Ruffled by the momentum generated by the
nomination of Pastor Yemi Osinbajo as General
Mohamadu Buhari's running mate, President
Goodluck Jonathan is asking a group of
Pentecostal pastors to help him avert what he
fears could be an impending loss in next month's
presidential polls.
Bishop David Oyedepo led the Pentecostal
pastors to the meeting with President
Goodluck Jonathan
Osinbajo, a prominent cleric with the Redeemed
Christian Church of God, law professor and
Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN emerged APC's
presidential running mate last month giving
President Jonathan and the ruling party, PDP,
what is being described as sleepless nights, by
sources.
Specifically last Thursday, the President held a
meeting in Abuja, with a number of Pentecostal
pastors led by Bishop David Oyedepo of Winners
Chapel, with the main agenda being how to
fashion out ways to solve the "Osinbajo"
problem.
Sources at the meeting confirmed that President
Jonathan confessed in a rather rattled and
humbling manner that "Osinbajo is my problem."
According to those at the meeting, the President
added that "everything was okay until APC
picked Osinbajo."
This is coming against the background of wild
speculations that APC is an Islamist party and
that General Buhari is a religious fundamentalist-
which has become one of the main planks of the
PDP presidential campaign. While PDP chieftains
and supporters have continued to characterize
APC as an Islamist party, APC leaders have
consistently dismissed such as unfounded,
baseless and a scare tactic by the PDP.
Many observers say the nomination of a
prominent Pentecostal pastor from the fastest
growing church in Africa by the APC may have
effectively doused such speculations and the
attempt to label the party as one with an
islamization agenda.
There has been a rather conscious attempt to
make next month's presidential polls a religious
one especially in the Southern part of the country
where there is a much larger Christian
population, observers say.
At the meeting organized by the Executive
Secretary of the National Christian Pilgrims
Commission (NCPC) John Kennedy Okpara,
President Jonathan poured out his mind that
running against a leading Pastor of the RCCG,
who is also known to be very close to the much
reverred General Overseer of the church, Pastor
E.A. Adeboye, is an uphill task.
Sources at the meeting, said Jonathan was
ruffled and much distracted as he confessed to
the challenge to him, of the APC naming such a
person as Osinbajo as General Buhari's running
mate.
In response, the Pastors led by Bishop Oyedepo
assured the President at the meeting that they
would, "starting from today," use every device
possible including social media, the pulpit and
influence peddling, to campaign in support of
President Jonathan and against the Buhari-
Osinbajo ticket.
Before the meeting with the President, sources
said the pastors held a meeting on the same day
to strategize and agree on how and what they
would present to the president.
At that pre-meeting, some Pentecostal pastors
suggested that they use the opportunity of the
meeting afforded by the President to express
their genuine fears on growing insecurity in the
North with Boko Haram killing and attacking
Christians and other innocent Nigerians.
But Bishop David Oyedepo, the most influential
pastor at the meeting interrupted the idea,
insisting that the meeting was to encourage and
strengthen President Jonathan ahead of the
elections and not to discuss compelling national
issues of concern to majority of Nigerians.
While some of the pastors were shocked and
disappointed that Bishop Oyedepo would not
allow them to raise important issues bothering
most Nigerians, they decided to keep silent not
to be seen as spoilsports.
And later after meeting the president, the pastors
gathered together again on the same day to
device strategies they will use to campaign
against Buhari/Osinbajo, with the main scheme
being to label the ticket as an Islamist one.
Some of the pastors also suggested that they
can influence Christians that the position of Vice
President is not an effective one, and that having
a Christian hold it makes no difference, although
the Nigerian constitution and the order of
precedence makes the office the next in rank to
the president.
Indeed as if carrying out the resolve, members of
the Winners Chapel said Bishop Oyedepo has
already started using the pulpit to achieve the
goals set out at last Thursday meeting in Abuja.
Some of the members said yesterday Sunday
January 18, Bishop Oyedepo raised a prayer
point that an Islamist would not become the
President of Nigeria in the polls coming next
month to the chagrin of many of the church
attendants on Sunday.
No comments: