“Evolve or die,” wrote hedge-fund billionaire Ray Dalio in a manifesto published in April titled “Why and How Capitalism Needs to Be Reformed.” With each passing month, more business executives have been joining this unlikely crusade to save capitalism from itself.

The loudest reform call yet from inside the system came this week from the Business Roundtable, which represents the chief executives of 192 of the nation’s largest companies. Most of its members signed a statement declaring that making profits for shareholders isn’t a corporation’s sole responsibility. Instead, companies have a broader mission to serve customers, employees, suppliers and communities, too, the statement said.

Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase and chairman of the Business Roundtable, led the signers who agreed: “Many Americans are struggling. Too often hard work is not rewarded.” Dimon had warned earlier this year in his annual letter to his company’s shareholders that the American Dream was “fraying for many” because of stagnant wages and income inequality.

Business leaders seem to recognize the crisis: The system isn’t delivering. President Trump’s election reflects a populist rage that threatens America’s future prosperity and stability.

Many progressives have responded cynically to the billionaires’ revolt. Dalio, after all, founded Bridgewater Associates, one of the world’s biggest hedge funds, and Dimon runs America’s biggest bank. Talk is cheap, critics argue, and if these CEOs really feel the system is in trouble, they should reduce their pay and give more to their workers and communities.

The skepticism is understandable, but it misses the larger political point: Corporate America fears the system is failing. As Dalio wrote, this is an “existential” moment. The guardians of capitalism seem to realize that they must respond to right-wing populists and left-wing progressives alike or face a worsening political crisis that is already hobbling the country.

The corporate panic about capitalism could be a turning point, opening the way for a future president to begin fixing the problems of stagnant wages and inequality that are at the core of America’s disarray. Democratic presidential candidates have been strewing proposals for radical change across the campaign trail: Some are well-considered, but many are wildly impractical and doomed to fail. America’s historical experience teaches us that economic reform succeeds when it goes mainstream, and that’s what’s happening now.

Today’s corporate reformers share the same concern about saving a broken capitalist system as did President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the New Deal era and President Theodore Roosevelt in the Progressive era. Dalio made the historical analogy in his manifesto: “We are now seeing conflicts between populists of the left and populists of the right increasing around the world in much the same way as they did in the 1930s when the income and wealth gaps were comparably large.”

A detailed agenda for change was published this year by the Aspen Institute’s Economic Strategy Group, which includes 60 prominent business leaders, policymakers and economists. The group’s report described “rising frustration with American politics, a populist backlash [and] social fragmentation.” To respond, it offered practical plans for reform, such as a “Higher Wages Tax Credit” that would help employers offset the cost of raising minimum wages.

This year’s corporate revolt was previewed in “Can American Capitalism Survive?” a 2018 book by Post writer Steven Pearlstein. “The dirty little secret is that nobody dislikes the move to shareholder capitalism more than corporate executives and directors,” he wrote, because it forced them “to abandon their role as proud stewards of the American system.”

Dalio has even questioned the profit motive, the capitalist holy of holies, arguing that while “usually an effective motivator and resource allocator . . . it is now producing a self-reinforcing feedback loop that widens the income/wealth/opportunity gap to the point that capitalism and the American dream are in jeopardy.”

FDR embodied the confident save-the-system mind-set the United States needs now. Biographer Jean Edward Smith recalls that in July 1932, as the Bonus Army of angry veterans marched on Washington, Franklin Roosevelt fended off attacks from Huey Long, a demagogic left-wing populist. FDR told his speechwriter Rexford Tugwell that Long was “the second most dangerous man in this country . . . He screams at people and they love it.”

Tugwell pressed his boss about who, then, was the most dangerous man. Roosevelt named the right-wing demagogue, Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who had routed the Bonus Army from its camps. “Did you ever see anyone more self-satisfied? There’s a potential Mussolini for you.”

Calm, reassuring, Roosevelt saved capitalism by reforming it, redeeming his campaign pledge to “the forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid.” Who in the current Democratic field can claim this role in 2020? The ground is ready. Even the moguls know it’s time for change.

Washington Post

When there are no good options, leaders must choose the least bad one. China’s government may loathe the idea of making concessions to the Hong Kong protesters, but considering the catastrophic consequences of a military crackdown, that is what it must do.

The crisis in Hong Kong appears to be careening toward a devastating climax. With China’s government now using rhetoric reminiscent of that which preceded the Tiananmen Square massacre in June 1989, Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protesters – and, indeed, its democracy – could well be in grave danger.

For more than two months, Hong Kong has been beset by protests. Triggered by a proposed law to allow the extradition of criminal suspects to mainland China, the demonstrations have since developed into broader calls to safeguard – or, perhaps more accurately, restore – the semi-autonomous territory’s democracy, including by strengthening state (especially police) accountability.

As the unrest drags on, the Chinese government’s patience is wearing thin – and its warnings are growing more ominous. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) garrison in Hong Kong is, in the wordsof its commander Chen Daoxiang, “determined to protect national sovereignty, security, stability, and the prosperity of Hong Kong.” To drive the point home, a promotional video showing Chinese military officers in action was released along with the statement.

Yang Guang, a spokesperson for the Chinese government’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, has echoed this sentiment, warningthe protesters – whom he calls “criminals” – not to “take restraint for weakness.” He then reiterated the government’s “firm resolve” to “safeguard the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong.”

Zhang Xiaoming, the director of the office, then took matters a step further, declaringthat China’s government “has sufficient methods and enough powerful means to quell all sorts of likely unrest (dongluan).” This came just two months after China’s defense minister arguedthat China’s stability since the Tiananmen crackdown proved that the government had made the “correct” choice.

Increasingly harsh warnings against Hong Kong’s protesters point not just to a hardening of positions, but also to the ascendance of figures in the Chinese government who favor asserting total control over the territory. And they have been reflected in the response from the police, which has been deploying rubber bullets and tear gas with rising frequency. Hundreds have been arrested, and 44 have been chargedwith “rioting.”

Yet, far from being deterred, the protesters are challenging the Chinese government with increasing resolve. In July, they vandalizedthe outside of the Chinese government’s liaison office in the city center. Last week, they mounted a general strike that nearly paralyzedthe city, one of Asia’s most important commercial hubs. Perhaps counter-intuitively, this radicalization has come alongside broadening support for the movement, with members of the middle class – such as lawyers and civil servants – openly joining the cause.

