THE MANIPULATION OF RELIGION IN NIGERIAN ELECTIONS: SEE DOCUMENT THAT IS BEING CIRCULATED
Samuel Zalanga
Before You Campaign or Vote for Buhari … THINK AGAIN!!!
BACKGROUND
Once again, as it so often happens in Nigeria’s history, our country is at the
cross-roads. A country that seems permanently located on the precipice, waiting
for just about anything to tip it over, has come to the third episode in its
history that threatens to shake it to its very foundations. Coming after the
bitter 30-month Civil War and the June 12 saga, Nigeria has again sleep-walked
itself into a most dreaded election year that will determine whether this
nation will stand to fulfil destiny or miscarry its glorious prognosis. If 2014
was the centenary of our amalgamation, 2015 is the year that will determine IF
Nigeria will stand and WHAT it will become by 2115. But of far greater significance
than our political growth (or gains) and our socio-economic development as a
polity is the fate of the Church for which Christ died on the Cross over 2,000
years ago.
Two incidents that underscore the present danger in our country happened during
the last week of December 2014. The first happened almost unnoticed but the
second raised all hell and has come to underline what may inform the pattern of
voting in the coming election (along religious lines).
First, on 29 December 2014, most newspapers in the country reported that Saudi
Arabia refused to grant flight permit for Nigerian arms procured from Pakistan
to fight Boko Haram (see http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/-s-arabia-refuses-to-grant-flight-permit-for-nigerian-arms-procured-from-pakistan/197883/).
If anyone thinks this was an isolated case without any consequence, it should
also be remembered that on 17 October 2014, barely two months before this
incident, the nation’s newspapers gleefully reported that Nigeria was
negotiating a ceasefire and the release of the Chibok girls with Boko Haram in
Saudi Arabia (see http://www.punchng.com/news/boko-haram-negotiating-cease-fire-release-of-abducted-girls/).
Most Nigerians didn’t query why the negotiation was taking place in Saudi Arabia;
they only wanted peace to return but, of course, the negotiation failed. We
blamed the government and never really found out why the parties could not
agree after going all the way to Saudi Arabia.
Recall, also, that two years before this, precisely on 2 November 2012, the
Boko Haram commanders had given their conditions for peace to return to the
country. Among these conditions was compensation for families of its members
killed in the course of its terrorist acts, the rebuilding of its mosques by the
Federal Government and the release of all its members in the custody of
security agencies. Furthermore, Boko Haram proposed a peace negotiation in
Saudi Arabia and proceeded to pick its own representatives (all Muslim
Nigerians). The terrorists even went further to pick those Nigerians that would
represent the Federal Government in the Saudi negotiations. They were all
Muslims, and the list included General Muhammadu Buhari (see http://www.punchng.com/news/boko-haram-wants-talks/).
So Boko Haram wanted Muslims to negotiate with Muslims in Saudi Arabia on the
terms of its ceasefire with Nigeria, and Buhari was their man, the one they
could trust to represent Nigeria on such matters.
It follows from the foregoing that Saudi Arabia is not a disinterested party in
all the goings-on in Nigeria. It is an accomplice. It is an open secret that
final authority on governance and religious affairs in Nigeria are not settled
until they are tabled in Saudi Arabia. So Nigeria is a de facto spiritual
satellite of Saudi Arabia by virtue of secret treaties signed and ratified on
our behalf, unknown to us. In the six years of incessant Boko Haram bloodshed
in Nigeria, Saudi Arabia is not on record to have said anything good or bad
about it. It has never shown any concern. Yet the Boko Haramists chose Riyadh
as the place to negotiate peace with Nigeria. So what is the connection between
Riyadh and Boko Haram that the terrorists would choose Saudi Arabia to
negotiate? Secret support. Covert assistance. Till tomorrow, nobody knows what
precise role Saudi Arabia played at the so-called peace negotiation that
failed. And nobody was told why it failed. But the moment Nigeria succeeded in
procuring weapons from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia suddenly rose up like the
Amalekites of old to deny air passage for the goods purchased. Again, as usual,
no reason was given.
Never forget that it was the same Saudi Arabian haven that Nigeria’s former
President Umar Yar’Adua was kept in near-death state for months while Nigeria
was undergoing a constitutional crisis as a tiny Northern cabal ran their
macabre dance of preventing the non-Muslim Vice-President, Goodluck Jonathan,
from assuming office as President when the former became incapacitated. The
Saudi authorities preferred Nigeria to be “ruled” by a vegetable in its custody
against the will of 167 million Nigerians. Only God knows how long we would
have remained thus captive if America, Saudi Arabia’s stronger ally, had not
intervened.
