The General Secretary of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Dr. Musa Asake, told FRIDAY OLOKOR in this interview that Christians will resist any plan to Islamise Nigeria

A prominent Muslims argued recently that Muslims have been marginalised by the Jonathan administration in terms of appointments and other considerations. What is your response to that?

What is marginalisation there? Whoever is saying that should remember that there is judgment when we will appear before God. Muslims have dominated every position. In fact, we Christians are not happy with Jonathan in that area. We voted, shared our blood for Jonathan and our worship places and communities were destroyed because we voted for him. But he came to power, brought these people and gave them the juicy positions. What marginalisation are they talking about? They are just bringing this one to divert our attention. The entire security of this country is in their hands. If they are talking about marginalisation, let us go to Kano; how many Christians are commissioners there? Don’t we have Kano Christian indigenes? Let us go to Sokoto where the Sultan is; how many Christians are in government there? It is the Muslims that are in control of everything going on in the country.

You have a professor like that saying things as if he didn’t go to school? The security of this nation has been tied to Muslims. The National Security Adviser is a Muslim; the Minister of Defence is a Muslim.

Let us pray that God will help us to get good leaders; men and women of integrity that will accept that we are all Nigerians. God created and put us here and nobody is going to move us from anywhere. I am from the North and I will live and die here. I respect my Christian brothers, they respect me. Nobody forced me. And those that are doing the killings, one day, the monkey will go to the market and will not return.

But do you think Christians have had a better deal under the present administration?

Why do I have to begin from Jonathan’s administration? The problems we are having in this country are oppositions to Jonathan’s administration. Because Jonathan is a Christian and there is a planned agenda to Islamise Nigeria, the Muslims are not happy. Just reflect back; the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua was there before Jonathan. Or just go down the lane; whenever we have a Muslim president, we do not see these stupid crises going on but because we have a Christian president, they are doing everything possible to make the nation ungovernable for him. And that is why they feel that unless a Muslim is the president of this country, nobody can be president of Nigeria.

After the (2011) presidential election, from nowhere, these hooligans started burning down churches and killing everybody on the streets. Christians are praying for Jonathan and we are praying that God will give him wisdom. Bring out the 2011 results, these people (Muslims) did not vote for him and I will assure you, they will not vote for him in 2015. All they do is go round him and get key positions. Let me at this point call on all Christians to go on their knees and continue to pray. We have never had any Muslim go to the radio or television and talk bad about the Sultan, why do we display our dirty linens in public? Jonathan is our own; he is a Christian and the political line in Nigeria has been drawn. Muslims are for Muslims and that is why you go to Kano, Katsina and Sokoto, you have Christians there but nobody has given them key position. Things are not good because Jonathan is a Christian but we must stand by him.

Since its establishment in 1980, this period seems to be most trying times for CAN. What is responsible for this development?

CAN is at its best this time. Let me make it very clear. CAN is at its best, yet we tend to see these issues that make it look as if Christians are not united? What I want to let you know is that when you are passing through some challenges, everybody is trying to find out what is going on and it seems as if you do not have anybody by your side.

If you check the number of killings and the people being wiped out, can you say Christians are the ones killing one another? Christians are united but they have a big problem. We have resorted to prayers and we believe our God will wipe our tears. Even in a family where you have a husband, his wife and children; there are bound to be some things that may not go together. In this current crisis, Christians are being killed. Some Christian clerics feel because they are so much protected, they will not talk much about what is going on. That is why people think we are not united. When it comes to CAN, there are some key Christians and mega church pastors that do not come to CAN because they feel they are in their own world. People look at it and say we are not united. I do not know whether we are not united, I just know that we do not cooperate as an organisation.

Would you say Christians have conducted themselves well in the face of tribulations?

Yes, we have done very well. There have been churches that have been burnt down but Christians do not stop going to church. I know of places of worship that were burnt down and Christians worship under trees and some in the rain and they have not given up. People have continued to come to church; they have continued to trust God in this time of difficulties.

How does CAN feel about the insurgency in the North and the kidnap of over 200 Chibok schoolgirls by Boko Haram?

That is an interesting question that we need to answer with honesty. The church has reached a point whereby we just need to continue to trust God. This insurgency by Boko Haram in the North is what northerners like me are bothered about. How I wish the northern elders and politicians have cried out and looked into how we can bring an end to this mad situation. Using the newspapers to condemn the action is not enough. I would have loved a situation whereby people in the North, if they are claiming to own the North, should act wisely. But they are sitting down in their secure places, watching the northern part of this country being burnt down to ashes and they are not doing anything. They sit at home and say ‘we condemn what is happening.’ It is very unfortunate. Look at the political history of this country — the leaders and the presidents of this country —virtually all of them have come from the North and nothing has happened. I hear people say Boko Haram is as a result of poverty in Nigeria. That is a stupid statement, as far as I am concerned. What is poverty? If you are poor, do you take up guns? Look at the arms they are using, the AK 47; I have never seen it before. But someone told me the price ranges from N200,000 to N300,000. From where are these people getting money to buy them? And somebody will tell me it is because of poverty. How I wish the Sultan (of Sokoto) who is the head of Islam in this country will call Islamic clerics to talk to them on how they will put an end to this carnage. I did not see where the Sultan said anything, but if anything happens in the camp of the Christians; the Church; and Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, who is the CAN President, many parochial issues will come up. Pastor Oritsejafor is not from the North; he does not have a church in the North and has nothing to lose in the North. But he is spending his resources to help the North. He is the voice of the voiceless Christians in the North and that is what these people do not want. Boko Haram said they are Muslims; they say they are Muslims and they are here to substitute the constitution of Nigeria with Shari’ah.