With their stark warnings having no effect, China’s leaders may well be sensing that the best – or even the only – way to restore their authority in Hong Kong is by force, though President Xi Jinping may wait until after the celebrations for the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic on October 1 to act. But, whether now or in two months, a Tiananmen-style crackdown is not the answer.

For starters, Hong Kong’s 31,000-strong police force is not up to the task of carrying out such a crackdown. Not only does it lack the manpower; its officers may refuse to use deadly force. After all, there is a big difference between firing rubber bullets at a crowd and murdering civilians. This means that China would have to deploy the local PLA garrison or transfer tens of thousands of paramilitary soldiers (the People’s Armed Police) from the mainland.

Hong Kong’s residents would almost certainly treat Chinese government forces as invaders, and mount the fiercest possible resistance. The resulting clashes – which would likely produce high numbers of civilian casualties – would mark the official end of the “one country, two systems” arrangement, with China’s government forced to assert direct and full control over Hong Kong’s administration.

With the Hong Kong government’s legitimacy destroyed, the city would instantly become ungovernable. Civil servants would quit their jobs in droves, and the public would continue to resist. Hong Kong’s complex transit, communications, and logistics systems would prove easy targets for defiant locals determined to cause major disruptions.

After the Tiananmen crackdown, the Communist Party of China’s ability to reinstitute control rested not only on the presence of tens of thousands of PLA troops, but also on the mobilization of the Party’s members. In Hong Kong, where the CPC has only a limited organizational presence (officially, it claims to have none at all), this would be impossible. And because the vast majority of Hong Kong’s residents are employed by private businesses, China cannot control them as easily as mainlanders who depend on the state for their livelihoods.

The economic consequences of such an approach would be dire. Some CPC leaders may think that Hong Kong, which now accounts for only 3% of Chinese GDP, is economically expendable. But the city’s world-class legal and logistical services and sophisticated financial markets, which channel foreign capital into China, mean that its value vastly exceeds its output.

If Chinese soldiers storm the city, an immediate exodus of expats and elites with foreign passports and green cards will follow, and Western businesses will relocate en masseto other Asian commercial hubs. Hong Kong’s economy – a critical bridge between China and the rest of the world – would almost instantly collapse.

When there are no good options, leaders must choose the least bad one. China’s government may loathe the idea of making concessions to the Hong Kong protesters, but considering the catastrophic consequences of a military crackdown, that is what it must do.

Project Syndicate

The present times in Nigeria have lately been compared to the days of the dark-goggled general, Sani Abacha. Part of what the folk making the comparison are wondering is how we crawled ourselves back into the hole we thought we escaped. So, here is a quick backward glance on the road that brought us here.

In the run-up to the 2015 elections, when the “anything but (Goodluck) Jonathan” din was at its zenith, one of the absurdities that characterised the period was the rash of amnesties given Candidate Muhammadu Buhari over his repressive actions as military head of state between 1983 and 1985. Trumpeting Buhari as a “converted democrat,” a deluge of essays informed us that if those who personally and grievously suffered his maladministration could forgive him in the interest of the nation, other Nigerians too should forgive him and move on. Nigeria, these essayists insinuated, was at the crossroads and sorely needed a leadership change.

The injunctions to forgive and forget came from surprising quarters that included intellectuals and elders who should have known better. One of the most astonishing for me was by Tunde Thompson. Thompson and his colleague, Nduka Irabor, were the first victims of Buhari’s infamous “Decree 4,” an anti-press draconian diktat that protected public officers from the shame of their bureaucratic shortcomings. In 2015, Thompson endorsed Buhari. That, of course, was his prerogative. What I found repulsive was the unprincipled rhetorical gymnastics he had to perform to extricate Buhari from any moral responsibility for the abuse of power he suffered. I do not believe that Thompson was as naïve about the workings of the machinery of governance as he portrayed himself. He – like other “forgivers” of Buhari’s sins – was probably enthusiastic about the promise of change that they re-victimised themselves to set their abuser free.

There were two important nuggets Thompson and co forgot. One, while they might have been the faces of the excesses of the regime, the wounds sustained from the abuses of that autocracy were not unique to them such that they could unilaterally declare forgiveness and exonerate Buhari from culpability. The trauma of that period cut into the flesh of the entire society and the cicatrix it left on the surface of Nigeria’s body still itches to this day. Nigerians went through abuses that grated our collective psyche, wrecked our senses of personhood and nationhood, and destructively inveighed on our corporate ethics such that some of us can no longer discern right from wrong anymore.

Two, Buhari himself did not deny responsibility for his despotic decrees but instead doubled down on the necessity of inflicting cruel punishment on the nation. Those who are familiar with this column will recall that I have said this a few times: my respect for Buhari dissolved to the last atom when I read an interview he granted during his 70th birthday celebrations. They asked him about his infamous Decree 2 and he, despite the benefit age and hindsight should had granted him to reflect, still maintained his sanctimonious stance that he did what was right. I concluded at the time that this man did not think about things.

It is precisely this lack of rationality – the arrogant unwillingness to engage critical thoughts on history – and how it might shape both his legacy and the future of the nation that makes him dangerous. Add to that the expectations of the Nigerians who voted him to bring an iron hand of discipline to the nation whose dysfunctionality was diagnosed as bordering on the looseness of individual and institutional morals. What you get is a man who makes savage and atrocious attacks on civil liberties. In 2015, to have urged ourselves to show some restraint in the enthusiasm about Buhari’s potential, and insist the man reflect on his brutal past was almost an act of indulgence. Now we can look back and see that those who slapped him with the label of a “born-again democrat,” and forgave him without him soliciting it, created the monster that now haunts us. We are stuck with a government that weaponises power solely for self-aggrandisement and jingoism.

When he became President in 2015, the first omen of what we would contend with was the move to bar AITfrom covering presidential activities as payback for its opposition to his candidature. Although that measure failed because of the blowback, the tendency to “squeeze” people who express their democratic agencies by standing against his administration has been the defining ethos of Aso Rock. They have come up with different ruses of curtailing democratic freedoms either by using legislation such as the one that pretends to tackle “hate speech” or the one that uses the court to declare antagonisms as “terrorism.” These are military tactics being repurposed for an ostensibly civilian era.

