By Enyeribe Ejiogu
Presiding Bishop and General Overseer of the Calvary Kingdom Church International, Archbishop Joseph Imariabe Ojo, has urged Nigerians not to lose hope in the face of the challenging situation confronting the country as the 2019 begins to run. Rather, people should hold firmly to their PVCs, and use their votes to define the future they want for themselves and the country. In this interview, Ojo, one of the respected leaders of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), speaks on vital national issues.
What did God lay in your heart regarding Nigeria?
The Lord spoke to us that 2019 shall be a year of overwhelming glory for the ministry and for us as a people. For us in the nation, it shall be a year of great faith in what God can do. We just have to urge people to have faith in God. Not in the economy, because man has failed us, both past and present administrations. The economy is nose-diving daily. Nigerians need to be courageous enough to admit that the economy is in shambles. We believe that in this year, God will make things better for us. As a nation, I am trusting that because God is on the throne, His will be done in the forthcoming election. We want the man who God will use to get us out of the bad situation. A man who will put this country in the right perspective. We don’t want people who will just promise us what they will do for us. We want people who tell us what they have done and we can verify. We want verifiable promises, not those made on air but never fulfilled. My desire is that the average Nigerian will have faith in God this year; look up to God and not man, because none of the political parties is exempted. You have people who are just poachers, grabbers and opportunists in the government. If you hold them by their promises, it is like you are holding unto a razorblade. It will definitely injure you. So it is only God that can help us and He will definitely help us this year and remove those things that will not give us peace. In 2019, the nation will have overwhelming glory.
What would you advise members of the church to do, bearing in mind that this is an election year?
I have been telling members of my church that first they should obtain and guard their permanent voters card (PVC) and keep it ready. Secondly, they should not sell their PVC. Rather, they should go to the polling booth on election and vote according to their conscience. If they are convinced that the governments in power at the federal level and in Lagos State have cushioned their pains and suffering enough and they want to continue to support either of them, they should vote for the party at the federal level. They are in the best position to make up their minds because they know what they are passing through. If the present administration in Lagos State has done enough to warrant retaining the reins of governance, please vote for the party that produced the administration. But if you think that there is another person that can do better and you are convinced about this, then vote for that person. I have always urged my members to make a free will decision. That has been my counsel to them. Don’t vote on the basis of the party, please vote for credible individuals, not parties. A good and credible person may belong to a party that is not too well known or popular. That is how God will bring about the real change we want. God can put it in your heart to support a particular person, even though the person is not in a popular party. That is what I have been saying to people, I have never believed in parties. I am not partisan in my decisions, I focus more on individuals. For instance, when Babatunde Fashola was the governor of Lagos State, he put a billboard very close to our church premises, when the Lagos Badagry Road was in terrible state (but not as bad as it is now), which said, “This is a federal road, please bear with us.” The notice was intended to embarrass the Peoples Democratic Party, which was in control of the federal government at the time. He had my respect and I used to call him ‘Fashionable Fashola’ and he did creditably well as governor. Everybody knew that he was the expression of God’s time to do good to Lagosians. Today, both Lagos State and the Federal Government belong to the same party. The road is worse now when Fashola is the Minister of Works under APC and the billboard has been removed. What this tells me is that Fashola has not shown integrity over the issue of the Lagos-Badagry road, which he tried to blame the past administration when he was governor of Lagos State under APC. Clearly, he did not speak from the sincerity of his heart when put up those billboards at various sections of the Lagos-Badagry road. He was just trying to play politics with the condition of the road when PDP was in charge of the federal government. Now that APC is in control at the centre, Lagos Badagry road is in worse condition. It can take you about four hours to get to Badagry from Mile 2. I am not joking about what I just said. We are at Kilometre 24 on the Lagos-Badagry road. It can take about two hours to get to Mile 2. Sometimes it can be more. The journey from Mile 2 to Badagry should not be more than one hour. This is because of the horrible condition of the road. Hoodlums now have a field day robbing motorists trapped in the gridlock that often happens on the road. You are helpless because there is no police presence. You have both the federal and state governments belonging to APC yet people in this axis of the state are going through excruciating pain on the Lagos-Badagry road. Really, Fashola has disappointed Lagosians over the Lagos-Badagry road. The suffering is too much.
