Olusegun Olanrewaju
Speaking from the pulpit in a Sunday message at the church’s headquarters in Ota, Ogun State, said he never spoke to any group of people on behalf of any politician.
The controversy surrounds the release, on an online news outlet, of an audio where Obi was heard appealing to the bishop in a video that went viral on Saturday, to help solicit votes from Christians in the South-West.
Obi was also alleged to have said the votes were needed because the 2023 presidential election was a ‘religious war’.
“Daddy, I need you to speak to your people in the South-West and Kwara, the Christians in the South-West and Kwara. This is a religious war. Like I keep saying: if this works, you people will never regret the support,” Obi was heard in the audio saying.
But in his reaction yesterday, Oyedepo said, “Nobody had ever told me what to say in this world. No. I have never campaigned for anybody, or spoken on anybody’s behalf, and I will not do that till I go to heaven.”
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The Pentecostal preacher added, “There is no (political) party in this country that didn’t come to me for prayers and advice.
“I advised them, some, they didn’t take. Those who chose to take it, see results; those who said no, are going about it (laughs). If you still come again, I will still tell you, it doesn’t change,” he said.
Meanwhile, Obi is under fire for declaring the 2023 presidential election a religious war.
*The controversial video
In the leaked audio, the LP presidential candidate Obi was heard begging Oyedepo for support.
Obi asked the bishop to help spread the message to his followers in the South-West and North-Central states.
The audio has since been generating heated conversations and controversies on social media, with many Nigerians condemning the former Anambra State governor for championing a ‘religious-driven campaign’ in a secular-promoting country like Nigeria.
In the audio clip, addressing Oyedepo as “daddy”, the LP’s standard-bearer, said, “Daddy, I need you to speak to your people in the South-West and Kwara, the Christians in the South-West and Kwara. This is a religious war.
Oyedepo added, “I believe that… I believe that… I believe that… You know I did a release ‘Nigeria Going Forward’ and I am coming with the second one today. I wanted it out when they won’t have any time to do damage control. But in the name of Jesus this would be a success. You know what I said in today’s own? A sickling nation like Nigeria will require a strong and healthy personality.
“I said anyone whose source of wealth could not be verified should not have access to governance. So all we are doing is appealing to the conscience of people to know where to go. But I want to assure you, in the name of Jesus, that the result will be favourable.”
Obi was then overheard saying on the other side of the phone that “If this works, you people will never regret the support.”
The LP candidate’s critics have accused him of playing politics of ethnicity and religion ahead of Nigeria’s 2023 presidential election, which he lost but has challenged in court.
Obi and his media team have stridently denied this, asking critics to provide evidence.
The leaked audio has, however, sparked controversy.
*The aftermath
Supporters of Obi have taken to social media sites, especially Twitter and Facebook, some describing the leaked tape fake.
Some even use the word ‘deep fake’, a term used to describe doctored clips generated with Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools.
One of the spokespersons of the LP, yesterday morning, went in defence of their principal, Obi.
Though Kenneth Okonkwo, the LP’s Presidential Campaign Council (PCC) spokesperson, confirmed the authenticity of the audio, he suggested a different interpretation of the conversation.
The admission has drawn the ire of Obi’s supporters who accused the actor-lawyer of undermining their efforts to dismiss the leaked file as a deep fake.
Okonkwo, in tweets, attempted to defend the ‘religious war’ comment made by his Obi in the viral as a ‘private conversation’.
He said, “Firstly, the context of the conversation was aptly put by Bishop Oyedepo when he said, ‘All Nigerians have (an) equal stake in this nation, nobody has the right to claim that he is dashing something to someone.”
Okonkwo also tweeted: “H.E Peter Obi was simply urging the Bishop to help him push this message of (an) equal stake of all Nigerians in the Nigerian project to his people and the Christendom because the politicians of the other party are carrying on this campaign as if it is a religious war (sic).”
He accused the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) of trying to ‘twist the narrative’ of the telephone conversation.
According to him, “it is not surprising that these political criminals are trying to spin the conversation as if Obi was making a religious statement.”
Okonkwo alleged that the APC was beginning what appears to be ‘the religious battle of the ballots’ by running a Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket in a religiously diverse country.
Another key spokesman in the ‘Obidient’ Movement, as the LP presidential flag bearer is known, Diran Onifade, however, attempted to do further damage control, saying in Abuja yesterday that the audio clip was just ‘another propaganda’ by the APC to discredit Obi.
According to him, “All these are meant to serve no other purpose than egregious mischief aimed at de-marketing Peter Obi; if the goal is to create a credibility problem, the ploy has failed woefully.”
Onifade also described the audio as a deep fake.
He said, “Peter Obi has long been on record as the only presidential candidate who has urged the Nigerians electorate not to vote for him based on religion or tribe.”
He also described it as APC’s “endless subterfuge to continue to hold on to what they know does not belong to them.”
While the political campaigns lasted, many held the belief that the LP candidate was running a religion-inspired campaign.
He courted the assistance of many churches and their shepherds, in a bid to humiliate the joint-Muslim ticket of the APC presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, on Election Day.
Some of the pastors that openly identified with the Obi quest include Paul Enenche of Dunamis, aside from others who have been claiming that the presidential poll was rigged against Obi, giving Tinubu a ‘stolen mandate’.