The administration has managed to clip the autonomy of other arms of government that could check its excesses. The legislature is full of their minions, and since the raid of the homes of serving Justices of the Supreme Court on suspicion of corruption, the message on how power will play out in his version of “democracy” is clear. There have been many cases of abuses of power from overzealous government officials who take their cues from the Presidency’s body language. This is why we have an abusive military that not only kills hapless civilians (think of the Shi’ites, the IPOB marchers, and even lately, policemen) but will not even condone criticisms of censoring organisations. Someone like Thompson will swear that none of these excesses – also think of that ludicrous instance of that time in 2016 when DSS raided forex dealers to force them to sell at stipulated rates – has anything to do with the man at the helm of leadership. His kind of willed naiveté is why democracy has lost more grounds since 2015.

Today, some of those who criticise the government have been picked up and detained at unknown locations. We live in a democracy where the Presidency has no qualms asking law enforcement agents to be “ruthless” with those they say are election riggers. On Saturday, the President himself gave a mandate to the military to “identify and eliminate” the bandits troubling the country. We live in times when security agents – with their inimical record of cruelty against civilians – are publicly given the charge to be judge and execute crimes without recourse to democratic procedures.

The case of SaharaReporterspublisher, Omoyele Sowore, is another example of what we are losing. Sowore is a DSS detainee, and they are scrambling to something with which to charge him. What they came up with from their so-called “painstaking investigation” would have been laughable if the man’s life and well-being were not at stake. The demands Sowore made with #RevolutionNow were not outside the legitimate claims one can make from a democratic government, but he is being punished for dissent as if it is 1984 all over again.

Recently, Wole Soyinka complained that we are back in the dark, repressive days of Abacha. Well, the truth is, we walked into all of these with our eyes wide open when we handed over the reins of a fragile polity to a man who never atoned for his original sins. When he got to power, the first thing he did was to cast off the pretences and show his true self. Now that developments such as attacks on democratic freedoms and Buhari’s anti-Midas touch on the economy are pushing us to re-engage the questions evaded earlier, we need to return to where the rain started beating us. We cannot afford to spend the next four years fighting a government that wants to take tyrannical liberties with civil liberties while other elemental issues of development get elided.

According to Wikipedia, the Nuremberg trials were a series of military tribunals held after World War II (1939 – 1945) after the defeat of Germany’s Adolf Hitler and his Axis Alliance (Germany, Japan and Italy) by the Allied Powers (Britain, France, USSR and the United States) under international law and the laws of war. The trials were most notable for the prosecution of prominent members of the political, military, judicial, and economic leadership of Nazi Germany, who planned, carried out, or otherwise participated in the Holocaust and other war crimes. The trials were held in Nuremberg, Germany, and their decisions marked a turning point between classical and contemporary international law.

The first and best known of the trials was that of the major war criminals before the International Military Tribunal (IMT). It was described as "the greatest trial in history" by Sir Norman Birkett, one of the British judges present throughout. Held between 20 November 1945 and 1 October 1946, the Tribunal was given the task of trying 24 of the most important political and military leaders of the Third Reich. Martin Bormann had, unknown to the Allies, died in May 1945 and was tried in absentia. Another defendant, Robert Ley, committed suicide within a week of the trial's commencement.

Adolf Hitler (on April 30, 1945) and Joseph Goebbels (24 hours later, together with his wife and six children) had both committed suicide to avoid capture. Heinrich Himmler attempted to commit suicide, but was captured before he could succeed; he committed suicide one day after being arrested by British forces. Heinrich Müller disappeared the day after Hitler's suicide, the most senior figure of the Nazi regime whose fate remains unknown. Reinhard Heydrich had been assassinated by Czech partisans in 1942. Josef Terboven killed himself with dynamite in Norway in 1945. Adolf Eichmann fled to Argentina to avoid capture but was apprehended by Israel's intelligence service (Mossad) and hanged in 1962. Hermann Göring was sentenced to death but, in defiance of his captors, committed suicide by swallowing cyanide the night before his execution.

Primarily treated here is the first trial, conducted by the International Military Tribunal. Further trials of lesser war criminals were conducted under Control Council Law No. 10 at the U.S. Nuremberg Military Tribunal (NMT), which included the Doctors' trial and the Judges' Trial.

The categorization of the crimes and the constitution of the court represented a juridical advance that would be followed afterward by the United Nations for the development of an international jurisprudence in matters of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and wars of aggression, and led to the creation of the International Criminal Court. For the first time in international law, the Nuremberg indictments also mentioned genocide (war crimes) particularly against Jews, Poles, Gypsies and others)"

We can see from the above that Nuremberg, the German city where Ike Ekweremadu’s own “trial” took place last Saturday, is not an ordinary city; it was where leaders of Nazi Germany accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity were tried at the end of the Second World War after the Allied Powers had defeated the Axis Powers. What were Ekweremadu’s own “crimes”? He was accused by his attackers of, among other things, crimes against Biafra, duplicity, and complicity with the Nigerian nation and State apparatus. He was harassed, beaten, and prevented from speaking to the crowd he had come to address and attending the yam festival he had travelled all the way from Nigeria to attend. In the end, he could not eat the yam he had savored to eat! He had to be whisked away Gestapo-style or else… Whereas he had arrived at the venue in high spirit gallivanting with a prepared speech possibly tucked somewhere in his well-iron traditional Igbo dress called isi-agu, he scampered out of the place disheveled and wondering what had hit him. Thank God he survived to tell the story by himself!

War crimes and crimes against humanity brought Hitler and his henchmen to Nuremberg. According to information pieced together from Ekweremadu’s own accounts and those of the Independent People of Biafra (IPOB), which claimed responsibility for the attack, the still serving Senator was accused of being IPOB’s persona non grata and an adversary of its cause of an independent state of Biafra. He was accused of being instrumental to the branding of IPOB as a terrorist organization and its subsequent proscription by governors of South-East states; he was held accountable for the deployment of “Operation Python Dance” to the South-East by the Muhammadu Buhari administration and the many atrocities allegedly committed by the military in the region in general and specifically against IPOB members and its sympathizers; that the isi-agu worn by Ekweremadu to the occasion had the Nigerian coat-of-arm, which is the insignia or symbol of authority of the Nigeria State, which the attackers saw as insensitivity and effrontery on Ekweremadu’s part and an affront to a people reeling from the oft-touted marginalization from the same Nigeria State and victimization of its leaders (e.g. Nnamdi Kadu) as well as its aspirations ( e.g. actualization of Biafra); and that Ekweremadu, as one of the foremost Igbo leaders, has not done enough to address the atrocities of Fulani herdsmen in Igboland.     

