Former Secretary-General of the Anglican Communion Worldwide, Bishop Josiah Idowu-Fearon, in this interview with SAXONE AKHAINE, speaks on the worsening poverty in Nigeria, the current administration’s response, and the politicisation of religion in a complex society.

How do you react to the dispute between the Presidency and Catholic Archbishops over Nigeria’s economic hardship and the government’s response?
I didn’t follow the discussion between the President and the Roman Catholic Archbishops. But to say people are not suffering as a result of what is going on in our country, I think we are being economical with the truth.

Since I retired to Kaduna, my successor here, Archbishop Timothy Yahaya, has kindly given me clearance to speak. You know, in Anglican ecclesiology and in our church community, we follow well-defined administrative procedures. The Bishop gives you what we call Permission to Officiate (PTO) in his diocese, whether you are a priest or a bishop.

So, he has given me that permission. I have, therefore, had the privilege of going around Kaduna. For example, I was in Nasarawa, and last Sunday, I was in Unguwan Rimi. You can see the suffering. There is no doubt about that.

Even in terms of attendance at church services, people cannot afford to board commercial motorcycles to church. A good number of our congregations are not wealthy enough to organise buses to bring members.

I was in a particular church to worship about a month ago. I counted almost 80 huge buses. There were more than 2,000 members in the church. As I drove in, I saw these buses. The church on its own made provisions for the members. It is not that the people themselves can afford to pay for taxis or buses to church.

So, there is poverty, and this also has implications for our spiritual life. We all need our spiritual life. If you cannot go to church, it means you cannot fellowship. Now, talk about families. I have visited people and seen the level of poverty. A good number of people have just one meal a day. They can hardly afford a balanced meal. I have seen these things. So, I am not an armchair researcher; I am down-to-earth, courtesy of my Bishop.

Now, to say there is no poverty, I am not sure what indices the government is looking at. When you talk about poverty, I have given you examples relating to transportation, feeding and even clothing children.

When you look at these indices, there is no doubt that we are suffering. There is poverty in the country.

Even with your own income, when you take N1,000 to the market, what do you come back with? Almost nothing. Inflation is so bad that household items we used to buy for N500 now cost N5,000. Even basic food items that people cannot do without have become very expensive.

I also heard the Minister of Finance talking about trillions of naira coming in and going to the state governors and local government chairmen. And I ask: where is the money? Where is this money?
So, there is poverty. Instead of denying it, the government should say, “We are aware. This is what we are doing, and this is what we are doing.” It is better to accept reality. I know there is politics going on. The opposition will want to play up the issue. For example, I heard the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, saying he would bring back fuel subsidies, and I laughed.

They will play politics because they know that many Nigerians are gullible and, you know, most of us are not informed. So, whoever is going to give us what we are asking for, nobody wants to ask: “How are you going to do it?”
So, there is politicking going on. But honestly, I believe the President should have accepted the situation and said, “These are the things we are doing to address the situation.”

How do you respond to the view that Bishop John Onaiyekan’s position does not represent the entire Christian community, especially as some Muslim and Christian clerics openly support President Tinubu? What are the implications of the growing involvement of religious leaders in politics?
People will always interpret events from their own perspectives. I did not, and will not, subscribe to the criticism of the Roman Catholic Bishops’ and Archbishops’ visit to the President. Whatever they said reflected the views of the Catholic community? No. I am not Roman Catholic; I am an Anglo-Catholic.

I am a church leader, and I am with the people. I know what they are going through. Here at the Kaduna Centre, we have Muslims, and I know their struggles. We even pay their transport fares to the centre because some cannot afford it. So, this is not a Roman Catholic issue. I don’t subscribe to denominational politics because we are one nation, even though we practise different religions and have different emphases within them.

On the involvement of clerics in politics, whether an Imam, Sheikh, priest or Bishop, when religious leaders regularly hobnob with politicians, they become compromised. They lose what I call their prophetic authority, or their authority as religious leaders. We represent the people to God and God to the people, so we are expected to speak the truth as revealed in the scriptures.

Unfortunately, this is not limited to Muslims. Some Christian leaders, Bishops and Overseers have also been compromised and lost that prophetic edge. If a politician gives you money and makes you comfortable, you can no longer challenge him. You become economical with the truth. That is part of the problem we face in this country.

