Tony Osauzo and Ighomuaye Lucky, Benin
It is an irony that in Nigeria so many government operatives have often failed to utilise resources available to provide for the greatest good of the populace.
Despite huge yearly budgetary provisions, it is common to find increasing poverty and reports of how some government officials have stolen money meant to solve citizens’ problems.
Confronted by government’s inability to meet the people’s needs, many public-spirited persons across the country are stepping out with their personal finances to provide social amenities for the people.
One of such persons is the founder of Believers’ Love World (aka Christ Embassy), Pastor Chris Oyakhilome, who recently donated the Faculty of Engineering building to Benson Idahosa University (BIU), Benin, Edo State, worth a N 1 billion, in appreciation of how the late founder of Church of God Mission, Archbishop Benson Idahosa, influenced him and shaped his life.
It was a show of gratitude such as the Holy Bible related when Jesus Christ healed 10 lepers and only one leper returned to Jesus to show gratitude and, as the Bible records, Jesus asked: “I healed 10, where are the remaining nine?”
At the inauguration of the building, Oyakhilome related his experience with the late Archbishop Idahosa, and how he remembers him 22 years after.
“I am very grateful. I didn’t think I was doing something other than expressing my appreciation.
“When I got into the university, I was taking the opportunity to say thank you. I am one grateful person and I am also learning. I am just a grateful person, grateful for many things.
“Firstly, for what the Archbishop Benson Idahosa was to me. I heard Bishop Feb, I call him Feb but you just heard the meaning of Feb but when he was talking of legacy, my thought was, when I was coming here, I thought about the legacy of the Archbishop.
“I aways have on my mind, I am his legacy, you are his legacy, this is our campus. Did you get it? It is our campus. It is the campus of the legacy of the Archbishop Benson Idahosa.
“We are his fruits. I count myself highly honoured to have been given the opportunity to be here.
“Two days from now, it will be 22 years since he transited from here. On that day when it happened, Reverend Tom was in Benin when he called me on phone, he said pastor, there is something on the screen and I don’t know what it is talking about.
“I asked, what is it? He said they are announcing that the Archbishop has passed on. He said I don’t understand what they are saying, but I understood.
“I understood because he told me. He invited me. He said to me, before the 14th of March, it was December, and he called and said Joy, and he said to her, where is your card? She came out with the card, he wrote something on it, he said again to me, remember before the 14th of March, I said, yes sir.
“Then I thought does he know why he sent for me? Because he sent. I was thinking does he know why he sent for me? He said follow me and I followed him.
“He took me round then he kept saying just for your inspiration and I followed him. We went around and came back.
“We sat down. He talked about what he was doing about the university. He held a picture, a large picture, and when he was done talking about the university and a few other things, he said, kneel down, let me pray for you.
“So, I went on my kneels. I knew that was the reason he sent for me because, years before, the Lord had told me what he was going to do on me but the particular occasion, he would call for me and he would do this.
“I didn’t know when but while I was there, he said, kneel down, let me pray for you. He laid hands on me and spoke words of the spirit.
“Now, it may interest you to know that two years before then, I was at a stage in my life, a young preacher, just going into the ministry, thinking because I don’t just really have any ministers who would take personal interest.
“It is one of the things that young ministers face, when you don’t have anybody who takes personal interest in you, to want to mentor you, but I had to learn from the archbishop.
“I was thinking, what do I do. So, I began to write down the names of the ministers I thought to contact. I had three names. The first one was the Archbishop Benson Idahosa and I had the other two. When I was thinking of how can I contact them? A voice spoke, three feet above my head and said don’t contact them. I will get them to contact you.
“It was a short while after that I got a message that the Archbishop wanted to see me. This was contact number one. Then I wanted to be very sure that he wanted to see me.
“I sent Reverend Tom. I said go and see the Archbishop because I got a message that he wanted to see me. Is it true? Reverend Tom went and the Archbishop said certainly. That was how I went to see him.
“Prior to that time, when I was a young teenager, I worked at the office known as the national office, Church of God Mission. Then, I used to see Feb, Freda and the other two girls, with a Toyota car, picked them from school. I was there, just a young boy.
“Mama just sat every day in that office. I would be at the lounge, looking at the pictures, large pictures of miracles, wonders and signs. I would stare and stare because I could see in my Bible the miracles but you see I only used imagination, now the archbishop had the pictures and I could see the pictures.
“His crusades, the videos from his crusades were amazing but beyond all of that was what the archbishop meant to me because I am a good learner, that is important. I know how to learn but I want to tell you, I wrote down some words just for you to understand where I am coming from.
“You know, my dad passed on before now, amazing gentleman, he preached the gospel too. My mother was amazing.
“They brought us up very well but when you talked about the ministry, there was nowhere to look but the Archbishop.
“As a minister of the gospel, the Archbishop taught us, taught me the word, he taught us worship and praises.
“We didn’t know that anywhere else. I was growing up in the church, and the first day I entered the Church of God Mission on a Sunday morning, I thought I had raptured.
“I thought I was in heaven. I am serious. It was completely different from where I was coming from. Just to understand, the choir did not have instrument in the church while growing up, only the microphone and the choir sang and we were good in clapping”, Oyakhilome said.
He added: “Idahosa had always told us to support the poor and the government, he said this knowing that the government was not poor. He taught us how to give. We are the legacy of his ministry, life, work and message, we are taking this message everywhere.”
He, therefore, appealed to everyone to key into the legacy of the late archbishop by contributing to actualise his dream university, adding: “It is our university, a university that we all need, and we just do what we have to do to have it.”
In her comments, BIU chancellor and wife of the late Archbishop, Archbishop Margaret Idahosa, said she never doubted the actualization of the university, even when some people expressed fears that it would be a tall dream after the demise of the founder.
“Nobody ever thought that BIU would be a reality. I thank God for people like Chris Oyakhilome and others who have made this dream a reality,” she said.
Also, the president of the university, Bishop Feb Idahosa, said BIU remains a legacy that was built by all, including the students and the likes of Oyakhilome.
“It is not a one-man show, it is only a vision that was built by a community. We are all part of the success story of the legacy,” he said.