These, no doubt, are weighty allegations. In his defence, Ekweremadu has described himself as, perhaps, one of the best friends of Ndigbo and its cause. He said he had often spoken out in defence of Ndigbo, regardless whose ox is gored and not minding placing his neck even on the chopping block. He related the role he played in getting IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu, the bail that got him out of Buhari’s gulag. He had also been a veritable mouth-piece of Ndigbo in the Senate as well as in the corridors of powers. It is doubtful if anyone, including IPOB, will deny that Ekweremadu has done all of that but it would appear as if the outrage in the land, as a result of the atrocities of those who wear impunity as a badge and who use their exalted offices to serve tribal and religious causes, have become so exacting that the people’s anger draws no limit and makes no distinction any more. So, Ekweremadu became guilty by association. He is seen pure and simple as a member of the oppressive ruling class. He is one of the cabal. He is also seen as a member of the ineffectual and docile class of Southern or Igbo leaders who, because of their privileged position, are unable to adequately stand up for their own people against the atrocities being visited on them from outside. In other words, the contributions being flagged by Ekweremadu are seen as mere tokenism, which are not far-reaching enough to address the critical situations at hand. Ndigbo expects Ekweremadu and his likes to have done more. In Nuremberg, Ndigbo gave a clear message to Ekweremadu and his likes to henceforth begin to do more or else…

“There were present at that season some that told him of the Galilaeans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or the eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall likewise perish” – Luke 13: 1 – 5. Suppose ye that Ekweremadu is the greatest offender amongst fawning and compromising Igbo leaders? Nay; not at all! His Nuremberg travail, unfortunate as it is, is a signal to other Igbo leaders; nay, all compromising and genuflecting leaders down South; who are too timid and selfish to stand up for the defence of their own people. Yet, once the oppressors have finished using them, they dump them. Witness Kemi Adeosun, erstwhile Finance Minister; and witness ex-CJN Walter Onnoghen! They are already preparing Fowler (Federal Internal Revenue Service) and Oyo-Ita (Head of Federal Civil Service) for the slaughter. You would think only southerners have issues!

Good, that Ekweremadu has accepted his fate and has moved on; his Nuremberg trial should not discourage him from doing more for Ndigbo; in fact, he should, more than ever before, re-dedicate himself to the cause of his people; so also other Ndigbo leaders, especially the governors. The ruling class outcry against IPOB as a result of Nuremberg is understandable. As our people would say, the death that kills your contemporary is telling you to get ready. The positive in Ekweremadu’s unsavoury experience, however, is that more of our leaders will now sit at home instead of squandering our riches on needless foreign trips!      

I’ve read Fowler’s response. Indices such as real value, factoring inflation and proportion of contributions to overall budget sizes in the six years under reference not imputed. For instance, what is the percentage value of FIRS revenues to FG Budgets in 2012, 2013 & 2014 compared to 2016, 2017 & 2018? What’s the Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) in the periods under comparison? Since he referred to dollar receipts of crude oil earnings, what is his collections worth in dollar terms in the corresponding periods? And when factored for official rates of inflation, what is the REAL value of his collections year-on-year? Now, his collections should be weighed in terms of his own very claims that the tax base has been expanded from 10m tax payers to N20m. This claimed expansion should more than adequately compensate for macroeconomic contraction that manifested in reduced oil revenues, the recession and reduced GDP growth rates. If we put these numbers in graphic formats (spreadsheets, bar charts, etc), Fowler’s gross underperformance will be clearly evident.

As Christian churches throughout the US face widespread decline, one church is bucking the trend. But is Hillsong a triumph of marketing or faith?

If someone were to choreograph an ideal concert audience, it would look something like this.

Everyone has their hands up and everyone is swaying. The opening bars of each song are met with a roar of frenzied recognition. For the few who don't already know them by heart, the lyrics beam down from massive screens flanking the stage.

The songs sound expertly engineered to elicit an emotional reaction. The melodies rise, fall, then rise again like a more dramatic version of Mumford and Sons. The band, Hillsong United, had sold out the Anthem, among Washington's favourite venues.

The collective style of the 10 members on stage is mirrored by their audience: skinny jeans, over-sized T-shirts and tattoos. This uniformity makes the fans look less like a crowd and more like a congregation.

There are a few hints that the members of Hillsong are not your average rockstars, different to a musician like Billie Eilish, who took the same stage just days before.

First, there is no alcohol being sold anywhere in the venue. Any related branding has been hidden. Second, there are volunteers in blue vests slowly circling the concert floor, seeking donations for a Christian ministry group. And third, there is a massive CGI recreation of Jesus Christ on the cross, beamed up above the stage.

This isn't just a concert, this is church.

Celebrity following

The band, Hillsong United, is a vital limb of Hillsong Church. Founded by husband and wife duo Brian and Bobbie Houston in Sydney, Australia, in 1983, the ministry has expanded into a global Evangelical phenomenon.

It spans six continents and claims churches in 23 cities. Every Sunday, an average of 130,000 worshippers will attend a Hillsong service somewhere around the world.

Hillsong's congregation now boasts a celebrity following: Justin Bieber and his wife, Hailey Baldwin Bieber, are famed members. NBA players Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving have been known to seek guidance from Hillsong New York's head pastor, Carl Lentz. Chris Pratt, Kylie Jenner and Kourtney Kardashian have also been tied to the church.

Hillsong declined repeated requests for an interview.

"They are one massively impactful ministry right now," says Mack Brock, who opened for Hillsong during its North American tour this year, after more than a decade as a worship leader at Elevation, a megachurch based in North Carolina.

Hillsong calls itself a "contemporary" Christian church, "on a mission to see God's kingdom established across the earth". This mission is being manifested in its ministry and its sprawling brand. Hillsong lays claim to two colleges (one in Sydney and one in Phoenix, Arizona), annual conferences, a 24-hour TV channel, community service initiatives and a music label.

Of these, Hillsong United is arguably the most visible and, certainly, the most accessible to the mainstream.

The band has more than 2 million followers on Instagram, with an additional 1.5 million combined from its 10 members. Their songs have almost 3.5 million weekly listens on Spotify. Their followers nearly double that of the platform's Top Christian channel.

Its most popular song to date, Oceans, has been played more than 155 million times on Spotify alone. For context, that is more than twice the plays than Billie Eilish's recent collaboration with Justin Bieber.

The tie between Christianity and rock music is not new, but the expanse of Hillsong's reach may be. The North America leg of its People tour included stops in more than 30 cities in the US and Canada. In November, they will take on Latin America, covering Brazil, Argentina and Peru.