All these Islamic clerics that come from outside to preach, is it the Church that invites them? Somebody in this country invites them. And when they come and preach hate messages, what are the Islamic leaders doing, the Sultan specifically? I am waiting for the day that he will talk to them because they respect him. And I assure you, if he calls them today, every village that has an Islamic cleric and politicians will all gather. If you bring in an Islamic preacher from Sudan, Senegal and so on and set people against one another by preaching messages of disunity, what do you expect? They will go round the country and set it on fire.

Do you remember the story of Denmark? There was a cartoon portraying (Prophet) Muhammad in negative sense. Christians were killed in that country. What did the Muslim leader say? Where was the Sultan? What did he say over an issue in far way country? Are we going to continue like this? I read some interviews where some were saying that Muslims were keeping quiet. Muslims have to keep quiet because they are (allegedly) very sympathetic to the activities of Boko Haram! Do you know the kind of insult that we Christians are receiving from our Muslim brothers and sisters? It is getting to the point that we are going to say ‘enough is enough.’ If you want to set your house on fire, I will help you.

Do think Christians will ever be forced to take up arms against their Muslim counterparts, if this trend continues?

Exactly! Don’t we know where to buy arms? Don’t we know how to use them? If they think they have violent youths, we too have violent youths; if they think that have youths that can’t respect leadership, we also have them; and if we set everywhere on fire, this Nigeria would not be a country that you and I would like to live. Let us just be very honest to ourselves. Look at the Senate and House of Representatives; whenever anything comes up involving both religions, the Muslims line up in one place while our Christian brothers sit and fold their hands because they are in the same House. Let me make this message very clear to all Christian politicians that are watching their brothers and sisters being burnt to ashes, look at the refugees in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states and we are playing like this. If you are in a position to do something now and you refuse to do it, don’t think you will be free.

On the issue of importing Muslim preachers to preach in the country, do you think it is an attempt to Islamise Nigeria?

The issue of Islamising Nigeria is a very clear issue. It is not a hidden agenda. They are very open and they are working hard and the strategies are there. Look at what they did by placing Nigeria in OIC (Organisation of Islamic Countries). Who did they consult? We have been living in peace, why introduce some foreign things to destroy us? Today, we have lost trust for one another and it is very unfortunate. But let me tell you one thing, Nigeria will not be an Islamic country. We are not like those small countries where they did that and survived; Nigeria can never be, I assure you. Even nominal Christians would stand against it.

The CAN President has been accused of dabbling into politics and being too close to politicians.

That is nonsense. The President of CAN is a Christian, he is a Nigerian. What do you want him to do? That accusation is baseless. Let them come out and tell us how many times they have seen him doing what? Why are they not talking about the Sultan now? Doesn’t he go to Jonathan? The Sultan goes to the President more than the CAN President, why are they not talking about him now? When you talk about CAN President going to see Jonathan, what is wrong with that? He is representing Christians in Nigeria. If it were Muslims that are being killed by Christians, you won’t be sitting here asking me these questions. Muslims would have given you enough work. At the just-concluded national conference, they claimed they were being marginalised; before you know it, they were at the Presidential Villa talking with President Jonathan.

Some people have argued that Christians attract much criticism because they have the virtue of being tolerant.

Tolerant or not, Muslims say Islam is a religion of peace. What religion will teach you to talk bad of another religion? As long as I am on this seat now, I will not allow anyone talk bad about my leader anymore. I was taught from childhood that when someone abuses your father, you abuse his also. We are now set and we will return fire for fire.

How can Christians and Muslims end the distrust among them?

The Nigerian Christian Inter-Religious Council is where 25 Christians and 25 Muslims should come together and discuss issues of peaceful coexistence. But let me ask you a question: Can you record one achievement of NIREC? Have they stopped anything from happening? I was one of the founding fathers of NIREC in 1999. There was a time we were having a meeting at NICON and there was a rally in Kano. The Sultan, being a co-chair with the CAN President also had to be in attendance. The Secretary-General of Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede has been the Coordinator and Executive Secretary. But for two years now, there has been no meeting. Let the Sultan come out and tell Nigerians what else was required for a meeting of NIREC? Ask the Sultan and Oloyede why we have not had a meeting. NIREC is in the hands of Oloyede and the Sultan and if they call us today, we will go, but if they don’t, I have my boss. They said we would have a meeting in Gombe but later the Sultan called to say the meeting would no longer hold. Why? To me, the inter-religious council is a useless organisation.

With the turn of events after the cease-fire agreement between the Federal Government and Boko Haram, will the insurgency ever stop?

Ask that in the Muslim community, they know these boys and I am sure they know those who sponsor them. You remember when the Federal Government came up with the issue of amnesty, CAN kicked against it because we believed that you should not discuss amnesty with those you do not know. If the CAN President is always at the Villa, then I expect the President to do what the CAN President tells him. This is a man that has gone to the American Congress to talk to them about ways of ending the activities of this terrorist group and still, all that the CAN President has told him has not happened. I do not know the details of the cease-fire agreement. Who is talking about ceasefire and who is doing the killings? I applaud the security people. I appreciate what they are doing. Their families don’t sleep well and I hope their leaders are taking note of that. On this cease-fire agreement, I have my doubts, so I reserve my comments.

-Punch