Pastor Enoch Adeboye, General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) and foremost cleric, has defended President Bola Tinubu against growing criticism over the worsening insecurity across the country.
Speaking about the concerns over the increasing wave of terrorism, kidnappings and violent attacks across the country at the US-Nigeria faith heroes award gala organized by the Save Nigeria Group in Washington, D.C. on June 23, Adeboye said Tinubu should only give instructions on how to deal with insecurity in Nigeria and cannot be blamed for failing to personally confront terrorists on the battlefield.
“I have to be clear about this one: I am not on the side of those who are saying the president is not doing enough. When the commander-in-chief has issued instructions to his subordinates he has performed his part. “You don’t expect him to go and put on khaki and (fight),” he said.
Adeboye, in comparing with the United States, said President Donald Trump was an example of how the commander-in-chief takes military decisions without personally engaging in combat.
“When my friend Trump tells you to go bomb anywhere, he doesn’t leave the White House.
“He has done his part. “‘I order, bomb Iran,’ and then he goes to his bedroom and sleeps. The rest is up to the supporters.”
The cleric, while defending Tinubu, admitted that Nigeria’s security crisis had worsened considerably, revealing that terrorist activities had spread from northern Nigeria to the southern part of the country including areas close to him.
“Things have gone far, far worse than before the bomb came,” he said, referring to the United States bombing of Islamist terrorists last December.
Far, far worse… so bad that they say, ‘Where is your God?’ That’s how bad it is.
“The terrorism, kidnapping and all that which was in the north is now even at my doorstep. They’ve come all the way down to the south. And, of course, the sponsors, they are all known, and they are still walking about free.”
Adeboye said he had called President Tinubu and wife, Senator Oluremi, an RCCG pastor, personally to discuss Nigeria’s worsening security situation.
He said he pressed the president to give a stern ultimatum to military commanders across the armed forces.
I told them to tell all the military people: ‘You have 90 days. Get rid of this trash or leave.’ And then deal with the supporters, the sponsors.”
Adeboye said the real masterminds of terrorism were not the gunmen who perpetrated the attacks but the influential people who funded and armed them.
“You know them,” he said, referring to an earlier public appeal to the presidency.
Some of them are businessmen. Some of them are politicians. Go get them. Because if you do not go after those that are supplying these people with arms and ammunition, and most of the time when they go about they go about on motorcycles, if we do not go after the sponsors the problem will continue.”
Adeboye also called on the United States and other members of the international community to step up collaboration with Nigeria in the fight against terrorism.
Fighting insurgency, he said, was not fighting the fighters but targeting those bankrolling violent groups.
