TUNDE Bakare, the fire-spitting pastor of Latter Rain Assembly, Lagos Nigeria, could as well have been a democracy and human rights activist if he were not called into priesthood. A lawyer by training, he combines the power of the pulpit and illumination of law to press for sustenance of democracy and emancipation of the teeming masses of Nigeria. Although, he never abandoned his flock and church to confront tanks on the streets of Lagos, like Gani Fawehinmi, the late Beko Ransome-Kuti, Femi Falana and some more in those dark days of the military, he , nonetheless, roared so loudly and consistently from the pulpit that each time he sneezes even Abacha and his goons caught influenza. Such was the power of his sermons and advocacy against oppression and the oppressors. However, with the advent of democracy, many thought he would recoil to his expansive church in the Ogba area of the former federal capital to tend his flock. He has been doing just that, it's just that he has also been a terrible thorn in the flesh of President Olusegun Obasanjo, his kinsman from Abeokuta , Ogun State , delivering powerful messages and a scary prophecy that shook even the tower of power in Abuja.His most scary prophecy yet was made in March 1999, barely weeks after Obasanjo had been elected as president, when he (Bakare) declared that Nigerians should not rejoice yet because Obasanjo was not the expected messiah. He declared further that the " prophetic axe of God" would fall on the former military Head of State-turned-politician before May 1999, (the date for the inauguration into office) unless he repented of his perceived iniquities and feared God. The prophecy generated a heated controversy nation­wide even as most Nigerians construed it to mean that some thing untoward might happen to the man before his inauguration. Although the pres­ident is alive and well, and his second term running without much hiccup, Bakare, in this exclusive interview argued that to the extent that the people were not rejoicing under the Obasanjo regime, the prophecy had been substantially fulfilled. And no matter how long it takes; it would be brought to fu1filment. Bakare stated emphatically that he had nothing personal against the president, rather he wished Obasanjo finished his tenure strong and well, riding triumphantly back to Abeokuta. The pastor, however, warned against any manipulation of the ongoing constitution amendment exercise as it may make or break the country. He would want the authorities to heed this warning as, according to him, the country was already tottering towards disintegration. He held nothing back as he tackled other issues of national interest, like the recently concluded national census which he described as an unnecessary waste of the country's meager resources. Excerpts of the interview:

Let us go way back in time to March 1999, when you made this prophecy about President Olusegun Obasanjo and it created a huge uproar. Has anything changed between then and now?
God's word doesn't return to him void. There is no prayer against prophecy. Prophecy is like a guided missile. When it comes from the mouth of the Lord; it will come to pass. It is just a question of time. However, when people repent, God relents. That year, that prophecy did not only generate controversy, it also generated serious prayers. I remember watching AIT (Africa Independent Television) and saw hundreds or more of pastors at the Ota praying against the prophecy. If the prophecy was a lie, why pray against it? Why just not wave it off?

But the truth of the matter is, (and as it's clearly evident in the Old Testament days in the Bible), when God spoke, the nation rose up to pray, people repented, God relented. But if you remember Nineveh , when Jonah said in 30 days...(the people of Nineveh should repent of their iniquities or face destruction). The people repented and God relented. Hundred years down the road, in the book of Nahum, the prophecy of Jonah hit Nineveh like a guided missile, in a way that it never recovered from and the bible recorded it as according to the words of the Lord He spoke through Jonah.

Many Nigerians out there missed that prophecy. Can we just recap it?
It is not a memory verse. It is from the spirit of God. But I will tell you what God said: 'Rejoice not yet, oh land; for your joy will be temporary. I am bringing your judges, your rulers, your prophets, your princes and your governors to my threshing floor, After I thresh them, I will restore to you a permanent joy. Obasanjo is not your messiah, he is King Agag and the prophetic axe will come upon his head before May 29, 1999.

Today is April 2, 2006, would you say that prophecy has come to pass?
To be very honest with you, I am not the judge of prophecies. Most of the prophets who prophesied, God spoke through them. It is not their job to go to a corner and start praying that it should come to pass. That is in the judgment of the people. Whether or not the land is rejoicing today, you can testify.

You are a Nigerian, living in Nigeria , and you should know if the country is rejoicing or not. When Obasanjo came in 1999, we all shout­ed ‘hallelujah, the messiah has come'. I know men of God who said Obasanjo is the only Christian acceptable to Muslims, the only southerner acceptable to the Northerners. Mathematically we were calculating and everybody was hopeful, but now, what do we have?

One aspect of the prophecy is that, the prophetic axe is coming upon this man's head. How you avert that is to fear God. That it did not hit by May1999 because people repented and prayed does not mean it is gone.

Remember, Samuel told Saul, 'Today, the kingdom is taken from you and given to your neighbour who is better than you.' That lasted 16 years before that 'today' came to pass. When God says it, it is a question of time, it will come to pass. Now, it is like one popular songs that I was singing in those days: A m'erin j'oba, ewku e wele. That song/parable that I gave then means a big hole is dug, velvet is spread over it and sticks and planks were used to set a throne on it and they asked this man to come and sit down. The end result: if he returns in peace, the Lord has not said to me.

