8th July, 2019
To: The National Assembly
Christian Association of Nigeria
Thro: The President
Christian Association of Nigeria
&
Heads of the Five Blocs of CAN
National Christian Center
Abuja
The National Assembly of CAN meeting in Abuja on 18th July, 2019
THE NEW AND OLD TESTAMENTS
My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
I arrived London, United Kingdom on the 20th of May 2019 on holidays when a Nigerian Anglican Bishop asked if I had come to attend the Hearing in the UK All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on International Freedom of Religion and Belief (IFoRB) Nigeria Inquiry. This information made me attend the Hearing the following morning, the 21st of May 2019 at Committee Room 20 in the House of Commons at The British House of Parliament. I was accompanied by an Elder in Diaspora and to our amazement a Nigerian Archbishop was making his presentation. What the Archbishop said in his presentation can be summarized as: "Yes there are killings in Nigeria, Yes the killings are on both sides but they are as a result of poverty and lack of education". All attempts made by me to be allowed to comment were ignored by the Chair who is a female member of the British House of Lords. At the conclusion of the Hearing, she promised to pass on all the information obtained at the Inquiry to the British Parliament.
As we were not satisfied with the presentation by the Nigerian Archbishop, we decided to contact the organizers immediately after the meeting to express our reservations concerning the presentation by the Archbishop. As a result of which a document was forwarded to us a few days later and we were requested to comment on 12 issues and return before or by 10th June 2019. Our comments were returned to APPG for IFoRB Nigeria Inquiry Hearing. It was on the basis of this request that we made a presentation titled: “The Competing Ideologies of Democracy and Sharia in Nigeria - The Nuance Understanding of the Drivers of the Conflicts in Nigeria by Farmers and Herders”. Copy of this presentation attached herewith as Annexure 'A'. It was also published in Nigerian Newspapers. Following this publication, the Nigerian High Commissioner in London replied and that was also published in Nigeria in which he, in our view was evasive and trivialized the only one issue he bothered to comment on. As a result of this, we decided that there was need to send a rebuttal. This we did and was published in some of the Nigerian Newspapers of Saturday 6 July 2019. Copy is attached herewith as Annexure ‘B’.
The object of this letter is to draw the attention of Christian leadership in Nigeria to the fact that ordinarily, the matters concerning democracy in Nigeria would have been better handled by a Christian political party. Unfortunately, Christians do not have a political party as all the political parties in Nigeria presently have their roots from the intelligence service (SSS) control since 1999 made up of Nigerians employed and trained to subvert the Constitution stealthily and overtly in favour of Sharia, first as an alternative source of legislation and later to replace the Constitution with Sharia. When the military banned religious groups from establishing political parties, we did not know at that time that it was stealth jihad. The Islamists stealthily through the secret service promoted all the political parties in Nigeria which enabled the Islamists to control all the parties in the country today.
As nature abhors vacuum, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) filled the void and has been speaking for the wellbeing of all Christians in Nigeria. This is what CAN has done admirably since 1976 when it was founded. Pastors not being political scientists, did not realize that moving from Democracy to Sharia is akin to moving from the New Testament back to the Old Testament. Pastors were convinced by the Islamists that they must join the Muslims to combine Church and the State and to ignore Christ teachings of “give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s”. Some individual Church leaders including the current President of CAN are championing this move.
In our reply of 3rd July 2019 Annexure ‘B’, we were emphatic that Sharia and Democracy are incompatible. We also asked the UK to mediate on "whether sovereign nation state is incompatible with the sovereignty of Allah and the primacy of Ummah". In view of the activities of the incumbent President of CAN and his availability to be used as instrument of stealth jihad, he has disqualified himself to lead Christians in countering Islamists Jihadists in Nigeria.
The NCEF has battled with the President of CAN since he came into office and we were told that he has been offered a second term to complete “his good work” of redirecting "Christians back to Egypt" and to the Old Testament. We have nothing personal against the President of CAN but as recipients of the Christian faith in Nigeria before some of our pastors, we want it on record that we tried our best. During our childhood, there were no Sharia Pastors. If the Church leaders want Rev Ayokunle for another 3 years, then we must query our Church Leaders if there is something they know, that they are yet to pass on to us, the Lay Faithfuls. In the light of these facts, Rev Ayokunle, the current President of CAN, who has not shown capacity and has displayed lack of understanding to what is at stake, Democracy Vs Sharia, should honourably step aside for someone more committed to the Faith to lead the Christian Faithfuls in Nigeria.
As Elders, we believe that we have done our best so that we can later account to our Maker.
May God guide you in your deliberations of 18th July 2019
God bless Nigeria!!!
Solomon Asemota SAN
Chairman, Board of Governors
Christian Social Movement of Nigeria (CSMN)