Nigeria may cease to exist - Pastor Enoch Adeboye
Worried by the incessant killings of innocent citizens in Nigeria, especially in the northern parts, the General Overseer of The Redeemed Christians Church of God, Pastor Enoch Adeboye, has warned that Nigeria as a nation may cease to exist.
Adeboye, while leading the congregation to pray during the May edition of the monthly Holy Ghost Service at the Redemption Camp at Mowe, Ogun State, late on Friday, also warned that elections might not take place next year if the killings are not stopped.
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During the service with the theme: “Stronger Than Your Enemies 5” and sub titled, ‘Habitation of the Almighty’, Adeboye pointed out that Nigerians would find it difficult to go out to vote next year if they fear that they could be killed while performing their civic duty.
He said there was a bishop that asked him if God has revealed to him (Adeboye), who would win 2019 election. Adeboye, who is popularly known as ‘Daddy G.O.’ said he replied that there might not even be a Nigeria in 2019 unless people stopped the killings.
He said: “I have seen a civil war. Nations may survive civil wars, but there is no nation that can survive a religious war!”
Noting his distress at the killings of Christian worshippers in Benue State recently and how it provoked his wife to nudge him, he said: “I said there is no father who would lose 19 children in a day and be quiet. She said what do you mean, because she hadn’t heard the news that in a church, somebody went in and shot 19 people.
“It doesn’t matter the denomination…by the special grace of God, all Christians in Nigeria call me Daddy. So when any of them dies, it’s my son or daughter that is dead,” Pastor Adeboye said.
Urging the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government to immediately stop the killings, he said: “I am going to ask you to join me in prayer, because unless these killings stop, and stop immediately, even Nigeria may not live. I am not talking about individuals now, I am talking about Nigeria itself…a bishop asked me not too long ago, ‘Daddy, has God told you who will win the next election?’
“I said, ‘Sir, I am not even sure yet that there will be an election. Because unless these killings stop, there may be no elections next year’. ‘Are you prophesying, Daddy?’ No, no! I am not prophesying. I am just reasoning. Because nobody will want to go out to vote if they are not sure they will be able to return home safely.”
Stating that he had seen war before and would not want to see another one, the pastor said: “It’s a terrible thing. A nation may survive a civil war, but no nation can survive a religious war and still remain the same. That Nigeria may live, these killings must stop. “So all of you who love Nigeria, I want you to rise on your feet, and cry to God with all your heart, and say: ‘Father, let the killings stop…that Nigeria may live, please God let the killings stop.”
The comment of Pastor Adeboye is coming a day after the Metropolitan Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, had warned that just as Christians mobilised against corruption in the 2015 presidential election, Christendom is going to mobilise against continued corruption and insecurity in the 2019 election.
Onaiyekan, who spoke against the backdrop of happenings in Nigeria, particularly corruption and killings across the country, warned that “We will mobilise against evil, whoever it is. It is very interesting that we mobilised against corruption in 2015. We mobilised strongly against corruption and which is why some people thought that we supported Buhari, even though Buhari was a Moslem candidate. Just as we mobilised against corruption in 2015, we are going to mobilise against continued corruption in 2019 and insecurity and I will say also, against any effort to simply turn our country into an impossible place – polarization where people can no longer see one another as brothers.”
He said his candid advice for President Buhari is to ask him to retire from politics in 2019.
It will be recalled that recently, herdsmen reportedly stormed St. Ignatius Catholic Church in Ayar-Mbalom, a community in Gwer East Local Government Area of Benue State, during Morning Mass, killing two Priests and 17 worshipers.
Terver Akase, a spokesperson to Governor Samuel Ortom, disclosed that the attackers, aside murdering the worshipers, also burnt 50 houses and sacked the entire community before leaving.
President Donald Trump of the United States of America during Buhari’s visit to that country warned “… we have had a very serious problem with Christians who are being murdered, killed in Nigeria.
We gonna be working on that problem, and working on that problem very, very hard, because we can’t allow that to happen.”