Pastor Ugochukwu Ezeagwula is the chairman of 2025 Kingdom Live World Conference planning committee of The Redeemed Evangelical Mission, (TREM). In this interview with IYABO LAWAL, he spoke on the forthcoming conference, the arrangements put in place and what participants stand to benefit.

What Kingdom Life Word Conference 2025 is all about?
Kingdom Life World Conference (KLWC) is the flagship yearly convention of TREM. This is the 35th edition. It’s a conference that brings together over 200 chapters, across the world. It’s more like our festive season in TREM. Beyond our internal community, we also invite people from across the city and beyond.

We have had amazing speakers in the past, it has been very impactful. We call it a life-changing conference. There are lots of testimonies that have come out of the conference. The interesting thing is that I grew up attending Kingdom Life. So, it’s very humbling that today, I am the chairman of the planning committee and this took my mind back to my early days, when I was in school.

I attended Command, Ikeja, so, I know for some of us who were in school, who were TREMITES, we will always look forward to Kingdom Life because it’s our festive season. It’s a conference that has stayed over the years and impacted a lot of generations.

For this year, we have our convener, who is the Presiding Bishop of TREM, Bishop Mike Okonkwo; his wife, Bishop Peace Okonkwo, and other speakers such as Dr. Mensa Otabil of ICGC, Accra, Ghana; Pastor Matthew Ashimolowo; Bishop Tudor Bismark from Zimbabwe; Bishop Wale Ajayi of the Church of God Mission; and Pastor Flourish Peters from Logic Church.

So, in a nutshell, Kingdom Life is the flagship yearly convention of The Redeemed Evangelical Mission.

Apart from these speakers, what are the major highlights that will standout this year’s conference?
One of the things I tell people about KLWC is that there is something in it for everybody. Over time, Kingdom Life has also evolved in such a way that we have some other programmes within the conference that speak to different segments of people. So, apart from the conference itself, which is very apostolic, we also have what we call the Big League Summit, which is the vision of the convener.

As the name implies, we are trying to raise apostles in the marketplace, people who are going to play in the Big League. Of course, the more righteous people that are economically self-sustaining, the more society is impacted. Money in the hands of a godly man will do much more than money in the hand of somebody who is not godly.

So, it’s important, therefore, that we raise this new breed of leaders in the marketplace. And that’s where the idea of the Big League Summit came about. For some years now, it’s been a major feature of the Kingdom Life World Conference.

This year, it’s going to be from Monday, November 23 to 30. For the Big League Summit, it’s going to be three days on Monday through to Wednesday in the morning sessions. Then also, we have other features of the conference, including an international music concert called the Zamar Concert. The concert over the years has been a very major feature of the Kingdom Life World Conference.

On Friday of the conference, it’s going to be an all-night concert; an atmosphere of worship and praise. And we have leading artistes that will perform in Nigeria. They’ve all graced the stage of the concert before and they are coming this year too.

Talking about Pastor Nathaniel Bassey, Dunsin Oyekan, Tim Godfrey; these are people that have graced the platform of Zamar, Mercy Chinwo and others. So, it’s a concert like no other. And what stands Zamar out is that it’s a period of unbridled worship.

People hold concerts here and there, but for us, it’s about intense, unbridled worship. And then, of course, we also have the business leg of it and that is the Gbagada Shopping Festival.

And the Gbagada Shopping Festival, you know, like I say to people, where you have close to 20,000 people coming together, you know, whether it is for worship or anything, it’s also an avenue for commerce. And so, it’s good that we are intentional about it. You know, people are going to travel from all around the country and even beyond Nigeria. They’re going to come for the conference.

There’s going to be exchange of value beyond the worship, beyond the word and beyond this, people are going to eat. You know somebody would want to buy some consumables. And so we want, we are creating an ecosystem where value is, you know, value stays. And then there is exchange of value. And it ties back to what we are talking about, you know, the marketplace mindset. So we’ve always had a commercial center every year during the course of the Kingdom Live World Conference. But for this year, we decided to scale it up and then also have something that will impact more around the community. And so we have what we call the Gbagada Shopping Festival. We have the billboards all around town already.

