…Says evils, insecurity has now become prevalent
Napoleon Obayojie, a fire-belching Pentecostal bishop, is a retired military officer who served under President Muhammadu Buhari as General Officer Commanding (GOC) in the Nigerian Army. Today, he is the General Overseer Christ Victory Life Church International, Abuja.
He speaks to BEN OGBEMUDIA on Nigeria’s security challenges, the Buhari he knows, and issues in Christendom, among other issues. Excerpts.
How has it been with the Christian world since you left the Army?
There are some of us that maybe were called from the beginning, but when you get a lot of money, then you go into money-making and believe in nothing else but money. It is within us; especially those who tagged themselves big pastors.
We can never deny it, but at the end of the day, it is the major problem that we have in Christendom. It is the same money and position that has divided us because some of the leaders that are rich, they form cliques, they have other people, other pastors that are loyal to them, and who, maybe, are getting some things from them and then they start attacking one another.
Maybe because of those who are at the top of the ladder, but that is not the Christianity we inherited, Jesus Christ said you are not of the world, and what does he mean that you are not of the world? It means anything in the world should not be our pursuit and our target. We must be different, but unfortunately some people do not reason it that way.
Talking about love of material things, how many jets do you have?
Well, I have told them from my quarters, both home and abroad. Anybody that buys jets for me free so that I will be like others, the next day you will hear that I have sold it because the world has not been conquered.
The gospel has not reached so many places, and some of the places that it has reached, the enemy has come and overtaken us and thrown us away. Like the little we are doing, I’m not praying to have a jet, and I don’t want to have one. It is not my ambition. I’m not encouraging anybody, but anybody who says he wants to acquire one, he can look for money and do it in his own way.
And some people will hear me now and say, don’t mind him, he is a poor man. Well, even if they call me, you poor pastor, I don’t mind, provided what I am pursuing, I am doing it and God does not mind. For instance, I have a rescue ministry and this rescue ministry is not like an NGO foundation where you come and donate money. All the money we spend in our Rescue Ministry comes from the church, comes from our members, and from Christians.
The rescue ministry is not for Christians alone. We go to villages, we go to prison, we go to hospitals and so many other places. Some places that are closer, we bring them to the church. We cater for people of all denominations and persuasion. We feed men, children and women. So, I don’t believe in it.
Are you saying there are cabals in the system?
When you use the language cabal, it means they are people that are ruling, but if you say there are people in a competition amongst themselves, yes. In fact, I have a pastor that came here and preached here. He is a friend, and from when he started preaching till when he finished, the least money he mentioned was N10 million. It’s either ten, twenty, fifty million naira or nothing else.
How he has done this, how he has done that and how he has bought a house outside Nigeria and the rest, but at the end of the day, the question is what have you done for God? People that are in your church are suffering, and you see them with your eyes, but you can’t think of how you to help.
Do you support women ordination as priests?
It is not a good omen for the body of Christ, but I can tell you authoritatively that the devil is out, fighting the last stage of war. I may not comment on it so much.
We have heard about some men of God getting involved in untoward practices like rituals, what is your take?
It is very, very terrible; it is not something that any one of us will love to hear or discuss. But the truth of it is that if a man of God go and join himself with the witchcraft, cultism and all manner of things, it is un-Christian, even if he has large followership. You cannot serve God and mammon.
Some say Nigeria is on the verge of collapsing. Banditry, kidnapping, and so on are festering. What are Christians doing to help the government in handling this?
I don’t think the government needs our help in the first place.
They don’t, because we Christians are not like other bodies who will form bandstands. Politicians recruit thugs for political reasons and begin to kill people. Go and find out all about what is happening. It is not from the church; it can never come from the church, because Jesus gave us his preaching which we are following. When I heard we are fighting corruption, I will just laugh. What are the indices of fighting corruption?
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You are holding to them tenaciously and you say you are fighting corruption? They are not tackling insecurity with all sincerity, because some of them are even benefitting from it. Do you know the cost of one AK47 and the ammunition that it will take? They are the ones behind it, and they will not like the war to end. Unless Nigeria decides to change, things aren’t going to be different.
Tomorrow, an election is coming, go and vote. They will look for their thugs, who will do the dance, and they are always available. When they start to terrorise people, the next thing you see is that the people have no power, no food.
They have no market, they have nothing, they don’t have hope, what will they do? They give them N5,000 naira. They will vote for you because of 5,000 naira, but very soon, you will see it happen, that money cannot even feed that person for two days. Terrorism is setting in.
Will you support secession by any part of this country?
The truths is this; you cannot beat a child, and tell the child not to cry. I am a bishop, a pastor, and I cannot gather people to say not to go for secession. Anything like that I can’t preach. The thing here is this, if things are working well, surely the Igbo people will not be asking for secession. And of course, over all these years, the Yoruba people have never been involved in uprising.
The little you see now is very recent, it’s not up to a year. What is going is that Nigerians are feeling that there’s no good infrastructure like roads in Nigeria. This has triggered dissent The killers and kidnappers are occupying a space. And the moment you slow down, they appear, start to kidnap people. If you want to look at it very well; who is the cause and what is the cause?
There used to be body they called FERMA that used to repair our roads. Since the beginning of this present government, they have not repaired anywhere. And I saw it one of these days in the television that they have been repairing roads, I saw the portion they put up for show, it is not up to 50 metres. The other portions were still bad Why are people doing all these things? Nigerians are no fools, they can see, even if we live abroad. How do you think, oh, these people are daft, and that you can just do anything, trick them and they believe you?
The Buhari you know, is he still there?
Well, I might not know, both in character, he is still the one, because he was my GOC when I was in the Nigeria Army. I knew all that happened. I also know that the day they transferred him and brought another person, there were celebrations and jubilation in all the barracks. People were saying, Thank God. When he was campaigning in 2015, I told some of my fellow bishops, you people are trying to put Nigeria into someone’s hands that can destroy it.
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I must tell you whether he is the same. I am not talking about whether he is of different built. He is inside money and governments are taking care of him; he can today be slim, and tomorrow be fat; that is not the issue. But as for character, and what he used to be when he was in the military is not different from what he is now.
As a military man, what message do you have to your colleagues?
Well, unfortunately, very many of them have been polarised with politics and money. It is no longer common these days; you cannot be bold enough to give a soldier money and say you want to bribe him. But now, it is happening everywhere, because the people at the top are doing this thing and now you that it is closer, you will say, which is my own? What am I dying for? Maybe till the next generation, but this present one will change the military and the forces from what it used to be.
Will you subscribe to another Northerner ruling Nigeria in 2023?
I have not seen the vision. I saw the vision of Obasanjo coming and I told my fellow friends about it, before they even brought him into politics. But right now, I don’t subscribe to one particular section of the country to produce the president. That is my own point, I don’t subscribe to that. That person that must rule us must come from the North, or from the South.
God should give us a David. Because right now, if you put anybody to rule Nigeria, it is not going to be easy the manner that we have been ruling for six years. The man is not going to find it easy at all. Therefore, I do not think we should be thinking of whether it should come from the South or the North. I am crying for Northern people. What is Buhari doing to them; all the killings that are happening? Where is it coming from? It is in the North. The schools that are closed are in the North, you can go on and on.
They are suffering, bad eggs are there, but they can’t do anything. It is worse in the North than in the South. I can’t see a governor who is loyal to his people that will now sleep when two or three schools are closed. In the same state that have been ransacked and carried away by bandits, and you are sleeping?
It does not happen anywhere in the world.
