by Femi Fani-Kayode
Ordinarily religion should not be brought into politics but sadly the APC has done precisely that. They have introduced religion into politics in a very irresponsible, divisive and dangerous manner and they are using it as a political tool and as a means to capture power.
Those of you that are Christians and that are moderate Muslims that believe in a secular state and that are still in the APC need to think twice. It is like having black people as members of Ku Klux Klan.
It is like having Jews as members of Hitler’s Nazi party. It is like having black South Africans as members of the apartheid-loving, white-supremacist Boer Nationalist Party. It is like having Christians and moderate Muslims as members of Al Qaeda, the Taliban and Al Shabab.
The difference between the APC and the PDP is that the former is a party that will only field a Muslim Presidential candidate at every point in time whilst the latter is quite capable of fielding either a Christian or a Muslim Presidential candidate at any point in time. The former is divisive whilst the latter is inclusive.
The former breeds and engenders a philosophy that is no different to that which was espoused by the Boers in apartheid South Africa: a philosophy that is established and enshrined on a platform of hate and division and that prides itself on the boastful assertion that some ethnic nationalities were ”born to rule” and that some faiths are more equal than others.
The latter encourages religious harmony and seeks to establish and build a plural society where adherents of all faiths, all ethnic nationalities and all tribes are regarded as being equal.
The PDP is for both Christians and Muslims and it believes in racial integration, religious tolerance and ethnic harmony. The APC is a Boko Haramite party that is for Muslim extremists only and a handful of Christians who really don’t know what they have got themselves into.
Such lost souls are in need of counselling. They forget that the wise ones say ”woe be unto any believer that seeks to join hands with others to bury Christ’s Church and to shame His people and His gospel”.
One of the more credible leaders in the APC is Sam Nda Isaiah, the Kakaki Nupe. He is the most formidable columnist in Nigeria and the publisher of the influential Leadership Newspaper. I know Sam very well and he is closer to me than a brother. We may not agree on everything but there is no doubt in my mind that he is a profoundly good man and a very serious-minded Christian. He is also forthright, cerebal, courageous, decisive and very tough.
He has Presidential ambitions and, in my view, if the APC had been a sensible or serious-minded set of people they would have fielded Sam as their candidate and paired him up with a muslim running mate from the South West but this will never happen because the Haramites and islamic fundamentalists in that party consider it to be ”their” platform.
Femi Aribisala made a very good point in his column in Premium Times and the Sunday Vanguard Newspaper week when he wrote about the deep wisdom there was in the APC fielding a northern Christian candidate for next year’s Presidential elections if they really wished to get rid of their muslim fundamentalist tag. I agree with him.
Yet sadly the truth is that the APC will never allow a christian to be the candidate of their party and, as one of its key leaders once said to me in very plain and simple terms, such a thing would happen only over his ”dead body”.
Expecting the APC to field a christian as its presidential candidate is like expecting ISIS to declare the Pope as its leader. It is like expecting Al Qaeda to declare the Archbishop of Canterbury as its Supreme Commander. It is like expecting Al Shabab to declare Pastor Enoch Adeboye of the Redeemed Christian Church of God as its Field Marshall. It is like expecting the Al Nusra Front to declare Dr.Daniel Olukoya of the Mountain Of Fire Ministries as its political facilitator. It is like expecting Boko Haram to declare Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor of the Word Of Life Bible Church and the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria, as its life President.
It is like expecting the Muslim Brotherhood, the Janjaweed, Daesh, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Khorasan and the Taliban to declare Bishop Mike Okonkwo, Pastor William F. Kumuyi, Bishop David Oyedepo, Archbishop Nicholas Duncan-Williams, Bishop T.D. Jakes, Rev. John Hagee, Rev. Creflo Dollar, Dr. B.O. Ezekiel, Pastor Wale Adefarasin, Pastor Tony Rapu, Pastor Paul Adefarasin and the late Archbishop Benson Idahosa as their spiritual mentors and elder statesmen. Such a thing can never happen. Those that think otherwise are simply naive.
