Catholic Archbishop Emeritus of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan.
Photo credit: Wikipedia.
The Catholic Archbishop Emeritus of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, has cautioned politicians against any attempt to rig the forthcoming general election.
Onaiyekan gave the caution during the celebration of his 40th anniversary as a bishop, at the Holy Trinity Church, Maitama, Abuja.
“With the current yearnings of the people for a better country, the election will no longer be business as usual,”he said.
He also admonished politicians to desist from manipulating election results or causing violence.
“All those who are planning to play games and scheme to rig in order to frustrate the desire of the decision of the people as regards the results of the elections should desist from such,” he noted.
Onaiyekan assured that he had no special candidate, adding that the advice was for the politicians to understand that “the mood in which Nigeria now is, is not a mood that they will quietly accept a rigged election.
“For the sake of peace, there will be serious repercussions if anybody doesn’t allow free and fair elections. It won’t be business as usual anymore,” he stated.
He added, “I want Nigerians to know that they can no longer keep quiet all the time, hoping that things will change, that God will work miracles.”
Onaiyekan advised Nigerians to use their voter cards to express their minds.
He stressed that the election outcome would not be about who has more campaign posters or can mobilise more crowds to stadiums.
“It will depend on who can convince Nigerians and give us a new kind of government.
“Government that is based on people interested in working for the common good and not out to enrich themselves or stay in power or protect their stolen wealth so as not to be queried,” he said.
The archbishop advised politicians to fear God, as they would answer for their actions before Him.
“Even if no one asks questions, God will ask questions, and He has His way of asking questions,” he added.
In another development,the General Overseer,Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Eunoch Adeboye, said that politicians were renting jobless youths to attend their campaign rallies.
Pastor Adeboye,who stated this during a sermon at the church auditorium in Mowe, Ogun State, said that political parties did not schedule their rallies “simultaneously in a town” because the crowd were paid to gather.
He noticed that after the “campaigns would be over” the participants will be jobless.
Pastor Adeboye, who earlier said that God is yet to reveal the winner of the 2023 elections, however, said that “thousands of youths” participating in the rallies were doing so because of joblessness.
“I watch it in the news. If human beings promote you, oh, I don’t know whether I should say this. I’m sure you have been watching the campaign rallies, I watch it on the news.
“I don’t know if you have noticed that two different people don’t hold their campaign simultaneously in a town. Have you noticed that? You don’t know why? This is because,majority of the crowd, majority are rented.
“So I come, I pay, you gather. After I’ve gone, another man comes, he pays, you gather,” Pastor Adeboye added.
He pointed out that , “Somebody said ‘Daddy, you keep on saying that you haven’t heard from God about who will win or who will…’
Maybe because there are several things occupying my mind and one of it is; when I see the crowd gathering and if you look at the crowd, majority of them crowd are young.
“When I see the hundreds of thousands of youths, you have to be jobless to be attending all these rallies. What is going to happen when the campaigns are over?” the clergy added.
