Bishop Kayode Williams, Founder, Christ Vessels of Grace Church Inc and National Coordinator, Integrity Ministers International Ministry Inc. (IMIM). In a recent interview with Adedoyin Falolu the clergyman sheds light on the role of faith-based organisations vis-à-vis the raging controversy over the Muslim-Muslim ticket declared by the All Progressives Congress (APC) party amongst other issues. Excerpts:
What do you make of the raging controversy over the Muslim-Muslim ticket announced by the All Progressives Congress party?
Well actually, I think I want to first of all thank Nigerians for being patient with the goings. The tension is good but it’s not necessary altogether. If you look at Bola Ahmed Tinubu, if you look at his antecedents you will know that he’s a man who always studies very hard.Before he makes decisions and even when he starts because we are following him. But God has decided to ask us that His own candidate from heaven to earth is Tinubu and that we as Integrity Ministers International Ministry should support him, collaborate with him, so we are all round moving with him to know the steps he’s taking. So when hegot to the issue of Muslim-Muslim ticket, Bola Ahmed Tinubu did not just jump into it. As a strategist, he asked somebody to hold on for him until he was able to consult widely, looking at the implications and consequences that will follow if he chooses a wrong vice president. At the end of the day he came up to tell the nation that he’s ready, that he is settling for a Muslim like himself: Kassim Shettima. Immediately there was uproar as citizens started reacting even gentlemen of the press were going to bring calamity to the country so we should not vote, saith the Lord.’ I will accept that wholeheartedly. But coercing as if they are paying the pastors in Nigeria? Do they know how some pastors struggle before they get their church built? Do they know how much pains, sorrows and agonies some pastors are passing through? So if anybody comes provided they do not dip their hands into anything that’s bad. So, if they gang up today and say Kayode we are removing you, I will just laugh it off. This is because they don’t need to remove me as I’m not a member of CAN. I’m an independent pastor living under the grace of God.
Do you think faith-based organisations like CAN, PFN, others have any role to play in politics?
The role they are supposed to play is the role of a father guiding his children, counseling them, talking to them without making noise. They forced me to do this, I didn’t want to talk. But I’m not a baby in Christendom. There’s nobody among the Christian leaders that will say that they have never heard of me. They know me, they know my roots: I have been to the CAC, the Apostolic Church and the Pentecostal and theAnglican churches respectively. There are hardly any of these churches that I have not organised crusades for one time or the other. So they seem to be talking to themselves alone because when you talk of people that will vote, it’s not these people that are talking, they may not have the opportunity of voting, and some of them may not even have their PVCs. But the people we call voters are the people they are castigating. Those pastors they are castigating are great mobilisers. Instead they mocked and made them look like ordinary people. There’s no pastor in Nigeria that’s ordinary because they carry the anointing of the Almighty.So, how can you call them unknown, are they criminals? Did they go there to steal? Just because they wore cassocks, so they should be called vagabonds? So many people said a lot of unprintable things and it is not edifying for me to use the same language with them. But all I’m doing is to appeal to everybody to let us come back to a roundtable and give peace a chance. Let us hear from these people, let them deliver their messages without rancour and quarrel. Let them showcase what they have and let the citizens judge. But as for me and my household and members of Integrity Ministers, we are for Tinubu because thus saith the Lord, Tinubu is my secret.