The idea of the Gbagada Shopping Festival is to create a platform or an avenue where, you know, people can buy, people can sell. Interesting thing about this year’s festival also, or the Gbagada Shopping Festival, is that it coincides with one of the weeks or the days of peak sales. You know, in the secular world, they call it the Black Friday, so part of what we are also getting all our vendors to do is to sell, to come to the place and sell at a relatively cheaper price to attract more sales.

Besides, the shopping festival is something we are very excited about. It’s the first of its kind in Gbagada. A lot of people that have seen it and said, oh, this is a novel idea. This is beautiful. That’s what the Gbagada Shopping Festival is all about.

Kingdom Life is a festival, and when you have a festival, it’s carnival-like. there’s something in it for everybody. By the way, the children are not left out. We have the largest children mass choir in Nigeria, and if not Africa, we have a mass choir of over 1,200 children.

So, this season gets the children excited. They are already rehearsing. And on the last day of the conference, it’s a showcase for them. It’s beautiful, it’s colourful. It’s wonderful. So, like I said, there is something in it for everybody. Kingdom Life is a festival in all respects, in all ramifications.

Would it be correct to say that the objective of KLWC over the years has been actualised? Beyond doubt, the conference objective has not just been actualised, it has been surpassed. Because at the end of the day, what do you say is the objective of a conference? It’s to transform lives and lives have been transformed.

I just gave you an example of myself as a person. I mean, I grew up in this commission. I grew up attending the conference. And today, God has lifted me to the point that I’m now privileged to chair the committee of this conference. So, I’m a life that has been transformed. And you can tell everybody around. I mean, Pastor Soji is doing amazing in business. You know, these are teachings. I know that Pastor Soji was really influenced by the teachings of Dr. Otabil. You can see that there are practical testimonies. And we have a series of testimonies that are being recorded as we speak; In fact, there’s a young man who came last year. He was having a challenge in his work; And he just decided to say, this kingdom life. You know, we had the tagline last year. We said, ‘my kingdom life’. He said, this kingdom life is my kingdom life. And unknown to him, he came for the conference.

And incidentally, one of the speakers of the big league summit is the chairman of the board of the organisation where he works and he’s having a challenge.

Imagine, he didn’t come for that conference. You know, and then he came and when he saw the man, he came to me, whispered, he said, this is my chairman. Can I be allowed to see him at the green room? I said, why not?
So, I called him. He came in. He saw his chairman. He told me he was having a running issue with his MD. You know, he’s an internal control person. And he was trying to, it seemed like he was blocking his boss. You know, and they were trying to frustrate him. And this was on a Thursday. He met with the chairman. Of course, the chairman, he was a political appointment. So he also was being a bit diplomatic around the answer.

But you see, God is awesome. Because on the Friday, the following day, a job that he had applied for long ago that he had forgotten, an international job, was made possible.

They sent him an offer on a Friday. And the day after this, the chairman was like, try to go and have a meeting with your MD on Monday. On Friday, he got an offer. Immediately, he resigned. And he’s taking up the offer. Earning in foreign currency and all that. That is my kingdom life. Those are the kind of testimonies that happen. It’s mind-blowing testimonies So, I can say without any doubt that the objectives of the conference have been met and were surpassed.

What informs the choice of the theme?
There’s a scriptural reference to it. 1 Peter 2:9, it reinforces the fact that you are not like every other person. You have a seal, you have the anointing, the grace of God upon your life, you know, and you do uncommon things, you know. It takes an uncommon person to achieve uncommon things. It takes an uncommon atmosphere for uncommon miracles to happen.