Let me be very clear here. I have nothing against Muslims. As a matter of fact I have nothing but respect for all those real Muslims that believe in a secular state, that believe in peaceful co-existence, that have no issues with those that do not share their faith, that do not use violence and terror as a means of effecting their purpose and that see religion as a purely personal affair. Most of my Muslim friends fall into that category.
Such is my liberal disposition when it comes to members of other faiths that on 17th Jan. 2013 I actually tweeted that I believed that Nasir El Rufai, the former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory and Babatunde Fashola, the Governor of Lagos state would have made a formidable combination as Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates respectively for the opposition in 2015.
They are both Muslims but I didn’t care simply because at that time the APC had not been formed as a party and the opposition had no religious or Islamist agenda. At that time they still harboured a certain level of decency, respectability and sanity.
Sadly today, just under two years after that suggestion was originally tweeted, the APC has not only been formed but it has also transmuted into a political party that has decided to use Islam as its primary tool of mobilisation and main source of motivation. It also has strong links with Boko Haram.
I have said it before and I will say it again: the APC is the political wing of Boko Haram and Boko Haram is the military wing of the APC. The two are soul mates. This is in the same way that Sinn Fein was the political wing of the Irish Republican Army and the Irish Republican Army was the military wing of Sinn Fein.
The suggestion that anyone should support a party such as this, a party that has a clear and distinct islamisation policy and agenda, a party that has strong covert links with Boko Haram and a party that, at least up until very recently, wished to field a Muslim/Muslim ticket is repugnant to me. It turns my stomach, it vexes my spirit, it troubles my soul and it offends my sensibilities. That is why I oppose such a party and such a single faith ticket.
The truth is that if it ever got power the APC would use it to islamise Nigeria, to humiliate and degrade Christians, to marginalise moderate Muslims, to undermine and destroy the Church of Christ and to implement a covert Boko Haram agenda. I have no apology to anyone for taking this position because it is based on nothing but truth. There is no doubt that there are quite a few people in the APC that are not muslim fundamentalists.
Sadly though those people are in a party that is infested with and in the control and power of jihadists, religious zealots and islamist extremists. This is a party that has defended Boko Haram on several occasions and whose supreme leader and leading presidential aspirant has espoused, endorsed and consistently enunciated some of the stated objectives, ideals and philosophies of Boko Haram such as the spreading of sharia law all over Nigeria, including down to the south.
Only an intellectually challenged person or someone that is blind, naive, irresponsible and shortsighted would support such a party. That is why I left them and that is why I am committed to opposing and exposing them. They are cult-like in all their ways, they are dangerous to the future, peace, unity, stability and well-being of Nigeria and their intentions for this country are absolutely evil.
It is my prayer that the few moderate and more reasonable men and women within their ranks like Sam Nda Isaiah, Kashim Ibrahim Imam, Kayode Fayemi, Lawal Shuaibu, Adams Oshiomole, Rabiu Kwakwanso, Rauf Aregbesola, Tanko Al Makura, Atiku Abubakar, Bukola Saraki, Hannatu Musawa, Sharon Ikeazor, Hadiza Usman Yakubu, Joseph Waku, Audu Ogbeh, Ogbonaya Onu, Abiola Ajimobi, Ibikunle Amosun, Adeyemi Ikuforiji, Joel Danlami Ikenya, Yusuf Tuggar and a handful of others would simply find the courage to get up and leave in the same way that Ali Modu Sheriff, Tom Ikimi, Ibrahim Shekarau, Attahiru Bafarawa, Femi Lanlehin, Nuhu Ribadu, Buba Marwa, Marcus Gundiri, Dele Belgore, yours truly and many others did a few weeks and months ago. It is better late than never.
An El Rufai/Fashola ticket is a dream that once was but sadly no longer exists. That dream was shattered and destroyed by the obsessive ambitions of a tiny handful of greedy and power-drunk men and the formation, metamorphosis and tragic evolution of what was originally an attractive and respectable political platform to a deeply divisive and divided political party that is obsessed with religion, that has sympathy for terrorists and that has troubling intentions for Nigeria. What a tragedy!
Femi Fani-Kayode is a lawyer and former minister of aviation. He is a member of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), he was once a member of the All Progressive Congress (APC). He writes from Lagos.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