You are seen as one of the must vitriolic critics of President Obasanjo. From the way you speak, you seem not to see anything good in him. Is there anything personal between you two?
There is nothing personal. I am related to the Owu people. My paternal great grandmother is from Olufakun compound in Owu. That is the only place where the masquerades of the Owu people come out. I also have Owu relatives from Totoro, Ago Owu and so on, but I am a thorough bred Egbaman. The president is one of us. And I thank God for him, like so many great Egba people God has created in time past, before him and many more that will come after him. Let it be on record that I have nothing personal against the president.

Absolutely, nothing personal. I remember when one of my maternal uncles, who is from Owu, clocked 80 years. He was related to General Obasanjo. I still call Obasanjo General. Forget all this Chief stuff, the man is still a soldier through and through. From his character, you will know he is still a general inside of him. He is still fighting imaginary battles.

Let me say it again for the sake of posterity that I never had any personal issue with the president. No agenda, no hatred, no bitterness. In fact, I wish he would succeed for three reasons. Number one: He is from my hometown, number two: He is a Yoruba man. But' let me quickly say that I am not a Yoruba irredentist or a tribalist. Number three: even if he is not born-again, even if he is just playing religious game, at least he is Matthew and he claims to be a Christian. For those reasons, and much more than that, for the sake of my nation I will want him to succeed. I desire for him to succeed so that we can have peace in our time and progress in such a manner that befits a nation that has tremendous resources.

The truth of the matter is that there is nothing personal at all. The day they rumoured that he died, my chest hit the ground, crying unto God for mercy. 'Why? Because God is not interested in the death of sinners. God doesn't drink blood. If I am going to be against him, what will it bring for me? Am I in politics? Do I have a candidate? The last time and the only time I ever voted in Nigerian was in 1979. I voted for Awo and they (General Olusegun Obasanjo's military regime said the best candidate cannot win and they imposed Shagari. From that moment, I knew that these things are manipulated. So, why waste my time? I am not discouraging people from voting but that was the first and last time I voted in my 1ife.

Are you saying you will never vote again?
Me, vote? Never! Vote for who? Out of two evils, choose none.

What if there is a system change?
In that case, you never can tell if you will not sponsor candidates because we are the salt of the earth. But I have no political agenda right now.

What is your attitude to Obasanjo's first tenure, and now, the second?
Such should be left to the experts who have the indices or indexes of measuring national growth. But I have friends and relatives that live in this economy and who have been terribly affected, adversely affected by the state of the nation, by the spate of insecurity, by NEPA, and so on. I spend more than N650, 000 every quarter on diesel alone. Yet I pay NEPA heavily. I do not know the logistics of checking.

Now, I listen to people and they said the president brought GSM. Is the president paying for airtime and handset? These are basic things any nation should not even think about as progress. They are things people take for granted in saner societies. Thank God, everybody has telephone now. But they are spending more money and creating more problems. There are simple things a man of his caliber should do.

Obasanjo is from a background that is extremely poor; he should have mercy upon the poor. A poor man who oppresses the poor is like a sweeping rake that has no control. He is from poor home, he has a poor background, he struggled to go to school. It should be his type that will create opportunities, create a level playing field so that the children of the poor can rise and thank him.

Awolowo is gone for many years now but we are still blessing him till tomorrow. People like us went to school because of free primary education in the Western region. People like M.K.O were able to use the scholarship of Western Region and when you look at what he contributed in his own little way to the progress of the country, you cannot but praise him for his efforts. Why can't Obasanjo emulate these patriots by working to leave worthy values? This man has been president for six years or more and he is still asking for more like Oliver Twist.

In all the nations I have been to, America, Britain, Germany, anywhere in the civilized world, when you rent a house you pay one-month rent deposit just as security measure and you move in and start paying your rent as it falls due. In Nigeria , you ask people to pay three years rent and you don't give them three years advance salary. That is wickedness.

With simple legislation, we should be able to regularize that. So that you rent a house and pay one-month advance and move into the house. That way, you can live from your salary. But you already encourage corruption by allowing people to ask for three years advance. It is wicked.

Maybe it is because most government officials also have properties and are also benefiting directly or indirectly from such obnoxious system. In a nation that is seeking progress, you do not create a situation where orders will not amount to anything. I have lived in both America and Britain; they encourage you to buy your accommodation rather than let. When I settled in England with my family, we rented a property. A year later, we bought that same property. Mortgage repayment was half of what I was paying as house rent. These are nations who seek the betterment of their people.

Parliament started in the UK for one reason, so that those who are being taxed would also monitor how government is spending their tax. But in a government like ours, where they don't need tax to run government but petrol and oil money, there is no accountability.

Nobody knows how much they are making from oil. It is a mystery that resides between Obasanjo, Kupolokun and Edmond Daukoru. The man is the Prime Minister, he is the president, he is the minister of petroleum, he is the one allocating everything. There is no accountability at all.