The second signpost of the danger hanging over the nation happened just two
days after Saudi Arabia refused to grant flight permit for Nigerian arms. On 31
December 2014, The Guardian of London broke the news of how Nigeria abstained
from a crucial UN resolution to grant Palestine an independent state. Nigeria’s
abstention was what tilted the scales against the Palestinian’s hope of a UN
Security Council resolution to force Israel to withdraw from Judea and Samaria
by 2017. This action gored the Arabian world which went wild with accusations
against Nigeria. The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), the Nigeria Supreme
Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) as well as other Islamic groups have
shouted themselves hoarse and they have sharpened their swords, waiting for
President Goodluck Jonathan on Election Day. The Islamic world, the foster
parents of Boko Haram, wanted Nigeria’s President to vote for Palestine against
Israel, the only country that has given Nigeria concrete support in its war
against the terrorists. What would have happened if Nigeria’s President on 31
December 2014 was a Muslim? Nigeria would simply have voted against Israel and
further sabotaged the Boko Haram war. That is what happens everywhere where a
Muslim is in command. They always sabotage Nigeria’s interest to promote the
cause of Islam.
The Palestinian Authority’s representative to the Organization of Islamic
Countries (OIC) said Nigeria’s refusal to vote for Palestine was a “big
disappointment” and a “clear contradiction” of its membership of OIC. He also
said that by its abstention from voting, Nigeria had violated numerous
resolutions passed at the Islamic Organizations’ summits. Question: Do
Nigerians know these “numerous resolutions” passed in OIC which were supposed to
be binding on Nigeria? Does the Church know? Who determined that these
“numerous resolutions” were and are in Nigeria’s national interest as a
sovereign secular state? Also, if Nigeria is a sovereign nation, isn’t it at
liberty to conduct its foreign policy as it deems fit and in its best national
interest without the Arab nations going into a swoon? What this portends is
that Nigeria has been sold on a blind alley to the Arabian world. It means
Nigeria’s secularity has been traded off through the “numerous resolutions” of
OIC and other global Islamic movements.
The Nigeria Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), which did not react to
Saudi Arabia’s blockage of arms delivery to Nigeria, hit the roof the moment
Nigeria withdrew its vote for Palestine. Ishaq Oloyede, a professor of Islamic
Studies and the Secretary-General of the group, accused the Federal government
of acting “against freedom” and abstaining from a “move to end a 66-year-old
crisis”. He said, “What Nigeria has done is not only a summersault on its
foreign policy but also a slap on the lovers of freedom all over the world and
such action is condemnable”. He concluded that “the Nigerian government has
betrayed the people of Nigeria and has created a very, very serious problem for
our foreign policy”
Professor Oloyede’s statement on behalf of NSCIA is a coded message for the
Church to decode for this season, for the coming elections, and for the future
of the Nigerian Church and Nigerian nation. We would probably understand what
he is saying better if we are conversant with the outcome of the OIC Meeting
held in Abuja in 1989, which is now commonly referred to as the “Abuja
Declaration of 1989”. Resolutions at this OIC meeting, as contained in its
original communiqué (not the current disguise now posted on Wikipedia (see http://kingdomnewsng.com/news/
103-beware-abuja-declaration-has-been-edited)) says, among other things, that
the OIC resolved:
• "To ensure [that] only Muslims are elected to all political posts of
member nations".
• "To eradicate in all its forms and ramifications all non-Muslim
religions in member nations (such religions shall include Christianity,
Ahmadiyya and other tribal modes of worship unacceptable to Muslim)." (Christianity
is underlined in the declaration)
• "To ensure the ultimate replacement of all western forms of legal and
judicial systems with the sharia in all member nations before then next
"Islam in Africa conference."
• "To ensure the appointment of only Muslims into strategic national and
international posts of member nations"
On Nigeria, the host of the conference, the OIC communiqué revealed a
little-known secret. It said:
The Joint Conference finally ratified the admission of Nigeria as a full member
of the Organization of the Islamic Conference OIC, and thanked the government
and people of Nigeria for having generously donated US $21 billion to the
Islamic Development Fund of the OIC, and sincerely requested the Federal
Government of Nigeria to implement all policies and programmes of the OIC to
show the whole world that Nigeria is truly an Islamic nation.
These resolutions made nearly three decades ago clarify many things at the same
time. It explains: (i) Why Saudi Arabia has been teleguiding political
governance and Islamic terrorism in Nigeria (by agreeing to host peace deals
between Nigeria and Boko Haram while never officially showing any interest in
the matter shows that it has underground links with terrorism in Nigeria.
Similarly, Pakistani sale of arms to Nigeria is not an indication of support;
it is a mercenary act; they needed the money to fight their own local
terrorisms); (ii) Why the Islamic world was shocked that Nigeria acted
independently and within its sovereign rights to decline to vote in support of
Palestine at the UN Council; (iii) Why the Nigerian Muslims will go to any
length – even at the risk of setting the nation on fire – to install Muslims in
critical leadership positions (presidency, military commands and postings,
defence, transport, petroleum and finance ministries, etc) so as to ensure
Islamic domination of the country. This philosophy has been disseminated to the
lowest levels of society, including who becomes class captain in elementary
schools and universities. Everything is being done deliberately to make Muslims
and Islam dominate Nigeria in conformity with the treaties previous leaders of
the country had signed which pronounced Nigeria an Islamic nation. The world
may officially call Nigeria the Federal Republic of Nigeria, but in Islamic and
OIC circles, it is The Islamic Republic of Nigeria. Read, for example, the 1999
Constitution of Nigeria and see how Islam is generously projected and how
Christianity is totally expunged.
