By Ikechukwu Amaechi
Something is disconcerting about the comportment of Nigeria’s self-acclaimed men of god: they have disingenuously created an industry out of their hallucination and in the process they have become ‘gods of men.’
Hallucination is neither a problem in itself nor a crime. People are entitled to their delusions. What I find utterly inexplicable is the fanfare and sheer relish with which Nigerians who ought to know better gobble up such delusionary garbage.
Could such conduct be a consequence of bewitchment? Or is it a practical manifestation of what Karl Marx, the German philosopher and economist, alluded to in his introduction to one of his works ‘A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right,’ that, “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”
Why have we become too obsessed with miracles, signs and wonders – the archetypal wicked and adulterous generation that Jesus Christ chastised in Matthew 12:39 for always demanding a sign?
These were the questions that concentrated my mind on Monday as I watched the video of Pastor Tunde Bakare’s sermon claiming that God anointed him Nigeria’s president right from his mother’s womb and the rapturous adulation of the animated congregants.
“Take it to the mountain top, if you have never heard it before, I am saying it to you this morning in the scheme of things as far as politics of Nigeria is concerned, President Muhammadu Buhari is number 15 and yours sincerely I am number 16,” Bakare declaimed.
“I have never said that to you before, I have never said that to you before,” he continued for emphasis. “I make it plain to you this morning, I let you know it this morning, nothing can change it in the name of Jesus, he is number 15, and I am number 16. To this end I was born, for this purpose, came I into the world.”
Having succeeded in working the congregation into a frenzy, he finally declared magisterially: “I have prepared you for this purpose for more than 30 years. That is why if he (Buhari) wants to run in 2019, I do not oppose, he is still number 15. It is when he steps out, that I step in. His assignment is that of Moses to take Nigeria to River Jordan but he can’t cross it. It will take a Joshua to go to the other side and begin to distribute resources for the people of this nation.”
That was his Sunday sermon on February 18, 2018, a year and half ago. That self-proclaimed Joshua that will take Nigerians to the Promised Land is Tunde Bakare, founder, Latter Rain Assembly, one of Nigeria’s most politically influential pastors, and General Buhari’s running-mate in the 2011 presidential election. And how the man relishes throwing his mega political weight around.
Nigeria is a country in a permanent state of politicking. Barely four months after governments at federal and state levels were inaugurated for fresh terms, the discussion has pivoted not around decaying infrastructure or the economy or the criminally poor living standards of the people, but the 2023 presidential contest. The intrigues are as benumbing and treacherous as the scheming is debilitating. Nigerian politicians neither play by the rules nor take prisoners. They kill, literally
So, the sudden reappearance of the 18-month-old video at a time when rumours are rife that Vice President Yemi Osinbajo may have run into troubled political waters with his godfathers and the infamous Aso Rock cabal cannot be mere happenstance. The coincidence is too uncanny.
Could it be that Bakare deliberately threw his 2018 prophecy into the troubling, albeit unfolding political melodrama hoping to profiteer from Osinbajo’s misery?
That will be unfortunate considering the fact that both men are Yoruba and Pentecostal pastors. But it will neither be a strange phenomenon nor a surprise. History bears witness to that tendency in Southwest politics.
But let us assume, without conceding, that God actually signed an irrevocable 2023 presidential deal with Bakare, what does that say about Nigeria’s democracy? How can power in a democracy be willed to one man willy-nilly by celestial powers without the consent and buy-in of the people in whom sovereignty resides in a representative government?
Since God does not lie and his covenants are immutable, if He actually promised Bakare Nigeria’s political diadem – the presidency – come 2023, then the idea of President Tunde Bakare, has become a done deal, a fait accompli with or without the people’s vote. So, why would anybody bother to vote in 2023, particularly if the vote is against Bakare, and incur God’s wrath? Such foolhardiness will be an affront on the authority of a jealous God and the consequences are better imagined.
But what happens if Bakare does not become Nigeria’s 16th president in 2023? It will either be that God lied to him or he lied against God? Time will tell.
The fiery preacher said he had prepared his congregants for the purpose of his God-ordained presidency for more than 30 years. Prepared them to do what? Will Nigeria become a theocratic state where those who tapped into his anointing by association will be the chosen ones to govern?
But what if God did not make any promise to Bakare? Is it possible that he is dropping God’s name in a desperate bid to wheedle the politically unwary? If so, why would he do that?
There could be two possible reasons. First is that religion, having become an opium, literally, has actually become the problem in Nigeria rather than the solution to the country’s myriad problems. Self-acclaimed men of god have dramatically transformed into gods to be worshipped by their gullible followers.
The second reason is our collective amnesia. If not, those who were shouting hallelujah to Bakare’s claim to divine presidential anointing would have recalled his dubious prophecy in 1999 when he declared to Nigerians that, “Obasanjo is not your Messiah, he is King Agag and the prophetic axe will come upon his head before May 29, 1999.”
Because of Bakare’s false prophesy, many had feared that Obasanjo would never live to be sworn in as president. The opposite was the case. Obasanjo went on to govern Nigeria for eight years. He even tried, though unsuccessfully, to secure an illegal third term. And 20 years after, the man is still alive.
But Bakare is not alone is this business of merchandising politically-tainted prophesies. During Obasanjo’s first term in office, another “god of man,” Pastor Chris Okotie, of Household of God, claimed that God promised him that he will be Nigeria’s president in 2003. He contested the election and made no impact whatsoever, and none of his followers ever asked him what happened, whether God had become a liar. He simply moved on. And they moved on too.
While the veracity of Okotie’s prophecy was put paid to in 2003, in three and half years, we will know if Bakare is one of those prophets God was talking about in Jeremiah 23:16-17: “Don’t listen to these false prophets when they prophesy to you, filling you with futile hopes. They are making up everything they say. They do not speak for me.”
Time will surely tell whether God had Bakare in mind when he spoke through Prophet Ezekiel chastising Israel’s dubious prophets thus: “This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Woe to the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing … Their visions are false and their divinations a lie. They say, ‘The LORD declares,’ when the LORD has not sent them; yet they expect their words to be fulfilled.” (Eze 13:3-6).
Using God’s name as a joker card on the political chessboard is nothing other than a harebrained scheme. Bakare should know better.
