2023: Only 'sinners' can fix Nigeria not, holy men - APC chieftain

Tunji Abayomi, a member of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), says Nigerians cannot afford to dwell on integrity in selecting a president because the challenges facing the country require a sinner to fix.

Mr Abayomi, who is the Pro-Chancellor of Adekunle Ajasin University in Ondo State, said poverty is the main challenge facing the country, hence, citizens must consider who can create wealth and not embark on a search for a holy man.

He said this during an interview on Sunrise Daily on Channels TV on Tuesday.

According to him, “Only sinful men would raise the society from sin because they understand the effect of the sin and the consequences,” Mr Abayomi, a lawyer, said.

Some of the presidential candidates in the race have been marred by allegations of corruption.

The candidate of the ruling APC, Bola Tinubu, forfeited $460,000 to the United States government in a case linked to drug trafficking in 1992.

On the other hand, the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, is facing allegation of using Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) to siphon money while he was vice president from 1999 to 2007.

PREMIUM TIMES also in an investigation revealed how Peter Obi of the Labour Party used shell companies in tax haven countries to conceal his wealth and failed to declare it to the Code of Conduct Bureau, an act that many believe to be against the 1999 constitution.

Mr Abayomi, a lawyer, said it will be almost impossible to get a holy man that can address the challenge of poverty facing the country.

He posited that what Nigeria needs is “a man with ancient wisdom, not necessarily a holy man.”

He said, “We are not in heaven, let us also appreciate that. We are in the world, and it would be presumptuous because of the tendency of utopian aspiration, but at the end of it all it achieves very little if we study the history of uprisings in the world.

“But only sinful men will raise the society because the problems of the society are the sins and they understand the value of those sins and the effects. Only sinful men would raise society from sin because they understand the effect of sin and the consequences, the structure of sin, and how to manage them, if you are looking for holy men, you are not going to achieve a whole lot. Look at the history of the world, that is just the reality.

“Integrity issues matter. To a certain extent, the constitution talks about corruption and so on. Obviously, we will deal with that. To expect the personal holiness of candidates, a man that has gone through the structure of life in this nation – a nation anywhere in the world – for example, you find that politicians are sinners. For example, you cannot run for office without money.

“Money is the root of all evil (sic). Somebody said the absence of it is the foundation of all problems. In essence, there will be some sort of balance. There will be a sinner, not a murderer,” he said.

The ruling party rode to power on the strength of fighting corruption and changing the way things are. President Muhammadu Buhari was marketed to Nigerians as an anti-corruption retired army general.