Leonard Bature Kawas, an Archbishop of the Pentecostal Ministry, is the FCT Senatorial candidate of the Justice and Freedom Party. In this interview with Patrick Andrew, he says the clerics are forced into politics because politicians have failed the people.
It is interesting that a none indigene, so to speak from the Nigerian context, is aspiring to represent the FCT in the senate. What are your chances in view of the fact that you are not an indigene of the Territory?
I have so much respect for the original inhabitants of the FCT but by law the FCT now holds the statues of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) which means that every Nigerian have the right to live, work and vie for elective position in the Territory. In my own case, having lived here for 22 years l have been a blessing to the people even more than their indigenous politicians. I have built schools where I have students on scholarship, engaged many people who are part of the original indigenes. I am a friend of the indigenes who loved me so much that they have even given me a traditional title of ‘Manzo’ by the Etsu of Jikwoyi, a title that was not even given to their own local politicians.
The work that I have done in the FCT: bringing free education, medical treatment to people from all Area Councils, I believe the people are not blind they know who is working and have their best interest at heart. That is why I believe my chances are very high.
I am well accepted among the different tribes including the indigenes, Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa speaking persons in the Territory. Also, I am widely accepted by Muslims, Christians and others alike. So, I am a candidate to watch out for because I am going to win this election landslide.
Many had been there, what is it that you intend to do differently that will touch and affect the lives of the FCT residents especially the indigenes?
What I want to promise Abuja people is that every income that will accrue to me from the National Assembly 80 percent of it will go into helping the less privileged. I am going to be the senator of the less privileged. I will ensure that community and the satellite towns have portable water, rural women are empowered by providing funds for them to start petty trading and gainful engagements. I will be the senator of the people. I don’t intend to represent myself there because God has blessed me already. Everybody who knows Archbishop Kawas knows that l am already a blessed man. I am going there for the people.
That’s what l shall be doing differently. I don’t have need for any girl friend because I am a man of God, so l have no need for a riotous lifestyle that is so expensive to sponsor like the other politicians we have around with numerous girl friends that they maintained, buy very expensive houses and cars for. They spend hundreds of millions on frivolous and wicked lifestyle, fund that could have been used to affect their constituents positively. They indulge in unnecessary foreign trips, but I am not crazy about travelling abroad because I have been going overseas for 23 years to America, London and in fact 71 countries of the world for the work of God. So now is the time to help my people and I am going to be the senator for everybody.
Suddenly, the clergy class seems to be interested in politics, why?
The clergy must be interested in politics because we are the one the people come to cry to. When the Mallam sits in the Mosque, a pastor sits in the church every day we receive hundreds of people that come to cry to us and most of the things they cry to us about are things we expected the politicians to do for them because the politicians have access to public money but they are not providing these basic necessities for the people.
And the people are coming to the clerics for help and it is from the N50 or so that we collect as offerings that we use to try to solve some of their problems. So since the politicians have made it clear that they are not interested in helping the people then we have to take it upon ourselves to help the people.
Secondly, this country- Nigeria has been governed by a certain class of people for so long and every year they make bogus promises that they don’t fulfill and the people don’t see them again until election time when they reappear with yet other bogus promises. Already, they are doing it because one can see all the big politicians in Abuja going round making big promises and they are all lies, they don’t intend to fulfill it.
It is only God fearing men that can salvage the situation at this time. It is a rescue mission because people across board are suffering. For example, you talk take Abuja for instance; the president and the FCT minister are here. Infrastructures are already put in place by the federal government and the FCT administration. In reality, the FCT senator does not really have serious problem in respect of providing basic infrastructure for the people, in fact mostly what he needs to do is to make myself available for the people, help them and ensure that hunger that is ravaging the land is cushioned to the barest minimum.
These are the works that the senator should do but we are very disappointed in the way things are being done and the way politicians have been living their lives, so that’s why clergy men are getting into politics. Henceforth, many more men of God will go into politics for the sake of the downtrodden people.
Your platform- the Freedom and Justice Party- in the estimation of many seems rather insignificant compared to the might of the PDP and APC, what capacity does your party have to dislodge the bigger parties?
Well, the names of these political parties in some quarters have become dangerous liabilities because of their past and present antecedents. For instance, 16 years of the PDP what did they accomplished for the people other than to perpetuate more corruption?
The three and half years of the APC administration across board, what have they done? The change they promised have you seen the change? Has your situation changed positively since they came to power? People are looking for a new platform where they can express themselves politically. The Freedom and Justice Party is a breath of fresh air for Nigerian people and we intend to comb the length and breadth of the FCT to make our logo and symbol very popular and people will know about us and the result will be landslide victory for FJP and for Archbishop Leonard Kawas as the senator of the FCT.
Most Nigerians say politics is a dirty game that’s why they are worried that the clerics are veering into it, how do you to react to this assertion?
They are very correct. Politics has been dirty until now, dirty because clean people allowed dirty people to be playing politics. Any game played by dirty people will be dirty. So if a dirty person begins to play football the game will become dirty and he would break other people’s legs, will act wickedly because he is dirty, in any game at all the result will be the same.
Politics has been dirty because it has been played by dirty people but from now onward you will see many persons of God come into politics to clean it up for the sake of the suffering masses of Nigeria and this is the difference.
As a clergy man if you were to advise the federal government on issues that will propel growth and development, what would you say?
If I sat with the President I will take him through the tutelage of how to fight corruption because what he is doing now is not fighting corruption but fighting opposition. To fight corruption there are areas that you must visibly tackled: Number one is inflated government contract; the way it was done under the military regime was the way it was done under the PDP administration and it is still being done similarly under President Muhammadu Buhari administration.
Next is diversion of government properties, people still sell government properties to themselves; people allocate plots of land to themselves using different fictitious names, use of influence to distort justice, bribery and corruption which has hit the roof in Nigeria. Even l as clergy man bribe was recently demanded from me in a federal government organisation and when l refused my legitimate demand was declined.
If you say you are fighting corruption and all these things thrive under your watch then in reality you are aiding and abetting corruption. Nothing has really changed in terms of corruption. Unless you block those loopholes just chasing people up and down will not change anything. As far as I am concerned this government’s corruption fight has not been effective.
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Politics has been dirty because it has been played by dirty people but from now onward you will see many persons of God come into politics to clean it up for the sake of the suffering masses of Nigeria and this is the difference.
