don’t like what he is doing, they can’t talk, but for the sake of political unity and not to hurt their interests, but they know in their heart, the governors I see here are by far more intelligent than him, every governor in this country right now can run this country better Buhari, I tell you that, every minister can run the country better than Buhari. We are in trouble, greater trouble, unless he wakes up this remaining period that is left for him.