Hillsong is "on the forefront of church music" Brock says. "They're the ones that I think do it best."

The meteoric rise of Hillsong, in all its various forms, is particularly striking given persistent declines in religiosity worldwide. For years, the Christian share of the US population has fallen, paralleled by an increase in those who do not identify with any religion at all.

Over a period of seven years - 2007 to 2014 - the percentage of adults who describe themselves as Christian dropped by almost eight percentage points. This drop is most pronounced among young people, a demographic that is especially enthralled by Hillsong.

'I'm going to cry my eyes out'

At the Anthem, the line to enter formed about an hour before the doors to the venue opened, more than two before anyone started singing.

"We've waited our whole lives to see them" says Danielle Caputo, 27, as she waited to see the band in July. "On earth, it's the easiest way to see God's love in person." Her friend, Kristin Maghamez adds: "Hillsong concerts are a place where you can truly worship."

Most of the people I spoke to answered with some version of this: Hillsong's music is an embodiment of their faith, and their concerts are a chance to share in it with others. "You feel like sometimes there's nobody with our views," Maghamez says. "[Christianity] is almost looked down upon."

Many intimated a visceral connection to Hillsong or, as Caputo put it: "I'm going to cry my eyes out." And there were plenty of tears, especially when Hillsong, the band, leaned more toward Hillsong, the church.

"God's been doing something," says lead singer Joel Houston - son of Bobbie and Brian - to the crowd, resting his hands on his guitar. "I believe there's not one person here by accident." "I believe God is going to meet you where you're at."

This notion - of meeting followers where they are - is central to Hillsong's mission, and to its appeal.

Hillsong is located squarely in the thoroughfare of the young and hip. Hillsong's band sells out arenas, its church services fill Manhattan's Hammerstein Ballroom, its pastors sit courtside at NBA games.

Brock and other followers interviewed reject the idea that Hillsong's designer aesthetic is either a deliberate choice on the part of its leaders, or a calculated marketing scheme. But to an outsider, Hillsong's initial appeal lies in the visuals. Its brand looks and feels like your cool friend on Instagram.

"They're relevant," says Joe Adevai, who attended Hillsong College in Sydney before becoming a worship leader in New Jersey. "They're keeping up with the culture," he said. "How do you stay cool and be a Christian?"

'We do not affirm a gay lifestyle'

Whatever the packaging, Hillsong is, fundamentally, a religious institution. More specifically, it is an Evangelical church, one that sees the Bible as "accurate, authoritative, and applicable to our everyday lives".

To some, this presents an inherent contradiction: a church marketed widely, with contemporary branding, that remains decidedly conservative.

Josh Canfield knows this tension intimately. He first joined Hillsong in 2008, soon becoming a vocalist on their worship team. Compared to the church of his youth, Hillsong seemed "edgy".

When Canfield, who is gay, joined Hillsong, he was still grappling with his sexuality in the context of his faith. While his parents' church was explicit in its stance - homosexuality is a sin - Hillsong was less transparent.

"It did feel like a "don't ask don't tell" kind of situation," Canfield says. "No one is going to ask, because no one wants to ask."

Sermons were resolutely positive, Canfield tells me, calling upon congregants to love the marginalised, immigrants and the poor. "But it does seem like they just forget about the LGBTQ group," he says.

In 2014, Canfield appeared on the reality show Survivor, speaking openly about his sexuality and his role at Hillsong. Canfield had told leadership at Hillsong New York of his plans, who "gave the go-ahead".

But after episodes began to air and Canfield's storyline gained media attention, head pastor Brian Houston publicly "clarified" Hillsong's stance on homosexuality.

In a blog post on Hillsong's website called Do I Love Gay People, Houston wrote that "God's word is clear" on homosexuality.

"Hillsong Church welcomes ALL people but does not affirm all lifestyles," he said. "Put clearly, we do not affirm a gay lifestyle and because of this we do not knowingly have actively gay people in positions of leadership, either paid or unpaid."

Canfield was asked to step down from his position with the vocalist team. After a series of private meetings with New York's head pastor, Carl Lentz, Canfield decided to leave the church.

"My problem is not that Hillsong believes that homosexuality is a sin, that is their prerogative to have that belief," he says. "But the problem is they're not being completely open about their beliefs because they don't want those people to leave… is that lying? In religious terms, is that a sin of omission?"

The semantic two-step in Houston's statement is a common refrain among Hillsong congregants: the church welcomes all people, but does not condone all "lifestyles". They prefer to talk about what they are for rather than what they are against, turning to some version of "love the sinner, not the sin".

"I think the Bible calls it out as a sin," Caputo says to me of gay marriage, a few weeks after the concert. "I don't think it's wrong to say that, but it needs to follow up with: God will love you anyway."

Steven Paulikas, a priest at All Saints Episcopal Church in Brooklyn and a doctoral student at Oxford's school of theology, argues there is a cost to this type of nuance.

"If a church says that it's welcoming in one part of its way of being, but explicitly says it's not welcoming in another place - those things are irreconcilable," he says. "And one thing trumps the other."

Paulikas did not comment specifically on Hillsong, but spoke about churches in general that include all people, but not all parts of them.

"That form of bait and switch is a type of spiritual violence," Paulikas says. "As a queer person… it's profoundly disturbing."

'Evangelism or marketing?'

On the surface, Paulikas' steepled church lacks some of the star power claimed by Hillsong. And though he says that his own congregation has grown in recent years, he acknowledges the institutional slide hurting others like it.

"We see our numbers declining and it is very distressing," he says. Looking at churches like Hillsong, "there are feelings of envy because our institutions are by and large losing people".

Paulikas and his colleagues talk about ways to expand their circles of faith - something Hillsong has mastered - "to an obsessive extent". But he objects to the "success" of a church being measured in relation to its fan following. The shine associated with Hillsong is of no interest to him.

"I see that as a distraction," he says. "Is that Evangelism or is that marketing?"

Moral teaching is strongest when it is removed from earthly markers of success like wealth and popularity, he continued.

After leaving Hillsong, Canfield has turned to a smaller congregation, one without the celebrity of Hillsong.

"When the cameras aren't there, and no one is interviewing you, that's where most true Christianity resides," he says.

But he is still defensive of his former church.

"You walk into Hillsong and it's cool and it's dark and there are lights going and there are all these people around you who are your age who are smiling and talking," Canfield says. "And then the music starts and it washes over you… the noise of outside gets cancelled out."