But who was that man that who set this dangerous precedent by officially
smuggling Nigeria into OIC? It was General Muhammadu Buhari, the same man who
now wants your vote to become President and Commander-in-Chief of the Nigeria’s
Armed Forces.
CHALLENGE BEFORE THE CHURCH
It doesn’t require any serious argument to see that the foregoing has serious
implications for the Church. But what is the reaction of the Church to the
state it has found itself.
By nature, the Church will turn to prayer, and we have been praying. Paul
rightly said in 2 Corinthians 10:4 “For the weapons of our warfare are not
carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds”. But what
is the testimony of our prayer?
In 2014 (last year), millions of Nigerians fasted for 100 days, but a few days
after the fast ended, we had an Islamic terrorist bomb blast in Nyanya, Abuja,
in which about 100 people died and 16 luxury buses were burnt. Some of the
victims might have fasted too. First puzzle: What was the national
content of our 100-day prayer and fasting that we still suffered such national
disaster? What was the content of our prayers that terrorism against the church
was not affected at all?
We are fasting again: 70 days in some churches; 40, 21 and 15 days in others.
What are the contents of our prayers again this year? We have evil prognosis
hanging over the nation and the federal only a few weeks away. Politicians have
moved their families away from our midst in preparation for battle – they
either win or kill. Mass killings continue in North East Nigeria by Muslim
jihadists. Many Christians still fast and pray without any mention the coming
elections and the nation’s security. We must pray AND take necessary action,
lest we are swallowed up. Can the 15,000 Boko Haram dead vote in the February
elections? Can the exterminated churches in the North praise The King of Glory?
That is the message. It takes the living (Church) to act before it is too late.
Surprisingly, some who seem to be concerned about the elections are using this
period to not only pray for Muhammadu Buhari to be elected as President, but
are actually campaigning for him even from behind the pulpit.
Going by the declarations in the media these past few months, it is obvious the
Muslims have made up their mind on who to vote for and on what basis (religious).
In particular, the Jigawa Governor, Sule Lamido, has publicly castigated
Buhari of divisive campaigns – of turning round to tell the people in the North
that his contest “is anchored on promoting and guiding their ideological faith
(Islam)” but “harping on the unity of Nigeria” once he is in the South (see http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/lamido-accuses-buhari-of-divisive-campaigns/197882/).
It was not his first time of playing the religious card. In 2003, Buhari
campaigned that “Muslims should only vote those who will promote Islam.”
Unlike the Muslims, Christians are divided on whether or not to vote for
President Jonathan or to vote for Muhammadu Buhari to rule Nigeria till age 80
(he is 72 already). We have heard of a Pastor leading a prayer from the pulpit
that the “the Caliphate rule that is coming this year should favour the
church…” What shame! The man knows that voting for Buhari is voting for the
Caliphate and yet he expects the Caliphate rule to favour the church? Does he
know that the very spirit behind Caliphate rule is antichrist and can NEVER
favour the church? The spirit behind Islam suppresses or destroys the church
everywhere. If anyone didn’t know that before the North East of Nigeria has
demonstrated it clearly.
A newspaper has also reported a very popular pastor of Redeemed Christian
Church of God (RCCG) openly pronouncing a curse from the pulpit on anyone who would
not vote for Buhari. Why? Perhaps because APC has in its serpentine wisdom
chosen an RCCG pastor as Buhari’s spare tyre (running mate). We know that the
utterances of such pastors do not reflect the official position of the RCCG.
Nevertheless, there is a general feeling sweeping across the Christian
community in Nigeria expressing a soft spot for Buhari. Some people do not care
what the facts are. To them, Buhari is the messiah of Nigeria has been waiting
for. Brethren, this is not normal. Have you seen the massive sacrifices being
deposited all over the land in preparation for these elections? Are we certain
that the majority of us have not come under the bewitchment of politicians?
First, we need to point out that a Christian should not reject Buhari just
because he is a Muslim or because he is from Northern Nigeria. A Northerner and
a Muslim has a right to lead the country and we should be ready to vote for
such a person. However, a Christian should either vote for or reject a
candidate based on his known character, competence and history. A Christian who
votes an Islamic fundamentalist in the age of Boko Haram has signed his suicide
note. Period!
Christians should be very discerning and not just cast their votes foolishly
(don’t throw your pearls you-know-where…)! Why do we have to warn Christians
about this coming election? We do so because these are not normal times; we do
so to preserve what is left in this left-to-destruct nation. Why would
Christians who have suffered six straight years of persecution and mass murder
not be wary of Buhari’s “I-win-or-Nigeria-will-scatter” mentality? What is the
intent of the APC leaders like Tinubu and Lai Muhammad who reportedly vowed to
form a parallel government if they do not win 2015 Presidential election? What
is the intent of the APC leaders, Bola Tinubu and Rauf Aregbesola, who openly
called on party members to dig up their charms and occult powers to win the
2015 elections? These people are not satisfied to leave the decision of who
becomes elected to the electorate; they want the demons to vote and preside
over Nigeria! To use charms and invocation means contracting demons to do
something for you. Why such desperation? Hyper-patriotic love of Nigeria?
