Speaking Truth To Power Is Not A Crime: In Defence of Reverend Father Onaiyekan

 "The Presidency must learn that democracy is strengthened, not threatened by dissent"

There is something profoundly troubling when a democratic government begins to regard every critical voice as an enemy and every uncomfortable observation as an act of political hostility. Democracy is not measured by how a government treats those who praise it. Rather, it is measured by how it responds to criticism.

                                     

His Excellency, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Archbishop Emeritus of Abuja,

The recent exchange involving the Presidency and John Onaiyekan should therefore concern every Nigerian who cherishes democracy, irrespective of political affiliation.

John Cardinal Onaiyekan does not have to be right on every issue. No human being is.

The Presidency is equally entitled to disagree with him. What should worry us is when disagreement with a respected religious leader descends into questioning his motives, integrity or right to intervene in the affairs of the country.

That is unnecessary. It is also dangerous for democracy.

The appropriate response to an argument is a better argument.

The answer to criticism is superior evidence.

The antidote to an uncomfortable opinion is not intimidation, vilification or character assassination.

A Presidency confident in its achievements should have no reason to fear a priest's microphone.

The Church Was Never Ordained to Be Government's Praise Singer

There appears to be a growing misconception that religious leaders should restrict themselves to preaching salvation, conducting marriages, administering sacraments and burying the dead while leaving governance entirely to politicians.

History teaches otherwise.

The authentic Church has always possessed a prophetic responsibility to speak truth to temporal authority.

From the biblical prophets who confronted kings to contemporary religious leaders who challenged oppressive governments, the responsibility of the clergy has never ended at the church door.

When society hurts, the Church cannot pretend not to hear its cries.

When citizens are hungry, religious leaders cannot preach as though hunger were merely an economic statistic.

When families struggle to feed themselves, when transportation costs consume household incomes, when businesses buckle under operating costs, when graduates wander for years without meaningful employment, when pensioners struggle to survive, and when ordinary workers discover that their wages can barely take them through the month, the priest, pastor or imam cannot reasonably be expected to remain silent. These Nigerians constitute their congregations.

They are the people sitting in church pews on Sundays and praying in mosques on Fridays. Religious leaders conduct their weddings, baptise their children, counsel their distressed families and bury those among them who die.

They encounter the human consequences of government policies in ways that official statistics sometimes cannot capture.

Consequently, when a religious leader draws government's attention to hardship, insecurity, poverty or despair, he is not necessarily campaigning for an opposition party. He may simply be reporting the suffering he encounters daily among the people entrusted to his spiritual care.

A government may dispute his conclusions. It cannot reasonably deny him the right to speak.

From Washington: Bishop Budde Looked a President in the Face

Only recently, the world witnessed an extraordinary example of the Church exercising this prophetic responsibility.

On January 21, 2025, at the Washington National Cathedral, Episcopal Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde stood before President Donald Trump, who was sitting in the front row, and appealed directly to him to show mercy towards immigrants and vulnerable people affected by his administration's policies.

Trump strongly criticised her afterwards and demanded an apology; Bishop Budde refused to withdraw her message, explaining that her appeal had been for compassion and mercy.

The important lesson for Nigeria is not that American political leaders always graciously accept criticism. They plainly do not.

The lesson is that a bishop could stand before the President of the United States and challenge the moral implications of government policy because prophetic intervention remains part of the legitimate space occupied by religious leadership in a democratic society.

If Bishop Budde could ask an American President to reconsider how his policies affect immigrants, why should Cardinal Onaiyekan be expected to look away from conditions affecting millions of Nigerians?

Desmond Tutu Did Not Keep Quiet Under Apartheid

The historical example is even more compelling in South Africa.

Desmond Tutu did not become one of Africa's most revered religious leaders because he remained diplomatically silent while apartheid ravaged his people.

He confronted injustice.

He condemned apartheid.

He challenged government policies.

He mobilised moral opinion at home and abroad.

The Nobel Committee eventually recognised Tutu's leadership in the non-violent struggle against apartheid when it awarded him the 1984 Nobel Prize

Tutu's interventions were unquestionably political in their consequences, but fundamentally moral in their origins.

Had Tutu accepted the argument that clergymen should not comment on government, apartheid would have lost one of its most powerful moral opponents.

History vindicated the priest, not apartheid.

Martin Luther King Jr. Was a Reverend Before He Became a Global Icon

The same lesson comes from the United States.

Martin Luther King Jr. was not merely a political activist. He was the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr., a Baptist minister whose Christian convictions were inseparable from his struggle against racial injustice.

When authorities considered his agitation inconvenient and he was jailed during the Birmingham campaign in 1963, King wrote his historic Letter from Birmingham Jail, explaining why waiting indefinitely for justice was morally unacceptable.