Has the administration failed or helped Nigeria because every now and then they reel out figures of economic advancement and drop in inflation in percentages?
That is another mystery. How do those figures translate into success? How do those digits affect the life of my grandmother in the village? Does she know digits? Garri is now how much per tin? I was giving example in the church, this morning. I said supposing you buy a bag of Garri for N1000 and they screamed. It was then they told me a bag of Garri is now N6, 000. That is incredible, unimaginable!

Now, tell me, who is in charge of the figures being reeled out? A fat belly does not know that such a thing as hunger exists. Look at Obasanjo's cheeks when he came out of prison and look at his cheeks now. And you will know who is better off, whether it is the citizens or himself.

Experts have argued that rather than this third term struggle, the president ought to have been building institutions; build NEPA, health, education, security, infrastructure for businesses to thrive, and so on. Do you subscribe to this?
You know the Babylonian system in the bible is still the pattern most people in the world follow. Ambitious men always think there are no other people like them. Ambitious men always think the ground is made for them alone. There were people before Obasanjo, there will be people after him. Oba to je ti ilu wro, o ni oruko. Oba to je ti ilu baje, o l'aruko (meaning that the king that reigns and the people rejoice, has a name; the king the reigns and the town scatters, also has a name).

The truth of the matter is that if he looks into and focuses on three or four areas that will alleviate the suffering of the people, any other person coming after him can build on that. All this talk about the president not wanting his 'legacies' destroyed is balderdash.

As a matter of fact, the president is tired, he should retire. From his pronouncements, from the way be talks, from his appreciation of issues, I am not too sure he has monopoly of wisdom or intelligence to lead this nation. And he seems to be larger than life, even his ministers, advisers have their sack letters signed in advance because he says 'you can advise, but I don't have to listen'.

Such a person should stay in his farm because this is a public arena. The king can be faulted in the public arena because the king is sustained by what is coming from the field, the proceeds of the land is for all. A man that says others have nothing to offer should just stay and administer his wives and children and his chickens. This nation will be built by the energy of the youths, by their foresight and accurate thinking.

"Does he have a university education? How is he going to answer to critical issues? When they give him a question, he doesn't answer."

Does he have a university education? How is he going to answer to critical issues? When they give him a question, he doesn't answer. Most of the things they say are prepared for them. They don't have a thorough grasp of issues. Do you think by fighting in the civil war, as if he is the only one that fought, he has become the defender of everything called Nigeria ?

During his recent trip to America , the president was pointedly asked on V.O.A about third term, and he answered that third term was not on the card for now. Then he went further to say that he would not do anything unconstitutional. As a pastor and lawyer, how do you read this?
I watched the programme myself, even on CNN's Inside Africa. I will answer the question this way: A man had eminent visitors from a neighbouring country. They arrived at his doorsteps and the man called his son and said "I want you to go straight to the market now and get me a very big goat because these are eminent personalities." But when he said this, he lifted his hand very high and also lifted up his leg far from the ground level.

And the son went to the market and bought a little goat. And the visitors screamed and said, 'but your father told you in our presence, buy a huge goat'. The son said it is the hand of my father you saw, not his leg. You didn't see his leg. That is exactly my response.

For those who cannot decode easily, like me, how do you break this down in a way people on the street will understand what you are saying?
What I'm saying is, ambiguity is the enemy of accountability. When you are not straight, of what use is that? "Oh, I will not take a third term, I don't need it." That is straightforward. But when you are evasive and ambiguous, there is a hidden agenda. Obasanjo has already made up his mind. It is a fait accompli.

He might be forced, and he will be forced to leave because he didn't want to go in 1979 truly. He became a statesman based on fear, he ran away. From what he is doing now, you will know that he never wanted to leave in 1979. It was not because of his love for democracy that he left, but because of fear for his life.

Do you have an empirical evidence to show that he never wanted to leave in 1979?
The truth of the matter is that, read everything, put everything together, did they really want to go or were they forced to go? Or was he afraid for his life? If he was not forced to go, why does he want to extend it now? lwa ki yio fi o ni wa sile (meaning, a man's character can never leave him).

From what you are seeing now, you are fully convinced that he really never wanted to go in 1979?
He was forced to leave. Circumstances compelled him to go. Did IBB want to go? No. He stepped aside and now he wants to step back. I said it in the church today, it was live on television, I said that the words that Jesus spoke to Judas Iscariot, I spoke that word to Abacha, I am now speaking it to OBJ: 'That which you want to do, do it quickly.

And whether you are in charge or God is in charge, we will see in this nation. There are three things awaiting anybody that tries to elongate this tenure: deposition and the code name for that is Gowon;-disgrace, the code name for that is IBB; and death, the code name for that is Abacha. And now that he wants to do it in a seemingly lawful way by manipulating his way and using remote control of power and money to manipulate the likes of Ibrahim Mantu (Deputy Senate President) who talks from both sides of the mouth, go ahead and do it. You may not even get just one of the three, you may get the three together-disgrace, deposition, and death; death by stroke, by paralysis. He can collapse. I wish he will do his best and ride a horse to Abeokuta and say 'I went, I saw

And I conquered
(Cuts in...) Who did he conquer? He couldn't conquer even himself. 'I went, I saw and I succeeded'.

Culled from The Sun