Buhari, too, is on record to have said, “If what happened in 2011 should again
happen in 2015, by the grace of God, the dog and the baboon would all be soaked
in their blood.” Pray, what happened in 2011 other than that Buhari lost the
election fair and square? Was the 2011 election not the best in Nigeria’s history,
an election supervised by the most senior Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian
universities and all party agents? Did the whole world not watch and attest to
the transparency of the election? But Buhari was not satisfied and incited
bloodshed in which about 800 people were slaughtered, including 10 NYSC members
who helped in the conduct of the elections.
Have we forgotten that Buhari’s loss of the 2011 election was the formal
introduction of bombing into Nigeria’s political history. From then on, we have
graduated into suicide bombing, female suicide bombing, infant suicide bombing,
abduction of women and school girls, rape of women, etc. Is Buhari even a
pretended democrat? They promised to make the country ungovernable and the
result is what we have been seeing in the country. Now, he has come back to be
rewarded with the crown for what ordinarily qualifies for treason – the second
in his 72-year history (more on that later).
The international community and the Nigerian electorate are in agreement on the
2011 election. Goodluck Jonathan won. In 2013, two years after the election,
Africa Confidential came up with an independent map of the 2011 election which
further reinforced the fact that President Jonathan won (see below).
2011 Election Map of Nigeria As Produced by Africa Confidential, 2013
As clear and universally accepted as this election result was, Buhari rejected
it. And blood has been flowing ceaselessly since then in Nigeria. What happens
if, for instance, Jonathan wins clearly again but by a much smaller margin?
Will Buhari accept? Can a man who is not democratic enough to accept the
results of election he clearly lost be trusted to conduct free and fair
election were he to be a sitting President? Again, is Buhari even a pretended
democrat?
WHAT BUHARI’S CANDIDACY REPRESENTS: THE IDEOLOGICAL WAR IN NIGERIA
It’s time for Christian leaders in Nigeria to recognize what is going on in
their country. There is war in Nigeria, and it is not a remote or
unidirectional war. It is total, national and belongs in a coordinated global
chain. There is economic war by the ruling elite on the poor. The prototype of
this war is what we see in the almajiri children. This is a picture of what the
Northern elite wants to make of all the children of Nigeria. If they can do
this to their own kith and kin what won’t they do to others?
There is also a political war of domination, whereby the Fulanis have cast
themselves as the native colonizers and feudal lords to rule the country with
Hausa hegemony, and they achieve this by playing the rest of the country one
against the other. They watch in amusement as other groups in the country fight
dirty over the crumbs. Nobody gets or becomes anything in the land unless with
the permission of this retrograde group. The undeclared objective is to
progressively ground Nigeria economically, politically and even militarily;
reduce the nation to near destitution; sabotage the nation’s economy and
security; sap its resilience; weaken its institutions; make democracy
unworkable while progressively pushing the Sharia into our political, judicial,
national and private space. Hospitals, schools, everything is marked for
destruction so that there will not be any alternative way to the Sharia and the
Islamic way of life. The Islamic jihad is a mass movement with volunteers
stepping forward periodically to execute the same mandate and working
assiduously and progressively towards the determined goal. They don’t mind how
long it will take them. They will wait and keep making it impossible for any good
thing to happen until such a time when they have weakened every resistance and
then they strike with the most horrendous violence imaginable. The more people
they can kill, the happier they become with the success of their mission. They
are not afraid to die like rats in the process. Ghaddafi, Saddam Hussein, and
Osama bin Laden are examples of the incurability of the lunatic affliction
under discourse here. As it happened in other cases, the programme is to
sabotage the nation’s progress in every way and by all means to make it easy
for Islam to walk over the nation at the appropriate time. It is an agenda for
all Muslims whether in the universities, the armed forces or in the Boko Haram
dug-outs. The Islamic world is resolved on only one point of agenda: to destroy
and never build. This evil alliance has determined that Nigeria will not arrive
at the door of its destiny. They have determined to substitute God’s glory over
the nation with their satanic programme.
But of all the wars ravaging Nigeria, the most debilitating is the religious
war. It is self-deception to think we can avoid it. It started the day Nigeria
got its flag of independence as a nation. It has become deep and entrenched,
leaving us no alternative. We either pretend that it doesn’t exist and we are
consumed, or we decide to stand and fight it out spiritually and physically.
Incidentally, the resolution of the religious war in Nigeria will be the
beginning of the resolution of all the types of war currently pillaging the
nation.
The Church must understand that Nigeria cannot continue as a nation without
resolving the ideological war which His Eminence Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, the
National President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), has striven
strenuously to explain but which the Church doesn’t seem to have understood.
