Rev Dr Israel Akanji
By Akanji Alowolodo, Gombe
The President of the Nigerian Baptist Convention (NBC), Rev Dr Israel Akanji has expressed optimism that Nigeria will come out stronger and more united at the end of the 2023 General elections irrespective of the outcome.
Isreal Akanji was fielding questions from Journalists in Gombe after the annual International Workers Conference held at First Baptist Church in Gombe over the weekend.
Reacting to assertion of some religious leaders on the insinuations that the Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) is an agenda to Islamize the country, the NBC President said that, “We believe that the nation is beyond any Scholar, the nation belongs to the Almighty God.”
He added that, “and, we as Christians do not just respond unless God leads us to respond, we are taught as Christians not to respond negative for negative or evil for evil, we don’t respond that way, we only respond to the leading of the Holy spirit.”
Israel Akanji said that,”We are hearing what people are saying, but, we are also listening to what God is saying to us, that the nation, Nigeria is bigger than any religion or any group and that God Himself is going to choose for us a leader after His heart, the best that will make the nation great again, we must always give room to God to lead us, the best of our choice may not be His choice.”
Making reference to the choice of David as King over Israel, he said that,”Just as it happened in the Bible when a king was about to be chosen for Israel, the Prophet was looking at the physical appearance but God was looking at the inside, it was the one God had prepared that eventually became king.”
“We are praying in Nigeria that he who God has prepared will be our leader and when he comes, God will be glorified, that is what we believe.”
On the preparations of the conduct of the 2023 General elections, he opined that, “The INEC has a lot to do, particularly in collaboration with security agencies for the success of the elections. And the security that we need for the elections is not the security they will take on the day of the elections, it is the security that must be put in place from now, from even before now, intelligence gathering to be able to know the hotbeds of violence and to prepare to counter such hotbeds.”
He stressed that,”It will be wrong for the security agencies to wait till the day of the election before they start moving round to say that they are going to provide security, work on the provision of security should begin from now in earnest and the government should work with the security agents to do that.”
Israel Akanji however said that,”I believe that INEC has tried but they have not done enough, they still have more to do in the area of people collecting their PVCs, it has a lot to do in not making people to waste all of their time trying to collect.”
According to him, “when people go to collect PVC and it is taking time, like 9 hours, definitely the person is bound to give up and just go away. That is where we feel that INEC has not done well enough, it needs to deploy more staff into handling this issue of PVCs and it need to be honest, on a day it is not convenient, it should not ask people to come, line them up and not attending to them.”
“So for me, the number of people who have not collected their PVCs is still alarming and that ought to be worked on very seriously and of course the security situation should be worked on,” he added.
He also said that, “But not all Nigerians know that we are all part of the security, don’t leave security into the hands of some people and make yourself vulnerable to just be ready for some people to come and attack you.”
Israel Akanji said that, “no, every community should rise up and say we are going for this election and nobody will intimidate us, nothing will happen to us, speak positively to yourself and be ready, let your men come out, let us engage and not give room for some marauders to just come and run us over, we are all part of the security system and we must all be ready to.”
The NBC President concluded saying,”I am quite positive about the general elections because I believe that unless the Lord builds the house, the builders Labour in vain, God is not leaving it to us alone, there is a divine presence which will frustrate the token of all those who are having negative thoughts, even if the leaders are not sincere, God will take over from them and make things work perfectly. Nigerians should have believe and remain positive.”