This brings me to the APC manifesto published in 2014/2015. The party itemised 41 major things it promised to do for Nigerians, from constitutional and electoral law amendments to economic, social and educational reforms. How do you feel about those promises today?
Of course none of the promises have been fulfilled. So when I hear these people begin to claim that those things have been done and they have fulfilled all the promises, I just wonder whether they believe that they are talking to illiterates or robots; they are not talking to people that see the way things are or feel the pain of the abject poverty in the land. My hope is that people will be wise enough when they go into the polling booth to cast their votes. Their decision and whoever they vote for will determine the fate of the nation. And that is if the election is free and fair.
Do you have any fears about the election being free and fair? If so, why?
Ehhhh…The reason is that during the Ekiti and Osun governorship elections there were reports of rigging, vote-buying, vote-suppression and outright ballot box snatching and manipulation of figures at the collation centres. It was just that some people felt it was best to let sleeping dogs lie. If this tendency is not stopped, there will be chaos during the 2019 election. We are praying and trusting God for a good outcome. We are also hoping that the officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, would be patriotic and rise above sectional and partisan considerations, to ensure that the forthcoming general election would be free and fair. If they have not sold their conscience, they can make us really happy with the outcome of the election. I am consoled by what God said in the bible, when he told Elijah that there were still prophets who had not bowed down to Baal. Today the modern Baal is money. People bow down to money, even some pastors, who go to the Government House, to bow to Baal (money) and promise that they would mobilise their members to vote for this or that governor.
President Muhammadu Buhari has consistently promised that the election would be free and fair. But he refused four times to sign the Electoral Act (Amendment) Bill passed by the National Assembly. What impression did you get from that regarding his avowed commitment to free and fair elections?
The clear feeling I get from the various news reports and everything I have observed is that President is not in-charge of his administration. He has good intentions but the implementation is not in sync with what he says in public, whether in Nigeria and outside the country. The reason is that there are bad people around him who have an agenda that is completely different from his and strive to implement what the President never, never thought about. And they do so in his name. Between the ‘thinker’ and the ‘implementer’ that is where the problem lies. Buhari has good intentions but there are hawks around him who do not want us to have free and fair elections.
Are you suggesting that the so-called cabal is orchestrating these things?
In some sense yes. But there are very influential people outside the government, but who have unhindered access to people in Aso Rock. They are the ones pulling strings and determining things, initiating, motivating and coordinating these things from outside. They are the people spinning the spider web. They are not in Aso Rock, but they have bad influence and access. They can do anything. They are the external cabal working with the internal cabal.
Recently, a social media post went viral on the renewed quest for restructuring of the country. The particular case of Sokoto State was compared with Lagos. In 1976, Sokoto had 20 local government areas just like Lagos. But today, the old Sokoto has been divided into 83 LGAs comprising Sokoto, Kebbi, Zamfara and Niger states while Lagos remained with its original 20 LGAs listed in the 1979/1999 constitutions. Do you think that restructuring is feasible, given the realities on the ground?
The clamour for restructuring will not go down until it is done. It will require a man who has the political will to confront the challenge and see it through. When it is done there will be peace in Nigeria. Let us not talk about Sokoto and Lagos. Let us look at the old Midwest where I come from. It was the fourth constitutional region in the first republic along with the Northern, Western and Eastern regions. Whereas the other regions have been broken into different states, the old Midwest Region was divided into just two states (Edo and Delta). That is clear marginalization. Meanwhile the old Northern Region was divided into 19 states. We have the oil that feeds and sustains the whole country, but we remain marginalised. People should stop talking about Lagos being marginalised, they should talk about the old Midwest Region which still has just two states. Our case is like what you have in the book, Animal Farm, written by George Orwell (“all animals are equal but some are more equal than others”). We have been shortchanged. We have been marginalised because we are the minority. But the situation will not remain like this because one with God is the majority. The injustice is unacceptable. That is why I wholeheartedly support restructuring of the country. I am a staunch advocate of restructuring.