The ideological war proceeds from the irreconcilable differences, to wit, that
all the Constitutions of Nigeria from independence proclaim that Nigeria is a
SECULAR STATE, meaning that: (i) Nigeria has no state religion; and (ii) every
Nigerian has inherent rights which allow them the freedom to choose their
religion and mode and place of worship. But the post-Independence
Constitutions, especially the military-inspired ones, have sabotaged the
secularity of the Nigerian nation by inserting Islamic codes that breach our
secularity and limit the space and freedom of non-Muslims to freely worship
according to their conscience. They are denied spaces to build churches; they
are refused employment and school admission from elementary to university
levels unless they convert to Islam or change their names to Islamic names. Now
they are being wiped out systematically in well-organized and well-funded
pogroms. The sad implications of the mass murder of Christians in the North
(not restricted to North East, remember) are many:
1. They strike terror in the hearts of Christians in the North
2. They put them on the alert that they are in constant danger of death
3. They mark their churches, schools and hospitals for the bonfire
4. They make an already educationally disadvantaged people balk at education
5. They sentence the Northern Christians to economic, emotional, social and
political distress
6. They waste their children
7. They force parents to prefer to keep their children illiterate to protect
them from being exposed to worse fate (the Islamic sermon on Chibok)
8. They reduce progressively and aim at total annihilation of Christianity in
the North through unending attack on Christians
9. They attack moderate or non-supportive Muslims (sometimes with greater
violence) to give a false impression of their real motive and to give the
pretentious international community an excuse to turn a blind eye or be
outrightly biased
10. They create a foothold from which to spread their gospel of hate and death
across the nation without hindrance.
The dark intents of the jihadists are worse and more than pictured here.
The irreconcilable differences behind the ongoing ideological warfare in
Nigeria are premised on the fact that Christians and all other religious groups
in the country want to live in a secular state, as stated in the Constitution,
while Muslims insist that they cannot live in a secular state. They must live
in an Islamic State and under Sharia rule. All Muslims are united on this point
and they fight for that common position everywhere. The university professors,
Supreme Court judges and military generals are fighting it with the same
intensity as the Boko Haram terrorists. In the 1999 Constitution that the
Abdusalami Abubakar regime bestowed on Nigeria, Christ, Christians and
Christianity are not mentioned even once; whereas Islam, Sharia and other
Islamic signposts are strewn all over the Constitution as if Nigeria is an
Islamic state. That Constitution was written solely by one Muslim named
Professor Auwalu Yadudu, a former Special Adviser to Gen. Sani Abacha on
Constitutional Matters. The 1979 Constitution of the Obasanjo administration
was written by the so-called 50 wise men led by Chief Rotimi Williams. While
the 1979 Constitution gave emphasis to Nigeria’s secularity, the 1999
Constitution of Yadudu abridged Nigeria’s secularity by making it an Islamic
Constitution in content, and he was there to fight that position in the
National Political Conference of 2014.
Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, has done an incredible job as the spiritual pastor of
Nigeria by correctly interpreting the danger the Church is in. The Nigerian
Church stands the chance of annihilation if it fails to correctly read the
signs of the times and take decisive steps to checkmate the enemy. The Church
Fathers in Nigeria are in the crucible of God’s gaze; and He is watching keenly
to see what they will do with the Cross of the salvation and the sheep he has
bestowed on them.
THE CHURCH HAS AN ANSWER
The only institution today that has an answer to the many ills of Nigeria is
the Church. Christianity is the largest religious group in Nigeria
(notwithstanding the Muslims’ propaganda to the contrary). The Church must take
a number of steps that must begin to manifest from the next general elections
in Nigeria. Among these are the following:
1. The Church must sit soberly to consider what it has failed to do in the past
and how many lives have been lost needlessly because of its inattention.
2. As the Church goes into a default mode of spiritual warfare, it must
research the entire realm of human experience called Arabism and Islam and then
deploy Spirit-directed weapons against them.
3. The Church must learn the warfare strategies of Arabism and Islam and mount
its counter measures to contain them.
4. The Church must find the mechanism to unite under charismatic, visionary and
spirit-filled leadership and use CAN and PFN as strategic planks to shape the
destiny of Nigeria and defend the Church. The Church must build itself into a
mass-educated mass movement backed with a war chest. This is the last war
Nigeria will have to fight, and it is the most decisive war. It is the war that
will determine whether Nigeria will live or not. It is the war that will
determine whether this generation will pass on Christianity to their
grandchildren. The Church must work out its unity as Christ prayed:
Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also who shall believe on me
through their word; That they all may be one; as you, Father, are in me, and I
in you, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that you
have sent me (John 17:20-21).
It must be emphasized that most Christians will cooperate under a formidable
Christian umbrella once they are properly schooled on the issues at stake. If
it is taken as a major agenda and prosecuted with all diligence, the possible
dissenters (such as the catholic leadership) will be in the minority. With
effective education, most individual Catholics in Nigeria will eventually come
to take a stand for Christian survival, irrespective of what their priests are
saying (a discernible pattern in the Catholic fold globally is that many have
already taken individual positions on church doctrines which they consider
unacceptable or opposed to the Bible).
5. The Church must defend its position vigorously and fight until justice and
righteousness is enthroned. The Church must never tire or give up, and must
always choose its leaders carefully to lead the Lord’s army.
6. The Church must begin to use its numerical advantage to influence decisions
for good in the land.
7. The Church should take interest in the emergence and choice of candidates
for political and decision-making positions in the country
8. More than any other thing, the Church should do whatever is legitimate to
ensure that the Church of Christ is not overrun in Nigeria. It must reverse its
losses and make the Islamic Agenda dead on arrival.
9. If the Church chooses to continue to bicker and fight private wars or
promote private enterprises instead of labouring collectively to advance the
Kingdom of God on earth, we will wake up some day – or maybe our great/grandchildren
will wake up – and find that the Church belonged to prehistory. It did in
Turkey, as is famously known now.
