By Lucky Isibor
The General Overseer of Gospel Defenders Ministries International Incorporated, Archbishop Fred Aghedo has admonished Christians to get involved in the Edo State 2024 governorship election to ensure a credible Governor is elected. He also appealed to church founders and Christian leaders to encourage their members, the men, women and youths to be involved in the election of a new Governor for Edo State to ensure a person with the fear of God is elected, as according to him when the righteous rule the people will enjoy.
Archbishop Aghedo made the call on Saturday, 10 February during a prayer summit by the Consensus Christian Leaders Forum (CCLF) AKA “Let The Righteous Rule”, held at the Gospel Defenders Ministries headquarters by Lucky Way, Off Ramat Park, Ikpoba Hill, Benin City.
“Now we are saying Christians must get involved in the politics of today, in the politics of tomorrow. We have made mistakes in the past for not getting involved, now we need to get involved. The only people that does not need to get involved are church founders. If you’re a church founder don’t go for elective position, but if you’re not get involved, let the members get involved, let the youths get involved and campaign for them because when the righteous rule, the people will rejoice”, Aghedo noted.
On why the group decided to organise the prayer session with the theme, “The Edo of Our Dream”, Archbishop Aghedo pointed out that the Consensus Christian Leaders Forum has been organising such prayer summits about four times annually for over two decades now, adding that more of such prayers will be organised ahead the Edo State 2024 governorship election.
“We discovered that our nation need prayers because of the insecurity and other challenges we are confronting and in Edo State the 2024 governorship election is just around the corner. We need to pray for peace in the coming election because a lot of things are beginning to rear their heads and we are beginning to hear feelers of impending terrible things. We believe that the heart of the king is in the hands of God, so the ability to pray can pacify so many things. You know security is the hallmark of the whole thing and there cannot be development when the place is not well secured. We have always been praying for the peace of our nation and of our state, but at a time like this now that Edo State is going to have their governorship election this year and so many things are coming up, we just feel we have to start with prayers because Jesus started with prayers and ended his mission with prayers”.
The guest speaker on the occasion Ambassador Dr.Oriakhi Davies admonished the people not to allow idiots elect a Governor for them because if they do, they’ll elect an idiot like themselves and defined an idiot as “a person who keeps doing the same thing over and over again and then expect a different result”.
While identifying where the people derailed in enthronning good governance, Dr. Oriakhi said, “We missed our bearing mostly at the beginning of politicking- democracy. Standards have been watered down. We missed it when neophyte began to pontificate over duties that should be left for professionals to deal with. We missed it when illiterates/half baked educated persons began to celebrate their multi-billiion naira acquisition, whereas professionals who should dictate the flow of good governance are relegated to copy typist (secretary).
Oriakhi enumerated what the people should look out for in who should be voted as the next Governor of Edo State under three broad headings of character, competence and capacity/vision.
According to him, “We need a person with the following; fear of God, honesty and truthfulness, respect for rule of law, justice and fairness to all, respect for religious and ethnic diversity, compassion and discipline, clean and credible lifestyle, no membership of cult groups and involvement in drugs and witchcraft, quality of performance in previous position held, good education sufficient to manage a complex society as Edo State, effective management skills”; among others.
Joining his voice on the need for Edo people to get it right in the 2024 governorship election, a legal luminary, Barrister Ofenimu urged the church not to fold its arms while politicians take the people for a ride, noting that the church is a strong platform for disseminating information to the grassroots.
He assured that himself and other like minded people would form groups and work with the Consensus Christian Leaders Forum to ensure a God fearing Governor emerges in the Edo 2024 governorship election.