"The music is so beautiful and uplifting and it makes you feel better," he continued. "I don't think there's anything in the Bible that says we can't feel good."

Compiled by Olalekan Adeleye

BBC

Sudan’s pro-democracy movement and ruling military council signed a final power-sharing agreement Saturday at a ceremony in the capital, Khartoum, after weeks of tortuous negotiations.

The historic deal paves the way for a transition to a civilian-led government after the military overthrow of President Omar al-Bashir months ago and the more recent deadly suppression of protests. Earlier this month, the two sides initialed a constitutional document in the wake of international pressure and amid growing concerns the political crisis that followed al-Bashir’s ouster could ignite civil war.

Mr Abdel-Fattah Burhan, head of the military council, called the signing a “victorious and historic day for our nation.”

“The revolution has achieved its goals,” he said, vowing the military would guarantee the transition to civilian rule.

Protest leader Mohammed Naji al-Asam said the two sides have ushered in a “new page” in Sudan’s history after three decades of “repression and corruption.”

The power-sharing deal creates a joint military and civilian sovereign council to rule for a little over three years until elections can be held. A military leader would head the 11-member council for the first 21 months, followed by a civilian leader for the next 18.

The agreement also establishes a Cabinet appointed by the activists, as well as a legislative body to be assembled within three months. The protest coalition is to have a majority in that body, as nominated by the Forces for Declaration of Freedom and Change, a coalition of opposition parties and movements representing the protesters.

The two sides appeared to agree on the soundness of a deal that came about in part because of international pressure. Ethiopia and the African Union co-led mediation efforts between the military and protesters.

Many regional leaders and international envoys attended Saturday’s ceremony, including Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. Attendees in the Friendship Hall where the ceremony took place received Ahmed with cheering and chanting.

But at least one analyst, Suliman Baldo, a senior researcher with the Enough Project, said the country will still face obstacles during the coming months of transition.

“Daunting challenges will face Sudan’s progress to democracy and sound governance, chief among them the survival of the elements of the former regime in the institutions of the transition,” Baldo said.

Still, the Sudanese celebrated in Khartoum and elsewhere across the country Saturday. Video posted online showed people celebrating in the streets in Darfur and the eastern province of Kassala.

Railway workers and other protesters had traveled to the capital Friday by train from Atbara, the northern transport hub where the uprising began in December.

The military overthrew al-Bashir in April following months of protests against his three-decade-long authoritarian rule. The protesters then remained in the streets, demanding a rapid transition to civilian leadership.

The ruling military council and the activists came under renewed pressure to reach an accord after security forces opened fire on student protesters on Aug. 1 in the city of Obeid, leaving six people dead. At least nine troops from the paramilitary Rapid Support forces were arrested over the killings.

In June, security forces violently dispersed the protesters’ main sit-in outside the military headquarters in Khartoum, killing dozens of people and plunging the fragile transition into crisis.

The power-sharing agreement includes the establishment of an independent investigation into the crackdown on protests, specifically the dispersal of the sit-in.

Former Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi, leader of the opposition Umma party, said the deal was a “first step” in the democratic change until “fair” elections are held.

“Today is the day of transition to civilian rule. ... The next stage will be a test for us, without exclusion. We will open the door so all people can participate,” said al-Mahdi, who led Sudan’s last freely elected government before an Islamist-backed military coup in 1989.

Mr Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, deputy head of the military council, and protest leader Ahmad Rabie who is a high school teacher, signed the deal. Both had initialed the documents earlier this month.

Spokesman Stephane Dujarric said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres congratulated the Sudanese people and looked forward to “engaging with and supporting the transitional governing institutions.”

Forces for Declaration of Freedom and Change, or FDFC, has nominated a well-known economist, Abdalla Hamdok, to lead the government during the transition. He served as the deputy executive secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa since November 2011, and has yet to be confirmed by the sovereign council. The council’s members are to be announced on Sunday, after which the ruling military council will immediately be disbanded.

The power-sharing deal has been criticized by the Sudan Revolutionary Front, an alliance of the largest rebel groups in Darfur. The rebels have stressed to protest leaders that the agreement did not include “basic principles” to achieve peace in Sudan. The deal calls for the government to reach a peace agreement with the rebels within six months.

The rebel alliance, which is part of the FDFC, wanted to include a peace document agreed on by the protest movement in the power-sharing deal. The rebel leaders have engaged in talks with other protest leaders to settle the disputed points.

Compiled by Olalekan Adeleye

AP

When residents of a municipality in southern Mexicogot fed up with their mayor after he failed to keep a campaignpromise, they knew what they had to do.

They made him wear a dress and paraded him around town. For days.

Earlier this week, a visibly stressed Mayor Javier Jimenez, from Huixtán province, walked around in a long dark skirt and frilly white blouse with ruffles and flowery embroidery, in front of furious residents of San Andrés Puerto Rico, while Luis Ton, another official also deemed deficient, was clad in a bright pink dress with white polka dots.

One of the key complaints, local news outlets say, is that Jimenez has not come through on his campaign promise to allocate 3 million pesos (equivalent to about $158,000) for improvements to the town’s water system, among other things, reported the newspaper El Diario de Mexico.

While the officials walked in women’s garb, residents held hand-scrawled posters describing what they saw as the politicians’ failings. In an interview with a reporter captured on video, the mayor, appearing uncomfortable, said he’s been trying to fulfill his promises. He said there is no more money in the fund because it has been given to various municipalities. As he spoke, some residents held posters denouncing government failures, and others could be heard yelling at him not to continue telling lies.

Jimenez and Ton also were forced to solicit funds from passing motorists – many of whom seemed to have smirks on their faces—in order to raise money for improving the water system. The two politicians had been “detained” by the residents for at least four days, according to Cultura Colectiva.

Residents are demanding an investigation into whether Jimenez stole the 3 million pesos he says has gone to various communities. In the interview with the local reporter, Jimenez said he is innocent, but that he would not resist an investigation.

Dressing up politicians who disappoint is a traditional – and cathartic -- way in several towns in the state of Chiapas of dressing them down. Often, politicians are taken by force and dressed up.

In May, residents of several communities from the municipality of Siltepec in Chiapas hauled the mayor, Pedro Damian Gonzalez Arriaga, out of his office and tied him to a post in the main square, according to Mexico News Daily.

Residents told reporters that they had enough of unfulfilled campaign promises to improve public infrastructure. They said they were tempted to shave his head “as if [he] were a sheep” and exhibiting him on the streets if he did not do his job.

