I am normally sceptical of seers, particularly when they make a habit of producing booklets and writing letters to persons they have prophesised negatively about asking for audience. That sums up my attitude to Primate Elijah Babatude Ayodele of INRI Evangelical Spiritual Church, Lagos, over the years. But when that seer consistently gets it right on several very public issues from year to year, even the most sceptical of us have to stand up and listen.
A random recall of some of his prophecies would include his prediction of a Bellview Airline crash of October 2005 and of Sosoliso Airline crash of December 2005, both of which he forsaw and foretold. He told Nigerians in December 2007 that Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, then Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) would be removed in the New Year. He was.
More recently, he alerted this football loving nation that the senior National team, the Super Eagles perform woefully at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. They proved him right.
With this antecedent, I find it irresistible to take a close look at what he had to say about the political situation in Nigeria and in particular the place of President Goodluck Jonathan in it. I shall paraphrase the relevant parts of his recent comments to two Lagos-based newspapers.
His words: “I have told you and I repeat it that this democracy will break this country. Apart from democracy breaking this country, the issue of zoning will bring no good to the country. The solution is that Jonathan must not contest the election if you want peace. He should honour the gentleman agreement in the PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) so that the country can move forward. If Jonathan contests, he will win by force but it will cause a lot of problems for the country, and this country may break up as a result of it. …People may see this as a bad prediction, but for those that have ears let them listen to the warning of God. People may criticize it but it is a warning from God. For those that God loves, He reveals himself. People are pushing Jonathan to run for presidency in 2011 but he should not listen to them. …. I know President Jonathan may not like what I’m saying, but he should not listen to sycophants… If Jonathan wants this country to be one indivisible entity, he should not contest next year’s presidential election. I am not against Jonathan, but that is what God says. We are saying it the way God revealed it to us. This is not a matter of calculation; it is what God said.”
Now, I am not a prophet and do not pretend to be one, but I had advised Goodluck Jonathan against running for office in 2011 in three different pieces published here in April and May. I gave a number of reasons for my position, some of which I hereby recall here.
“I have said, and I know that most Nigerians agree, that one of Nigeria’s most critical challenges is the conduct free, fair and credible elections. This, we situate in the total lack of neutrality of those who have the constitutional duty of supervising this all-important pillar of democracy. Not even the military had succeeded in exorcising the lie of the demon that’s been sold to us over time – that every government must be interested in its successor, euphemism for imposition of its successors. It is a position rooted in the tendency of office holder to do things that they would need a friendly successor to cover up. It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that to solve this critical problem , Nigeria needs an interim leader, disinterested in succeeding himself , who not do anything that he would need covered up after his tenure; and who is courageous enough to resist pressures from family, friends, ethnic group, political party and sundry other interest groups to lend his official weight to their cause.
Now, let’s face it; such a person would be hard to find. But that is precisely the kind of person that Dr Jonathan has to be in the very short time it has pleased God to put him in office. I have no doubt in my mind that unless he yields to God, to be that man, he’s likely to be outside the will of God. That’s a big assertion that, but it is the hard cold truth….
“Today, Jonathan is President of the Federal Republic by virtue of an arrangement that zones the top post to the north of Nigeria for two terms totalling eight years. The North should therefore have another term. I do not subscribe to the arrangement and so, were I in government, it won’t be binding on me. And indeed, if I have my way, it should never have been put in place at all. But it is in place in spite of ex-President Obasanjo’s latter day less-than-honest assertion to the contrary. And Jonathan subscribed to it. He came to office by it, and he is not on record, to my knowledge, as having ever disagreed with the arrangement. So, he is bound by it. He is a Christian and the Bible says that true Christians swear to their own hurt and do not renege! (See Psalm 15:4). .
Flowing from this, and most important of all, is this truth: there are simply no righteous ways by which Dr Jonathan can pick up his party’s ticket to run in 2011! To run, he has to play “realpolitik”, which is politics devoid of moral and ethical considerations; politics without conscience. He has to pull down the party structure, hound his opponents, tear the rule books and generally be ruthless. Recent events are already pointing in this direction… “
Since those words were written, Vincent Ogbulafor has been removed as Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party; Okwesilieze Nwodo has stepped in and his hurry to bury the party’s zoning formula has left nobody in doubt he was playing out a script; the party is in disarray in spite of all pretences to the contrary; the order of elections reportedly was negotiated to neutralise certain forces etc.
Now, Mr President, even if I am wrong; what if the prophet is right?
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