10. The day Nigeria will be officially proclaimed “The Islamic Republic of
Nigeria” as it is secretly done for now in the OIC and other Islamic documents
around the world will never arise if the Church stands united on Isaiah 7: 7
and fights the Lord’s battle with everything at its disposal.
11. The battle for the liberation of the Nigerian Church from Islamic
stranglehold begins with the Presidential election on 14 February 2015. The
emergence of Goodluck Jonathan in the 2011 Presidential Elections was a big
blow to the Islamic Agenda, and that explains the massive bloodletting that
followed it and the graduation of political and religious violence to an
unmanageable state. The sabotage of the nation’s security and economic
interest, as well as the widespread violence, massive bloodshed, political and
social destabilization of the country are an organized platform of political
blackmail of the Jonathan Presidency and an indirect campaign for a Northern
Muslim Presidency to take over. To be sure, the violence will not cease
automatically even if a Muslim becomes President; it will attenuate because the
Muslim President will begin to endorse and implement the Islamic Agenda and
legitimizing all official and unofficial actions taken in the land without
necessarily resorting to open violence. Violence doesn’t need to be physical to
be violence. Hunger and poverty could be more strategic weapons of warfare.
These were the tools the Babangida regime used to castrate the middle class,
and it has not recovered till today.
12. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari of the APC, based on his antecedents and what he
currently represents, is another delegate of the Fulani political domination of
Nigeria and an agent of the Islamic Agenda. He is not Nigeria’s Messiah and the
Church will be signing a suicide note by empowering him to become the President
of Nigeria.
THE MUHAMMADU BUHARI FACT SHEET
1. General Muhammadu Buhari, the APC Presidential candidate, is one of the
Nigerian army generals who has not amassed wealth on the ludicrous state that
others have. It is however wrong to state that he is not corrupt, as it is
often claimed, because:
• He is a product and primary beneficiary of the political, ethnic and
spiritual corruption that breads economic corruption in Nigeria. He is the
current face of the Caliphate and Fulani stranglehold on Nigeria. His
double-face campaigns suggest a sinister objective other than personal ambition
or patriotic zeal. He is the current champion of the feudal hold on Nigeria’s
progress. Feudalism is antithetical to democracy.
• As Petroleum Task Force (PTF) Chairman under Gen. Sani Abacha, Buhari
recruited his relation as a consultant to run the organization, and the fellow
stole all the money that needed to be stolen (about N25 billion, according to
some sources).
• As PTF Chairman, 80% of projects executed by the PTF were located in the
North. Someone should ask what he did for Lagos from Bola Tinubu or what he did
in the South generally.
• Buhari has been quoted in the press as saying Abacha was not corrupt. All the
Abacha loot seized in foreign countries is balderdash to incorruptible Buhari.
2. General Buhari did not fight corruption, and cannot. When he seized power in
the December 1983 coup, he kept Shehu Shagari, the profligate President in an
Ikoyi Guest House and sent Alex Ekwueme, his Deputy, who had no official
portfolio, to Kirikiri prison. All the UPN and NPP Governors were sent to
Kirikiri. When the courts tried them and found them not guilty Buhari refused
to release them. Governor Adekunle Ajasin was tried thrice and absolved thrice,
yet Buhari refused to release him. He only released them after their health had
failed, and they died one after the other soon after. Is that how to fight
corruption? How many Fulanis did Buhari jail? Or were they all angels?
3. You surely remember that it was the Buhari military regime that changed the
colour of the Naira to beat supposed economic saboteurs in 1984. Most Nigerians
were caught at the wrong end. You could only withdraw a limited sum of your
money in the bank, and you could not deposit beyond a decreed amount. Many
people lost their legitimate earnings because of Buhari’s brand of economic
management. But guess what? One whole year after the currency had been changed,
the old currency which was no longer legal tender was still circulating freely
in Sokoto. It was front-page news in the Nigerian Tribune. Can you then see to
what intents the rigid rule of Gen Buhari was deployed? The laws were made for
the South, definitely not for the Caliphate.
4. Remember the Emir of Gwandu story? While Buhari was waging his economic war,
all travellers’ luggage to and from Nigeria was rigorously searched by security
agents to prevent the importation of the naira. In the midst of this policy,
the Emir of Gwandu arrived Nigeria with 53 suitcases which the Airport Command
of the Customs under Atiku Abubakar refuse to clear. But within a moment, Gen
Buhari’s ADC Major Jokolo surfaced at the Airport and forcefully cleared the
suitcases. Do you know the implication of the ADC to the Head of State
personally clearing goods at the airport? It is as good as the C-in-C himself
appearing on the scene to clear the goods. Have you ever heard of an ADC to the
President of any country leaving his principal to do any other thing under the
sun other than the few hours when he is asleep? Gen. Buhari broke his iron laws
to pass the Emir of Gwandu. Got the message?
5. The UPN Governors Buhari arrested and jailed were the most efficient in the
country at the time. UPN states were called ‘the Progressive States’ and
implemented the ‘Four Cardinal Programmes’, which included free education at
all levels, free health services, integrated rural development, etc. What
happened to these lofty pro-people programmes under Buhari? They were buried,
and their propagators imprisoned – some of them for nearly 1,000 years – to
underscore his iron rule.