Not all residents were on board with punishing the mayor with a sort of sartorial dunce cap, reported La Republica.

While many applauded the move, others said residents should have chosen a more mature way to express their displeasure with political leaders.

Compiled by Olalekan Adeleye

Fox News

For the Nigerian Left, the strongest lesson of what may now be called Nigeria’s RevolutionNow – that is, the August 5 mass protests organised by some young fragments of the movement – may be formulated as a warning: If Nigeria survives long enough from the current battering of the country’s ruling class, variants of what was attempted on August 5 may be attempted again and again until a spark leads to a national conflagration or a successful popular revolution resulting from a better conceived, planned and executed strategy. Such a successful popular revolution will present to every Left entity – organisation or individual – the choice of joining the revolution as an active participant, thereby ending this long stalemate. An implicit premise of this proposition is that Nigeria’s present ruling class has refused to, or indeed cannot mobilise the social forces necessary to pull the nation out of its ever-expanding crisis.

One may start the story of RevolutionNow by recalling the 2019 general elections conducted earlier this year. The official result of the presidential contest showed that President Muhammadu Buhari of APC won while the other presidential candidates, including Omoyele Sowore of the Leftist AAC, lost. This point should be conceded.

However: It is a long-established and tested principle of political strategy that in a non-democratic setting such as Nigeria, a Left-wing formation or a formation with a Leftwing leadership may organise itself, its programmes and its activities in distinct but connected levels, or in concentric circles. This simple principle “prima facie” explains and justifies, ideologically and historically, the link between Sowore’s presidential contest and his “involvement in” or “leadership of” RevolutionNow.

Sowore himself may not be acutely aware of this. But Sowore’s lawyer, radical human-rights lawyer, Femi Falana, should theoretically be aware of the principle. In any case, I have seen that Falana endorses its application in the present case if the term “revolution”, as used in RevolutionNow, is demystified and given its factual, true and contextual meaning.

We may briefly go to some background: Omoyele Sowore was the president of the students’ union of the University of Lagos for a period during the long military dictatorship of the mid-1980s to late 1990s. He was a radical, Left-wing and popular student leader.

He also commanded attention in the national students’ movement. He was however ideologically and organisationally outside the Marxist core that maintained and exercised hegemony in the national students’ movement during that period. It was a measure of its success in strategy and tactics that on several campuses, this Marxist core managed to strongly “influence” students’ politics without insisting that the official leaderships be revolutionary Marxists.

Now, how do we assess RevolutionNow? We may begin by asserting that proclamations of revolutions are not new. In fact, in certain circumstances, a proclamation is necessary, if not mandatory – if it is a “people’s revolution” or a “revolution of the people.” But this proclamation is made not to herald a revolution-in-general (which the masses ought to have known) but to announce the start of a new stage, such as armed struggle.

For historically – tested reasons a proclamation is made not before the commencement of the new stage. On the other hand, in order not to confuse the people and put them in prolonged suspense, a proclamation is not delayed for too long after the commencement. The proclamation of the start of a new stage is made after the first definitive acts – if these are deemed successful. It is this tradition of the proclamation of people’s revolution that right-wing coup-makers copy and bastardise. The content, tone, and language of a revolutionary proclamation make the statement indelible in the history of the liberation of the people. Finally, it should be obvious that at the point of making a proclamation, the leadership should be unreachable.

Does RevolutionNow, in its broad ideological and political amateurishness, have precedents in Nigeria? Yes, it has precedents in Nigeria. Have I taken part in the organisation and leadership of any? Yes, I have taken part in more than one. Which one is most fresh in my memory? The “revolution” of January 1975 in Lagos: that is in pre-internet and pre-social media Nigeria. Were mistakes committed in it? Yes, grave mistakes were committed – although these were not the fundamental reasons the “revolution” did not succeed in its illusory ultimate objective!!

Those old enough may remember that between late 1974 and early 1975 there was a wave of strikes and mass protests throughout the country- but especially in Lagos which was then the federal capital of Nigeria.

The general issues included corruption, “bad governance” and the shifting of the promised date for disengagement of the military from governance. But the particular national issue was the long-awaited wage reviews. Among the radical groups which participated in the struggle was the Anti-Poverty Movement of Nigeria (APMON), a revolutionary Marxist formation, a mass mobiliser with an unknown operational base and a shadowy leadership.

At the start of the struggle I was transiting from being a graduate student to being a lecturer in the Department of Mathematics, University of Lagos. Comrade Bene was a graduate student of Botany in the same university. Bene and I were both in the leadership of APMON.

In addition I was the Secretary of APMON and my office in the department was APMON’s coordinating centre – unknown to anyone outside the leadership. I was 28 and Bene was 27. In crisis periods the link between this coordinating centre and members of APMON’s leadership outside the campus and outside Lagos was provided by the late Comrade Tony Engurube, a revolutionary Marxist of Ijaw parentage but very fluent in Yoruba, French and a certain Swedish language – in addition to English, of course.

One evening during the particular struggle under reference we stumbled on a rough document carrying what was claimed by the author or authors to be a proposed wage structure for the army. The figures were scandalously high. An emergency meeting of APMON’s leadership was called the next day.

The unanimous decision of this fateful meeting was that the production of an agitational publication in support of striking dockworkers and medical doctors should be stopped for the “uncovered” military wage structure to be added as an appendix. About 400 copies of the revised publication were to be produced and distributed covertly at strategic locations in Lagos. The decision was carried out immediately. That was it! The publication, to use a modern language, became “viral” within 72 hours. The effect was electrifying. My banker-senior brother with whom I was squatting in Lagos came back from work to show me a paper “some people” were distributed in Lagos Island! We both shouted!

Security agents poured out in search of “subversive” and “unpatriotic” people, “enemies of the nation”. Another emergency meeting of APMON’s leadership was called. However, the decision this time was not unanimous. But the majority opinion – which was supposed to be binding – was that the organisation had achieved its realisable maximum objective and should suspend all public and private agitation, with or without the “document.”

As the meeting was dispersing it could be observed that some comrades were still not happy with the decision. They believed that the “revolution” was nearing victory and required only a final push! In fact, earlier that day, a particular comrade, with some APMON cadres, had gone to Nigeria’s land border with the Benin Republic at Idi-Iroko to urge border guards not to allow certain senior state functionaries to escape from the country! Three days later soldiers swooped on him as he was agitating at Lawanson Bus Stop! And two days later, two comrades, one from a well-known Ondo family, and myself, not knowing that we had been uncovered and were just being lured and trailed, drove into the military police headquarters at Apapa. We went there in a prestigious Volvo car to secure the release of our detained comrade! The gates closed behind us for six months.