As the 35th edition; what should the participants look for, especially as regards the uniqueness of the number?
One thing I will just say is that the blessings of God are new every morning. Do you understand? So, one thing everybody who is coming for the 35th edition will know is that their lives will never remain the same. This is a life-enriching conference, a life-transforming conference. So, yes, not just because it is the 35th edition, but because this year, this year God is set to visit us in a unique way. It’s an uncommon conference. In an uncommon way, God is set to visit everybody in an uncommon way.

If I am to be part of the Gbagada Festival as a visitor or as a participant, what do I do?
For the Gbagada Shopping Festival, the target audience are different. So, you have the exhibitors, which we call the vendors, and then, of course, we have the participants.

So, for the exhibitors, what you simply need to do is either visit the website, and then there’s a link. So, visit the website, gbagada shopfest.com and you’ll see information about the Shopping Festival, how you can register as an exhibitor. For participants, you just walk in and enjoy good deals. So this environment is open.

It’s open to everybody during that period. By the way, we’ve had subscriptions, massive subscriptions. It’s very encouraging, you know, for the first time we’re doing a Shopping Festival in Gbagada, having that kind of subscription; and the interesting thing also is that most of the people that have subscribed are not even TREMITES. It means that the community has received the message, and they are taking it in very, very well. So we are expecting massive participation, even on the side of shoppers who are going to come to buy.

Why should I leave SPAR and ShopRite, and even the Gbagada Market, and be at the Gbagada Festival?
Simple, it’s going to be unbeatable deal. So, there are unbeatable deals. Another thing we need to know is that God has blessed us with creativity and innovation. This year, I don’t know if there’s any Shopping Festival that is going to do what we are doing. So, what we’re doing during this Shopping Festival is that one of the key highlights is that we are theming each day. So, we have a theme for each day. For instance, there’s a day for fashion. There’s a day for renewable energy. There’s a day for electronics.

Why are we doing that? Before we came in here, we had a meeting with a brand that is coming in on renewable energy. Now for that brand, for instance, on the day that it’s earmarked for renewable energy, as a committee, we are driving incentives.

So, we are saying, every renewable energy product that is purchased on this day, you qualify for a raffle draw, where you win amazing prizes. And guess what you are going to win? You might end up winning a solar inverter.

We are stimulating sales for the exhibitor, and at the same time, we are also creating value for the participants. And so back to your question as to what you are going to get, it’s uncommon deals because it’s an uncommon conference.

With such a large number of people coming to the conference, how do you manage traffic and possibly security during the programme?
One of the things we did last year when we were appointed members of the planning committee was to solve the issue of security. Prior to last year, we had incidents where vehicles were parked on the highway, not because we want to park, but because there was no space.

So, what we did last year was to invest, as a committee, we invested in recovering additional space, because the church has a large expanse of land. We brought heavy equipment in, and we were able to clear some places, fill some places, recover more parking spaces. And we’re going to do that also this year.

One thing I assure you is that we will not be a nuisance to the community. And also, we will deploy and engage the services of government agencies that are statutorily responsible for effective management of traffic. We have a good relationship; we engage them every year. And then also, for security, we also ensure that we have security personnel around in such a way that is not scary and intrusive.

It’s still a ground of worship, but one thing we do a lot is intelligence gathering. This is a full camera zone, and we have a control room. So, in terms of security, without necessarily being too loud, I can tell you that security is adequately taken care of.

Also, one thing you cannot take away in terms of security, you must see, you must be able to see the intruder. And that’s where we are, every year we make sure we light up, we enhance the lighting around the environment. Just to say that security and traffic issues are very paramount to us. Beyond that also, there’s safety, Safety in case of emergency and all that. So, part of what we are doing this year is an enlightenment video that’s going to be played, just so that you know what to do in case of an emergency. This is an international conference, and we have a lot of people coming in.