6. Gen. Buhari is the author of the transportation chaos that Lagosians endure
daily. He was the one who derailed the lofty Metroline Project of the Jakande
Administration and actually paid more compensation to the French for the breach
in contract than was required to complete the project. He never accused Jakande
of corruption on the project; it was just not in his character to see good done
and support it. Now he has been frequenting Lagos, piggy-backed by Bola Tinubu,
to come and garner the votes he needs to rule Nigeria. Shouldn’t Lagos State
reward him with 1000% vote for being such a visionary manager and engineer of
progress?
7. A vote for Buhari in the coming Presidential Election is a positive vote for
treachery. On 31 December 1983 when Buhari assumed leadership as head of State
of Nigeria, he and his gang of professional coup-makers in the army, committed
treason against the Constitution and people of Nigeria. It doesn’t matter
whether the coup was successful or not. If it had failed, Buhari and his fellow
conspirators would have been summarily shot or at best sentence to life in
prison. A man who commits treason in any sane society is never rewarded with
the crown. The Constitution of Nigeria is against it. If he escaped with his
life, it is an insult to parade around the presidential not to talk of seeking
power.
8. Buhari’s 20-month rule was characterized by two laws – Decree 2 and Decree
4. Decree 2 empowered him to detain anybody indefinitely and for whatever
reason. A fall-out of this jungle law was his clamp down on public opinion. A
front-page report in a national newspaper had a telling headline: “Don’t Debate
the Future!” Buhari had all the answers to all national problems and any
attempt at public discourse was courting a long jail term.
9. Nigerians might not have known the reason why they were barred from debating
the future. But now we know. It was during this time that Buhari smuggled
Nigeria into OIC. It was Buhari who smuggled Nigeria into OIC. It was Ibrahim
Babangida who consolidated it and saw it through. Nigerians only saw the end of
the action and not the Buhari beginning of it.
10. Decree No. 4, which Gen. Buhari promulgated also made the publication of
truth an offence once a public official claimed to be offended by it. It was
the only law of its kind in the whole world. Two journalists were jailed for
this to emphasize that Buhari was not joking. Any king in whose court the truth
is not a defence belongs in the jungle.
11. Gen. Buhari wants to be President of Nigeria in 2015. What vision has he outlined
other than that he would (i) Fight corruption; and (ii) Fight Boko Haram? If
his fight against corruption was effective the first time, why is the cancer
still there? And why has it spread nationwide?
12. As a former Head of State, Buhari is a member of Council of State. It is
well-known that he hardly attends meetings. If he has a genius of an idea on
how to eradicate BH why didn’t he discuss it in the Council? Isn’t he concerned
by the magnitude of unwarranted deaths in the country since he lost election in
2011? Is the Council of State, the highest advisory body in Nigeria, not a
sufficiently distinguished body for anyone who belongs to contribute his best
towards making Nigeria our dream land? Where is Gen. Buhari’s patriotism? Where
does his loyalty lie? What is his mission in government? Is it only by becoming
President that he can fight BH? Don’t we all eat without necessarily becoming
farmers? What is Gen. Buhari’s declared and undeclared mission?
13. Understand this: Boko Haram is an expression of the Islamic Agenda over
Nigeria. It is not an accident, as some people assume. It is a contrary
ideology to the ideology of democracy to which the majority of Nigerians
subscribe. Muslims don’t want to live in a democracy; they want to live under Sharia;
the majority of Nigerians want to live in a democracy. The differences are
irreconcilable. That is the underlying factor in Nigeria’s instability. Unless
we sit down and iron that out Nigeria cannot make progress. It would be
thoughtless to vote fundamentalists who don’t want to live in a democracy to
preside over those who want to.
14. Buhari is a Muslim fundamentalist. First proof is that he took Nigeria to
OIC while silencing us not to debate the future. Second proof is that Buhari
has not changed and never will. In a speech that he delivered at a seminar
organized by the Supreme Council of Sharia in Nigeria in August 2001, he said:
I will continue to show openly and inside me the total commitment to Sharia
movement that is sweeping all over Nigeria … God willing, we will not stop the
agitation for the total implementation of the Sharia in the country…” (The
News, 19 January 2015).
Again, just before the 2011 elections, Buhari said Muslims should not vote for
a Christian. A few years back, Nasir El-Rufai, observed that Buhari remains
“perpetually unelectable” as a result of his “insensitivity to Nigeria’s
diversity and his parochial focus.” (see Vanguard, 18 January, 2015).
There are no suicide bombers in Christendom. Only Christians who want to commit
suicide would vote a declared missionary of Sharia and the Islamic Agenda in
Nigeria.
15. Let it be reiterated for emphasis that Buhari cannot stop Boko Haram. It is
not in his fundamentalist’s interest to do so. Some people claimed that he
crushed Maitatsine Movement in the 1980s. Buhari did not crush “Maitatsine
Rioters” The leader of the sect was killed in 1980 and that was during
Shagari’s rule. But the group continued their mass killings throughout the time
of Buhari. They caused a lot of damage in Yola and Jimeta early 1984 where over
700 people were killed. In Gombe, in April 1985, over 100 people were killed,
including police officers, and 1,000 others were killed in Yobe at the same
time. All this was under Gen. Buhari and Idiagbon. It was after this that Musa
Makaniki, the new leader of the sect fled to Cameroon and there was quiet.