In July, a group of musicians/artistes took their peaceful protest to the Redemption Camp where they challenged General Overseer of Redeemed Christian Church of God, Mr Enoch Adeboye, to speak up on raging issues. The artistes prodded Adeboye to use his globally acknowledged influence to speak on the security situation in the country, including advocating the release of the young woman, Leah Sharibu, who, unfortunately, remains in her Boko Haram abductors’ gulag.

When Adeboye’s media aides responded to the protesters, they said his silence does not mean he is apathetic. It was just that he had ceded such a responsibility to bodies formed to take on such tasks, namely Christian Association of Nigeria and the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria. Truly, when CAN too responded to the protesters, they told them to take their issues to the government and leave the good Pastor alone. Why single out a church leader and invest him with the moral responsibility that should be distributed to a collective? Besides, CAN and PFN were already speaking on the issue, why should the Pastor usurp their roles? The response of CAN to the protesters sounded reasonable enough, but I am afraid they missed a significant point.

When the times are dire like this, people look up to a prophet to apprehend the times, articulate them in divine speak, and provide a moral direction for the future. The prophet of God is the one the people believe is imbued with the perspicacity to divine the times and speak to the situation using the weight of his spiritual authority and charisma. In an intensely religious country like ours, the words of prophets weigh a lot. In secular climes, people look to their intellectuals and celebrities to take a moral stand on their country’s situation. In Nigeria, we have pastors. I do not think there is any personality whose words weigh half of Adeboye’s. That is why they pester him to say something.

Yes, I do understand the hesitancy of pastors who do not want to talk too loudly on political issues. There are times one cannot blame pastors for taking refuge in silence. Take the case of Mr W.F. Kumuyi. The man has been, for most of his career as a shepherd of Christ, apolitical. But sometime in October last year, he paid a congenial visit to Aso Rock where President Muhammadu Buhari hosted him and his wife. In June, Kumuyi preached a sermon where he told Christians not to attack the President either through the newspapers or the Internet, and instead strive towards Christ-like behaviour. The kind of backlash he received must have made him wonder what was outrageous about the statement that the “children of anger” dragged him on the floor of the social media. His admonition was truly biblical but when a country is going through hell, people will not take kindly to a spiritual injunction that can be weaponised by the political establishment. If one keeps quiet in this Buhari government, one will die and still be blamed for one’s death. Anyway, Kumuyi’s experience must have taught others that in these tough times, the pastor who will last is the one who keeps his political views to himself.

But unlike others, Adeboye cannot afford to be apolitical or lukewarm. Number one reason is the Vice President, Mr Yemi Osinbajo. One of the factors that changed public perception of the Buhari candidature in 2015 was Osinbajo who was offered to the public as not just a lawyer, but a pastor as well. He was not merely a self-labelled pastor, he was also affiliated with RCCG, one of the largest gatherings of Christians in the world. By implication, Osinbajo was Adeboye’s son and that factor gave them mileage in the 2015 elections. We cannot quantify how many votes it translated into, but it did help to ameliorate the fear of “Islamisation” that had previously dogged Buhari’s ambition. When people invested their votes in Osinbajo, they were also voting for Adeboye. If things are not going well, Adeboye owes it to people to speak unequivocally on issues and not just relegate that responsibility to other Christian bodies. They have their roles to play, no doubt, but he owes people that obligation.

The second reason has to do with Adeboye’s deployment of his spiritual gifts. In what has become a Pentecostal lore, the prophesy that ended the despotic rule of Mr Sani Abacha and triggered the civilian rule in Nigeria came from the altar in his church. At the church’s December convention, Adeboye repeated the story of how his prophesy ended Abacha’s evil reign as a testimony to God’s working power. If he takes the credit for giving the word of power that launched Nigeria on the path of democratic rule, he should also take responsibility for what democracy has brought for and on us. Things are falling apart, and democracy is beginning to feel like military rule. So, where do we go from here? Like Adeboye himself acknowledged lately when some of his church ministers were kidnapped, on the issue of security, things have never been so bad in Nigeria as they are presently. Violence has become so routine; incidents have to be spectacular before they make the news.

Chairman of CAN in Kaduna, Joseph Hagan, recently disclosed that their association had paid about N300m as ransoms for their abducted members since 2015. That is a hefty amount of money for any organisation to shell out. Considering that the churches are not manufacturing goods, it means it is the poor church members who fronted the costs. That is the more reason influential people should raise their voices to put pressure on the government. On that score, I must give some credit to Mr David Oyedepo of Living Faith Church. After one of his pastors, Jeremiah Omolara, was killed and his wife abducted, Oyedepo got on the altar and cursed the kidnappers. I am not a believer in the telepathic power of curses, so I see what he was doing with his charged admixture of curses and prophetic utterances before the church and general public as public incitement. He was propelling them to an urgency that will impact their civic agencies. His confrontational approach might be problematic for some, but there is also the potential of such prayers rattling the political establishment enough to compel them to treat security issues more urgently. In these times when religious and tribal leaders are cautious about dissenting and offending political power, Oyedepo’s audacity is refreshing. On that score, he earned my respect.

Finally, one other reason Adeboye owes us is because it seems his God – and this is judging from what His prophet says about him – is not politically neutral. On Friday, at the Holy Ghost night of RCCG convention, Adeboye told us that God revealed to him that Osinbajo would be involved in a helicopter crash. Adeboye claimed he prayed for Osinbajo and the disaster was averted. To be clear, I have no problems with God saving the Vice President of a nation, but I want God to do the same too for poor and hapless Nigerians who have become perennial victims of routine violence in Nigeria. Many people all over Nigeria are disqualified in the consideration for citizen protection by the country because their lives do not even register in the consciousness of the state to warrant security for them. They too need God to intervene for them with the same force of power as He did for Osinbajo. These people need influential pastors to intercede for them both spiritually and politically; prophets like the days of old who will risk everything and boldly declare, “Thus saith the Lord…” They need people with moral influence to put agents of political power in a state of dis-ease. We thank God for the life of our brother Osinbajo, but God’s flock is being eaten by the wolves in the corridors of power across the country. They need God to do more for them, not regale them with the story of how He saved a politician in a cassock.