Rev. Umah Ukpai is a frontline and renowned evangelist . Aside the call of God upon his life, he is known for his blunt approach to issues of life. Re¬cently, he spoke with Sunday Sun on the state of the nation, especially as the 2015 elections is fast approach¬ing. He also talked about the lead¬ership crisis that recently rocked the Assemblies of God church , the denomination he belongs to.
Excerpts.
The atmosphere is looking unpredictable. Looking at the radar, what are you seeing as we approach 2015?
A society of honest people wanting to have a fair election, it doesn’t hide. This is a country where the rule of law does not obtain. A country that we have no regard for the sacredness of human beings around us. We have no plan to serve the people. Most of our politicians, not all of them want an ac¬cess road to power, political power, financial power and to me, it is the primary purpose behind their interest going into politics. A situation where you have no feeling for the poorest of the poor, the less privileged, a situation where you don’t have the fear of God in your own conscience, you cannot be fair to anybody. God will help us. It will not destroy Nigeria because God loves this country beyond our imagination. Some of the things we do in this country, if done in other countries, the country will cease to exist. That we are here is a puzzle and a miracle. Well, as a preacher , I will say be¬cause of the prayers of the saints, not for the prayers this country would have been down long time ago because the things that look for unity is not there. We don’t have what i call corporate sentiments of our nation. We don’t think like a nation, we think like tribalists. The whole constituency is the tribe and we think only about this our little tribe. We don’t think about the big picture, the big Nigeria and unfortunately, if your father is not from a given place, you might have been born there but you are not from there. They can collect tax from you; even as they collect these taxes they will let you know you are not one of them. It’s difficult to have a united nation because the practice and the constitu-tion do not support that. Unfortunately, the most cheated man in life is the selfish man. And because we are congregation of selfish, self centered people, we are going to cheat ourselves during 2015. Only God’s mercy would keep us together at the end of the term. May be I should just chip in, there is nothing new that will happen that has not happened before. We are going to see people kill others, we are going to see and hear of stealing of voting materials, we are going to see disorganized election, but God in his own miraculous way will keep us together at the end of the day. But we shall have bruis¬es, we shall be wounded and some of the wounded solders will be left behind. But we shall still be there as a nation.
You just used the words wounded, bruises. Is 2015 election based on the picture you’ve painted?
No; It’s already on. We are wounding our¬selves. We already have wounded soldiers and it will be more. Even in the process of having no elections, we are already wound¬ing and hurting one another. And as I said, and am saying over again, we are political lepers. A political leper does not feel any pain. When he hurts you, he doesn’t feel the pain. Why? Be¬cause, the limbs are all dead. We are not feeling people. We have lost the capacity for surprise. We have lost the capacity for wonderment. When you lose the capacity for surprise, you are dangerous, you can do the unimaginable. As it stands now, our politicians can do the unimaginable. They were club¬bing three men who offended them and I hear, even when the men could not run again, they were still clubbing them. When they fell, they were still clubbing them until the three died. I just asked myself, what did they stand to gain by killing three people? The family of those three persons cannot be the same again. Their children have lost their bread winner; the wives have lost their husband. When I heard it, I wept. I did not think there is anything that can justify such acts. Nothing, not even in winning that election, assuming the people who killed those three persons are going to win the elect ion, No: and because God will judge, the repercus¬sion is more than the gain.
The picture you painted is like it”s going to be a fearful 2015 election. Is it going to be a do or die thing?
To the politician, it’s a do or die affair. Even as we are speaking now, 2015 is very far away. I’m talking about now. Our at¬titude to one another smells danger. When you don’t care how your neighbor feels, you don’t care about how your enemies feel, Jesus said we should love our enemies. When you don’t care how your enemies feel, you are a dangerous man. Most politicians don’t care about how their opponents feel. They are willing to destroy them with a club and use that club to catapult themselves to a place of relevance. They will use the club to kill their opponents and use the same club to protect themselves and say we have won.
INEC has promised free and fair election. Foreign agen¬cies have been meeting with the INEC chairman to give necessary support to ensure free and fair election. From the picture you’ve painted, it’s likely history will repeat itself?