Maitatsine sect did not have bombs and sophisticated weapons and all the means
of communication that Boko Haram now has. They were using bows, arrows, sticks
and local guns. Yet they destroyed about 5,000 people under one of the most
vicious military rules in Nigeria (Buhari’s). Their operations continued during
Buhari’s reign. If it took six years to silence Maitatsine who were using bows
and arrows. If Buhari, as a military government had a running battle with the
bow-and-arrow Maitatsines, what is his magic wand for dealing with BH? Where is
he hiding the blueprint even after over 15,000 deaths? Is Buhari a patriot? Is
he a statesman? Is he a defender of the poor?
16. Gen. Buhari continues to demonstrate his disdain for the laws of Nigeria.
• He refused to appear before the Oputa panel to explain the excesses of his
government; instead he went to court. He sought the protection of the court
whose powers he emasculated with his military decrees. He believes he does not
owe the nation or any individual any explanation for whatever he does. Nobody
was crucified by the Oputa Panel. It was meant for national healing,
clarification of issues, public apology where necessary, etc. But Buhari
ignored it. That is the arrogance of the man who wants to rule us. Buhari did
not and still does not believe in freedom of speech. He was quoted recently as
warning Amaechi that he is not Jonathan (and so would not stomach Amaechi’s insolence
towards a sitting President).
• He has refused to file a proper application before INEC to qualify him to
contest election to the high office of President of Nigeria. The law says all
contestants should file their applications and append photocopies of their
certificates. Buhari told INEC to go and get his certificates from the Military
Board? How can a man who cannot obey simple rules as a private citizen be
trusted to rule with conscience and justice when he gets to power. Buhari, as
things stands today, is not qualified to run for election in Nigeria because he
has not fulfilled the requirements of the law. In law, if Buhari were to win
the coming election he has disqualified himself by not following the rule.
Don’t they have lawyers in APC? Elementary logic says you cannot put something
on nothing. A candidate cannot have a JAMB score whose improperly filled
application form has been rejected by the computer. Wherever the lawless insist
on sitting in senate over the lawful, they must expect a divine joker. Whoever
is intemperate enough not to serve the law in humility cannot be an enforcer of
the law. Not in a decent society.
17. Gen. Buhari’s goons broke into Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s home during his
military reign looking for ideas to run his government. Where does he intend to
break into this time for a loot? RCCG?
18. Prof. Yemi Osinbajo and Gen. Buhari only met yesterday morning. They don’t
have any more shared vision than the party cards they both hold. Prof. Osinbajo
has made his mark as a distinguished Nigerian. His vision is defined and known.
The 2015 election is not the beginning or end of anything for him. He cannot be
the Jihadists’ bribe to the Church of God. He is already a prince in the
Kingdom. He is a wise man and the son of a wise man. He is made already for
here and for the hereafter. He belongs to the Church; the jihadists cannot give
to the Church as a bribe what already belongs to the Church. It was a hard
thing – the Devil knew – yet he went ahead to tempt the King of Glory after a
40-day marathon!
19. Christians should tell with their votes all those with ungodly agenda over
Nigeria that they don’t own Nigeria. They have killed, they have maimed, they
made widows in their thousands, they have made orphans of many thousands, they
have rendered hundreds of thousands displaced people living on charity in their
fatherlands. Now they have come back for the crown as a reward for their crime.
20. No, Buhari is not the political messiah. The beautiful one is yet to come!
And President Goodluck Jonathan?
The Goodluck Jonathan administration has recorded measurable improvements in
agriculture, aviation, railway system, road rehabilitation and construction.
Considering the unprecedented security challenges faced by his administration,
we can say that President Goodluck Jonathan has tried his best. Nevertheless,
most Nigerians believe he could have done much more. Jonathan’s best is not
good enough for Nigerians. For example, the Jonathan government does not appear
to have done enough in protecting the lives of innocent Nigerians who were
slaughtered by the Jihadists. Unfortunately, President Jonathan has been busy
working round the agenda the Islamists set for him. The unconscionable
violence and bloodshed was to blackmail him and prepare themselves for a
takeover. Jihadists love to swim in blood. It is all a game of power to them.
What glory! What civilization!
For the church, President Jonathan is a better option for now. He is not a
threat to the corporate existence of the Church and his religious stand is not
toxic to Christianity.
Buhari on the other hand has not hidden his malignant hatred for Christianity.
He has declared his stand for sharia publicly. His beliefs are pro-Boko Haram.
Whoever and whatever rises against the Church is an antichrist, Christians
should know what it means to cooperate with the Antichrist. Some people have
written dissertations on why they endorse Buhari/Osinbajo ticket. May they not
write same when the ultimate antichrist comes.
Half a word is enough for the wise...
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Department of Anthropology, Sociology & Reconciliation Studies
Bethel University, 3900 Bethel Drive #24
Saint Paul, MN 55112.
Office Phone: 651-638-6023