The Kingdom Life Conference is a yearly event, will the Gbagada shopping festival also continue?
I have a limited tenure as the Kingdom Life Chairman; and so, if it remains as Gbagada Shopping Festival or not, one thing that has always been constant in the conference is the commercial area, that is what it was called last year, but what we will just do this year is we gave it a life, called it Gbagada shopping festival and enhance it, increase the exhibition spaces and moved it to a location more visible to the public. Who knows, the person coming next might decide to call it International Fair and make it even bigger than what it is, but it is a major feature of Kingdom Life Conference.

So, if I’m not at Kingdom Life 2025, Gbagada Festival or the Big League, what would I miss?
Where have you been? That’s the question, where would you say you have been in 2025? You went through 2025, you are opportune to be in Lagos and you are not at Kingdom Life World Conference, where you will have an opportunity to be a part of the Big League Summit, be a part of the Zamar Concert and of course, the Gbagada Festival. Look at how one week is feature-packed. One week, this is eight days, fully feature-packed. You can’t come here and it’s a dull moment, right? And then not to talk about the great apostolic impartation that’s going to happen during that conference.

Can you tell us the highlights of the event?
The first night is the opening night, so, it’s just one session: evening session. Then on Monday, we will have the morning session, which is the Big League Summit. In the evening, it’s the Big League Summit. So, from Monday 24 through to Wednesday 26, the morning session is going to be Big League Summit. It’s part of the conference, but that’s what we have in the morning session because it’s addressing businesses and careers.

Then in the evening, on those days also, from Monday through to Thursday, in the evenings, we have the apostolic sessions. In the evenings where we have men of God such as Dr. Mensah, Bishop Tudor, Pastor Ashimolowo, Pastor Flourish and Bishop Wale Ajayi.

This is evening, Monday to Thursday. And I said Monday to Wednesday morning is Big League Summit.Then, Thursday morning is a special international women prayer conference. So, our resident pastor at the headquarters, who is also the wife of the Presiding Bishop, that’s Dr. Peace Okonkwo, she has a ministry. God has inspired in her a ministry that has also spanned up to 30 years.

She gathers women together once every month to pray. So that Thursday of the conference, which is 27, is also going to coincide with the day in the month that she usually holds the international women prayer conference. So, that day is going to be a special edition of the international women prayer conference.

Now, what happens with the special edition is that it’s also open to men. It is not every edition that is open to men, but special editions are open to men. So it’s a prayer conference that testimonies have come out of. People who have not had children, people who have been believing in God for the fruit of the womb for 20 years have been blessed by the fruit of the womb.

So, we’ve had amazing testimonies come out of that. Then on Friday, the morning session is a bit lighter because we have the concert in the evening.In the morning session, we have the graduation of our Bible school. So that morning session on Friday is geared towards the graduation of the Bible school.

On Wednesday morning, during the Big League Summit, we are also going to graduate our skills participants. So, we have a skills initiative that is a part of the Kingdom Life, although it holds earlier. It holds during the summer, where we train people in different skills.

Last year, we introduced the digital skills in collaboration with MTN Foundation. So, we’ve had thousands of people train in digital skills. And then, of course, we have other vocational skills like hair making, shoe making and many more.

So, usually, we graduate them. They’ve finished now for this year. They’ve finished, but we’ll now bring them together on Wednesday of the Big League Summit. You know, because that day is also geared towards entrepreneurship. So we’ll bring them on the Wednesday of the Big League Summit for their graduation.

I think the last count, there are about a thousand. But we’ve actually done more. So, if you look at over the years, we’ve trained more than 10,000. But this year, I can tell you, yes, both for the vocational. So the vocational people come onsite here for three weeks. They come here every day for three weeks.

They had a graduation then like a preliminary graduation and it was fully packed. That’s for only the vocational. Then this one now is the main graduation, where the vocational and the digital. People for digital doubled the number of vocational skills. Because digital skills is online. So that is, we partner with MTN Foundation. They created a platform, and they extended it to us. There’s so much happening.