On Sheikh Jingir’s statement, I know some Christians have taken offence, arguing that there are more Christians, while Muslims make the same claim. As a student of Christian-Muslim relations, I object to this argument. When Christians say, “We are more,” I ask: to what end? What benefit does it bring?
Perhaps what people seek is accessibility. If there is a Muslim Vice-President, some Muslims may feel they have easier access to him, just as Christians may feel the same when one of their own occupies such a position. But there are people who go beyond this.

I had direct access to the late President Muhammadu Buhari, but I can say this for the record: Buhari never gave me one kobo of government money. When I visited him, I sometimes took my own packet of tea because I knew he loved tea. He helped me, however, with the Kaduna Centre. He told me that if he asked the government for assistance, I would refuse, so he would ask his friends to help. The money was deposited into the Centre’s account, and we can account for it.

The same happened with former Vice-President Namadi Sambo. He agreed to provide the Kaduna Centre with a 70KVA generator to power the lift. He is a Muslim; I am a Christian. They knew what we were doing there.
So, whether Christian or Muslim, people sometimes seek someone of their religion to gain access, favour or opportunities. But this divide-and-rule approach will not help us.

I have said repeatedly that politics is a game of numbers. If all Christians in Nigeria decided not to vote for Tinubu, he could not become President. The same applies if only Muslims voted for a Muslim-Muslim ticket. Neither a Muslim-Muslim nor Christian-Christian arrangement should define our politics.

I once wrote an article on this, and I remember the late President Buhari saying that Nigeria does not need a Muslim or Christian President; we need a President who is Christian or Muslim. There is a difference.

We don’t need leaders who merely wear their religion as an identity. We need leaders who carry their faith with them. Whether President, Vice-President, Governor, Deputy Governor, Senator or Minister, we need people whose faith informs their conduct. Neither Islam nor Christianity encourages tribalism, stealing, lying or exploiting people. So, when people insist, “You must be a Muslim or a Christian,” I ask: Is it in the heart?

You were the Chairman of the Kaduna Peace Commission, but it no longer exists. What happened? And do you think that was the right step?
In fairness to the current administration, they have not actually sat down with our governor. We have not had that opportunity. However, the Secretary to the State Government (SSG) had conversations with us. He shared with us the thinking of the present administration. He was also aware of the law that established the commission.

The law provides for a five-year tenure. It is clear: five years. We had stayed for more than five years. I think we were moving into our sixth or seventh year.

I was also part of the discussion with the SSG when we agreed that the focus should be on conflict prevention. To the extent that he even said that when the Kaduna Centre expands, the government would see how it could partner with us and encourage people to come and study there.

So, the situation that warranted the establishment of the Peace Commission has changed. We achieved a lot, no doubt about it. But because it was a mandate for a period of five years, we felt it was right for the government to take that decision.

Again, for now, none of us was invited to be part of the ongoing process because the government is not yet focusing on prevention. When we get to that stage, I am still in conversation with the SSG.

Do you consider Governor Uba Sani’s return to the Muslim-governor, Christian deputy arrangement in Kaduna a step in the right direction, after el-Rufai’s Muslim-Muslim ticket?
Well, because it is a state matter, I wouldn’t want to say much about it, but I will generalise. I think the situation we face in this country demands decisions that reflect the peculiarities of each state.

My PhD research focused on Kaduna State. There is hardly any local government in the state that I don’t know fairly well, including its religious composition. My thesis, titled ‘Religion, Social Responsibility and Development in Kaduna State’, was undertaken in the Department of Sociology at Ahmadu Bello University.

Kaduna is very complex. My research required identifying three areas: those with a Muslim majority and Christian minority; those with a Christian majority and Muslim minority; and those with roughly equal numbers. It is an old study, so I don’t want to dwell on it.

When I speak about Kaduna, I do so with academic authority because I have actually traversed the state and studied its population and religious composition.

So, although I said earlier that I don’t subscribe to Muslim-Muslim or Christian-Christian tickets, the political terrain in Kaduna supports what Governor Uba Sani has done.

But that does not detract from my earlier point: if all Muslims in Kaduna refused to vote for Uba Sani because of this decision, and only Christians voted for him, he could not win.