Bishop Kukah: Let Nigeria be

BY KOLE OLUWAJANA

In Nigeria, these are trying times. Often we are challenged by very insensitive public figures. Whatever they say and wherever they go make news. We are helpless as salt and insult are applied on our injury. Wish we can tear their faces on newsprint and kick their annoying faces, even in their regalia of cassocks, on televisions; but we cannot, because we bought those items and we will be the losers. We hardly see them on the streets where our fists and frowned faces will have good effect. On the altar or the thrones, where they preside, they are always a distance away, kept away from the reach of those of us that feel the pains of corrupt and inept government. They know all these. They know we can do nothing as these people insult our sensibility.

Some of these supposedly public figures or speakers are not like us that sweat it out daily and are prey to the goats that are never tired of eating people’s yam. We are in business and have spouses, children and extended family members to feed. We are not supported by any congregation or town, and receive no pension or stipends from the government. We are quite different from Bishop Kukah and most members of his team that visited President Buhari recently. Even one of them with a congregation of less than 2000 has a private jet supposedly bought for him by his congregation. It is understandable if they see things differently, react differently and talk differently.

People that are eulogizing former President Jonathan must know that majority of the citizens of this country are angry. In a keynote address in October 2014, at a book festival in Port Harcourt, Bishop Kukah said anger “is not necessarily a negative outlet if it energizes us to moral revulsion.” Citing the example of Jesus Christ, Bishop Kukah noted that Jesus was angry with the money changers in the temple and He flogged them and overturned their tables. There was a moral revulsion in the act of Jesus Christ because He could not stand the impunity and corruption. If one might again ask Bishop Kukah, what moral revulsion is shown in his recent utterances and actions as they relate to the government of former President Jonathan?

How best can we describe recent utterances of Bishop Matthew Kukah, as he projects himself as the spokesperson or “leader” of his self-assembled men and women of wisdom and repute?

There are three reasons why we need to have a second look at the role and utterances of Bishop Kukah. One, by his own confession in an interview on Channels Television, morning of Thursday August 13, 2015, Bishop Kukah revealed that he singularly put together his peace team. For good effect, he also took up the role of lead-speaker for the group. He is always thought of as a smart man. He obviously could not take the risk of allowing more careful people like General Abdulsalam, Archbishop Okoh, Sultan of Sokoto or any other person in the team to perform that role.

Secondly, some members of Bishop Kukah’s team might not be comfortable with the way they are being projected or represented by their spokesperson. A good speaker and vibrant activist like Bishop Kukah will always have his way and his say. It is difficult for some of us to imagine General Abdulsalam, Sultan of Sokoto, or Archbishop Okoh expressing those views credited to them as expressed by Bishop Kukah. It is acknowledged that with the exemption of one or two people, members of the team are respectable people. However, Ecclesiastes 10:1 in the Bible says “dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour: so does a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour.”

Thirdly, there is an undertone of self-righteousness in utterances of Bishop Kukah and a progressive journey away from truth and reality. He probably means well because that is all he could see, limited by his relationship with the previous government. There is the risk that he will begin to see his jaundiced position as the truth if we keep quiet.

To many of us out there, two views of the peace team as expressed by Bishop Kukah do not represent the truth and feelings of vast majority of ordinary Nigerians affected by the inept and corrupt government of former President Jonathan. It is not true things are static in Nigeria and that there is no governance. It is also not true that former President Jonathan willingly conceded to President Buhari. Let it be understood by Bishop Kukah and those in his school of thought that Nigeria has since moved beyond the spot where we were marooned by the previous government. Not only that we have moved far away from where we were before May 29, 2015, we are also moving in the right direction.

Let it be understood by the likes of Bishop Kukah that President Buhari and Vice President Osinbajo will be heroes to many of us if all they will achieve at the end of their tenure is to stop the bleeding and corruption that many of us have identified as the major hindrance to our national development. It will be a major stride if the goats are stopped from eating our tubers and barns of yam. Nigerians are hard-working, creative and intelligent. There are human and natural resources to make this nation great if the yam-eating goats are caged. This is obviously the focus of President Buhari’s government and any message to the contrary from whatever source is anti-people and from the pit of hell.

On the acceptance of the results of the presidential election by the former president, Dr Kukah, as a Bishop in the church of God, should understand that the situation was beyond the control of any man. From all indications, if the former president and some people around him had a choice, the “status quo” would have remained with all the accompanying repercussions.

To Jonathan’s Government, Bishop Kukah has been more patronizing than critical. He once said “Jonathan did his best. We are just caught in the bubble of exuberance.” An objective appraisal would have added that Jonathan’s best wasn’t good enough for Nigeria.

Since President Buhari was sworn in, Bishop Kukah has offered several unsolicited counsel. What has remained constant is his effort to paint President Jonathan in beautiful colors worthy of admiration, a justification for sustaining the legacy of the last government, an obviously impossible task. In what sounds like a blackmail, he recently said: “It will be totally irresponsible to suggest that the Confab report shall be thrown out.” He was reported to have cautioned President Buhari against jettisoning the report of the Confab.

To demonstrate his mastery of how government works, to the envy of the less-informed, Bishop Kukah told us that “people think that Buhari will wake up one day and say that he is implementing the report of the Confab. It does not work like that. Buhari may give that report to the relevant organs of government that can look at it for implementation. The offices can simply look at those things and policy changes will take place without you noticing.”

In his convocation lecture at Ebonyi State University shortly after the presidential election, Bishop Kukah identified why PDP lost the election. According to him, PDP lost because the party “has become an association of takers and Buccaneers” and could not deal quickly with the issues of greed and arrogance of some of its men and women in power. With such report, why would Bishop Kukah expect such rottenness to be covered up while activities continued as if nothing happened?

One might ask, what was the basis for Bishop Kukah’s present assertions? If he was talking from personal conviction, it can be concluded that he has been in wrong company, discussing with the wrong people and so we are not his right audience. If the objective is to make President Buhari toe a line of reconciliation with a very corrupt immediate past Government, they will surely fail. If the objective is truly to ensure a peaceful transition, we thank them for the role they played and we thank God that the objective has been achieved. It was most unnecessary to go back for directive from a president who did not set you up in the first instance. What further directive or instruction was Ayo Oritshajafor expecting from President Buhari or Vice-President Osinbajo? Had it been a military regime, he probably would not have returned home with the team. Bishop Mike Okonkwo of TREM spoke the minds of many people when he said Christians failed in their responsibilities to former President Goodluck Jonathan. Some of us are of the view that he relied on their counsel and they failed him and Nigeria.

Justifiably so, Bishop Kukah has alluded to the fact that he and the eminent people assembled by him are not jobless people and they have busy schedules. That is true and there is actually no need to add more jobs. Our comfort is that Nigeria is not in short supply of equally erudite and patriotic people. Bishop Kukah and his team have played a good role for allowing God to use them. Honestly, many of us appreciate their contributions. However, it is time for them to face their busy schedules and let Nigeria be.

Oluwajana, a legal practitioner, writes from Lagos