Looking for the Leadership

Yesterday (24 Feb) the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria (CBCN) issued a stern warning to the acting president, Goodluck Jonathan.  Following the prolonged and unaccountable absence of its president,  Umaru Yar’Adua,  the question of Nigeria’s leadership was in some confusion until the recent disclosure that he was receiving medical health in Saudi Arabia...

 

After a three month absence, the President returned to Nigeria on Wednesday.

 

What the bishops wanted was assurance that Nigeria’s democratic process would not be destabilised as Nigeria anticipates its general election and its Jubilee anniversary in a few months time.

But the bishops were doing something else: they were taking bold steps to fill a leadership vacuum which had been created in the silence which followed Yar’Adua’s mysterious disappearance.

Rev Felix Alaba-Job, president of CBCN made it clear that the nation couldn’t afford “unpatriotic leadership and irresponsible citizenry.”

And all of us should have a vested interest in this call for stability.  Nigeria is not just another African nation living below its potential. It is the largest of all the African nations with 147 million people. It hosts 47% of West Africa and with its oil and mineral deposits it is potentially one of the richest nations in the world.  Nigeria is also a post-colonial country which has one of the highest indexes of corruption and is one of the world’s most simmering melting pots for religious violence between Muslims and Christians.   And it has now become a synonym for terrorism.  When I travelled through Miami a few days ago the immigration officer asked me if I had ever lived in Nigeria.

But none of us can afford bad leadership in Nigeria.  For Nigeria in many ways still acts as a beacon of African hope.  Its people are enterprising. The Nigerian Diaspora is pervasive.  And its global Christian influence is inestimable. Today some of the largest churches in Europe are led by Nigerians. The largest Protestant congregation in the Ukraine is led by a Nigerian.  And there is a sense that if Nigeria in particular and Africa in general is to rise from its economic and political knees to assume its full height in international company this kind of leadership could yet come from people of faith and in particular the Christian church in Nigeria and abroad.

The church in Nigeria doesn’t have to become embroiled in party politics to be effective.  But it does have a role to be politically aware and prophetic if it wants the leadership Nigeria deserves.

 

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