The Federal Judicial Center describes the letter as one of the most important documents to emerge from America's civil-rights movement.

Imagine telling Martin Luther King that segregation was a political matter and therefore none of the Church's business.

Imagine telling Desmond Tutu that apartheid was government policy and therefore outside the pulpit's jurisdiction.

Imagine telling Bishop Budde that immigration was exclusively presidential business and therefore beneath ecclesiastical commentary.

History would consider such arguments absurd.

Why, then, should Nigeria expect something different from Cardinal Onaiyekan?

Criticism Is Not Treason

This is where the Nigerian Presidency must exercise restraint.

Cardinal Onaiyekan is neither an elected opposition politician nor an aspirant to the Presidency. He is a senior religious leader and elder statesman expressing his understanding of developments in his country.

Government is perfectly entitled to respond.

But response is different from disparagement.

If Onaiyekan presents incorrect statistics, correct him with credible statistics.

If he misrepresents a government programme, explain the programme.

If he criticises an economic policy, demonstrate its achievements.

If he exaggerates the country's difficulties, present evidence showing improvement.

That is democratic engagement.

But casting aspersions on the character or intentions of a respected religious leader merely because his observations make government uncomfortable lowers the quality of national discourse.

Democracy does not require citizens to agree with government; rather, it requires government to tolerate citizens who disagree with it.

Indeed, one of the earliest warning signs of authoritarianism is the gradual construction of an environment in which criticism of government becomes synonymous with hostility to the state. Nigeria must never travel that road.

The Irony of a Presidency With a Pastor as First Lady

There is an additional irony that should encourage reflection rather than confrontation.

Nigeria's First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, is herself an ordained pastor of the Redeemed Christian Church of God.

That fact makes it even more important for the administration to appreciate the independence and prophetic responsibility of the clergy.

Surely, Christianity cannot demand that pastors speak about righteousness only when righteousness concerns private individuals but remain silent when moral questions intersect with public policy.

The pulpit cannot become prophetic when the opposition governs and suddenly become apolitical when one's preferred government assumes office.

Moral authority loses its meaning when its application depends upon who occupies Aso Rock.

Government Should Listen to the Message, Not Attack the Messenger

Nigeria is going through difficult times. This is not a partisan statement.

It is an everyday reality for many families.

The real question should therefore not be:

Why is Onaiyekan talking?

It should be:

What conditions are making respected national figures feel compelled to talk?

Government should worry less about voices describing hardship and concentrate more on reducing hardship itself.

Silencing the person who announces that a building is burning does not extinguish the fire. Attacking the thermometer does not cure the fever. And discrediting the priest who reports his congregation's cries does not remove the circumstances that produce those cries.

If government succeeds in improving living conditions, creating employment, reducing insecurity, restoring purchasing power and giving Nigerians renewed confidence in tomorrow, the testimonies of ordinary citizens will become government's most persuasive public-relations machinery.

No presidential spokesman or Minister can communicate government success more effectively than a citizen whose life has genuinely improved.

Let Onaiyekan Speak

The Presidency must therefore resist the temptation to personalise criticism.

Let Cardinal Onaiyekan speak.

Let the bishops speak.

Let the pastors speak.

Let the imams speak.

Let traditional rulers speak.

Let academics speak.

Let journalists speak.

Let organised labour speak.

Let civil society speak.

And, above all, let ordinary Nigerians speak.

Government too should speak and defend its record vigorously.

That is the beauty of democracy: arguments competing in the marketplace of ideas while citizens ultimately make their judgement.

Muzzling dissent is not democratic strength. It is evidence of democratic insecurity.

A government does not become weaker because a priest criticises it.

It becomes stronger when it can hear uncomfortable truths without reaching for the weapon of personal denunciation.

Cardinal Onaiyekan's obligation as a cleric is to his conscience, his faith and the people among whom he ministers.

Government's obligation is to govern.

Where the two intersect, disagreement is inevitable. But disagreement must never become intolerance.

Desmond Tutu spoke.

Martin Luther King Jr. spoke.

Bishop Mariann Budde spoke.

Across generations and continents, religious leaders have challenged presidents, prime ministers, military regimes and unjust political establishments because conscience sometimes demands that the pulpit address the palace.

Nigeria should not be different.

The Presidency may disagree with Cardinal Onaiyekan. It may reject his conclusions. It may challenge his facts. It may even consider his intervention unfair.

But it should defend, rather than diminish, his right to speak.

For the day priests become afraid to speak, journalists become afraid to write, academics become afraid to question, and citizens become afraid to complain is the day democracy begins its silent retreat.

"And Nigeria has travelled too far on its democratic journey to start walking backwards"