Oh Yes, history will repeat itself. But if we want a change, let all the politicians go to school and learn how to play the game of politics. As long as we have untrained politi¬cians, they are going to break the rules of the game which is what they are doing already. Will somebody please, start a school for politicians where they will be taught the rule of this game? We need a school for Nigerian politicians. We need it urgently because the longer we delay, the more people shout aaah: Just this ward congress they had, how many people were killed? And as I speak nobody has been arrested for killing somebody dur¬ing the ward congress. Our security agencies have said nothing about those who were killed and those who killed them. But am sure some family members are weeping? A nation that kills her own is not a good nation, we are killing our own.
You just said we have sur¬vived by sheer miracle. For how long are we going to bank on these miracles?
Unfortunately the bible says, his mercy endures forever. As long as he remains merciful so shall we remain as a nation. But what we do, do not reflect on us as people that want to survive as a nation. The love of unity is over for one another, care for one another, respect for one another and appre¬ciation for one another.
And you said that noth¬ing shocks and surprises us Nigerians? Why are we so ad¬dicted to such attitudes? Why are we different from other nations?
It is because we have no respect for God. A man who has no regard for God cannot have regard for his neighbor. To me, it’s very frightening. Do you know I can not even go near any congress; whether ward congress or primary congress. I can’t go near them because of what may happen.
There’s this pastor that warned Christians about voting for Moslem- Mos¬lem party, and some pastors are also condemning it. what is your take on that?
To me, it is selfishness at his highest peak and whoever is thinking about Moslem/ moslem party is not even thinking of the consequences and that person is selfish. It’s equivalent to a man saying , I will be the principal runner for this ticket and my son will be my running mate. It’s simply saying , no other person is suitable except us. To me, it doesn’t make sense.
But we had that during Abiola and Kingibe?
And what was the result?
They won overwhelmingly sir
Where are they? Did they rule.? The prob¬lem is not whether they won or not. How did that profit Nigeria when they won.
Are you saying religion is something we can’t overlook?
No, you cannot overlook. To overlook religion is to commit suicide in broad day light. And anybody who is talking about Moslem- Moslem ticket is already setting the country on fire. Anybody who is talking about Moslem- Moslem ticket has made Nigeria an accident waiting to happen. Same thing goes to Christian Christian ticket. Politics is what you do everyday. When you go to mosque and you will not go to church, when I go to church and I will not go to the mosque that is what we are practicing ev¬eryday. When the church bell rings and you will not go to the mosque and you will go to church , you are declaring your position, what you stand for.
Some people are of the opin¬ion that president Good luck Jonathan shouldn’t contest for 2015 election because of the chaos and insurgency in the country. What is your take on that?
Whoever is asking him not to contest has stopped thinking. Number one ,the insecurity in the country is part of life. Life has no trou¬ble free zone. There is no country under the sun that has no problem, not one country. In the United States of America, the best coun¬try on the planet earth, they can kill a black man without giving account. They have not shut down white house, or have they? That this problem started while he was in office, he must have learnt lessons that money can¬not buy. He has learnt lessons that no school can teach. We need a man who has tested these problems and learnt some lessons and found ways of solving these problems. We shouldn’t be afraid of opposition. It is part of life. Even in your own family, you are bound to have a child that opposes you. Even in a church, you are bound to have someone who opposes you. Infact a good church is a church where they have some elders who oppose the , but it should be handled with majority.
But he doesn’t seem to be solving any problem?
He is. He may not be solving it the with the speed that you want but he is. When the Boko Haram starts, why we are still here in Nigeria? Why has it not overrun us? Some¬body must have wedged the hedge. The oth¬er thing I want you to know, you don’t need knowledge or anointing to criticize others. Criticisms do not require knowledge, and it does not require accountability. You can just wake up and criticize everybody. That we are still here and that we are still functioning, shows that somebody is working very hard to stop our enemies from crushing all of us. To me, he is the best candidate. He has gone through the mill. He has gone through these crises, he knows it more than many people who are proposing to take over from him. Secondly, we had never had such teachable leader. A leader who is humble, a leader you can demand account and he will give it. We have had bullies rule over us. Somehow, I think we prefer bullies to leaders who can think, leaders who are accountable, leaders who are teachable, leaders who have feeling, leaders who are meek and humble. That is something we never had in Nigeria. So, it is strange to us. We want the violent man who will drive us quick to our graves. We are not used to the leader who will work with us, as we go through the crises of life.
Source: Sun
