Muslim-Muslim ticket: Christian leaders must engage candidates, says Tunde Bakare

Serving Overseer of the Citadel Global Community Church, Pastor Tunde Bakare has tasked Christian leaders to take their discussions on the 2023 general elections to nation-building and national development.

Bakare was speaking on the heels of reactions which has trailed the decision of the ruling All Progressives Congress to run a Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket.

In a statement on Sunday, Bakare chatted the way forward for such discussions to take place, charging Christian leaders to interface with presidential aspirants and their running mates on key indicators.

“Going forward, ahead of 2023, we must learn from our mistakes. Christian leaders must, at this point, bring the candidates and their running mates to the negotiation table doing so with an open mind and based on a clearly articulated charter for nation-building and national development.

“Christian leaders must, at this point, convene a strategic concourse to define the minimum standards across sectors of governance below which no Nigerian, Christian or Muslim, must be subjected. The SNG Charter and the Nigerian Charter for National Reconciliation and Reintegration which was unanimously adopted by the delegates to the 2014 National Conference, can be a springboard for such sector-by-sector deliberations. This must be done between now and September when the campaigns will officially commence. The Charter may be launched in Abuja and may be termed The Abuja Declaration for Nationhood.

“Thereafter, Christian leaders must then carefully engage each presidential candidate and running mate based on that Charter and provide a unified direction to the body of Christ in Nigeria having assessed each presidential/vice-presidential ticket based on key performance indicators around the Charter. This would be a more mature, structured and strategic way to respond to the situation as against the emotional reactions that have dominated the polity since the choice of a running mate was made by the APC presidential candidate.

“For the Christians in Northern Nigeria who feel marginalised by the choice of a Northern Muslim as running mate, the time has come to upgrade the conversation from politics to governance. The time has come to interrogate the impact of politics on development,” he said.