BY BELLO GWARZO ABDULLAHI
Religion, as Karl Marx once said, is the opium of the masses, and many people have written about how religious manipulation is used to achieve selfish ends. Dr. Yusuf Bala Usman wrote on The Manipulation of Religion many years ago, and the fact remains that what he wrote then is very much around now. Thus, political temptations abound to use religion for manipulative intents. It is used as a national deception dressed in religious language.
The temptation is to persuade Nigerians that because a man wears a cassock, carries a Bible, sits on a minbar, wears a turban, or commands a large congregation, he is automatically qualified to occupy a Government House. This is not true. And we must stop pretending that it is.
A.G. Abubakar’s essay, “Imams, Pastors, and Partisan Politics: Abandoning the Minbar and Pulpit for the Siren?”, therefore arrives at a critical moment. As the 2027 political season gradually takes shape, Nigerians should pay close attention to the growing movement of religious personalities towards partisan politics.
A pulpit is not a political party. A minbar is not a campaign platform. A congregation is not an electoral constituency. And religious popularity is not a substitute for administrative competence.
This is not an argument against religious people participating in democracy. They have every constitutional right to contest elections, join political parties, and seek public office. But the question remains: Should religious leaders convert the moral authority entrusted to them into partisan political power? My answer is an emphatic no. And I agree with Abubakar that Nigeria may actually need religious leaders more outside the corridors of political power than inside them.
The reason for this is simple. Once a religious leader becomes a partisan politician, something fundamental changes. The person who once claimed to speak for conscience begins to speak for a party. The person who once condemned political corruption may suddenly find himself defending the same politicians he once criticised. The person who once preached impartiality begins calculating electoral alliances. And the congregation that once listened to him as a moral authority begins wondering whether the sermon is about God—or the next election. This is the danger, if truth be told.
Nigeria is already suffering from a crisis of credibility. We do not need to turn our religious institutions into extensions of political machinery. We have enough politicians, but what we desperately lack are people willing to tell politicians the truth. That should be the calling of the religious establishment.
Nigeria is perhaps one of the most religious societies on earth. We pray constantly. We preach constantly. We hold conventions, revivals, crusades, Ramadan lectures, Friday sermons, and prayer meetings on an enormous scale. Yet corruption survives. Insecurity survives. Poverty survives. Bad governance survives. Youth unemployment survives. Institutional decay survives. Electoral manipulation survives.
Why? The answer is that religiosity without civic responsibility has become one of Nigeria’s greatest contradictions. We have created a society where a politician can steal public money on Monday, attend a church or mosque on Tuesday, make a generous donation on Wednesday, and receive public praise on Thursday.
The same man may appear on the front row of a religious gathering, receive prayers from respected clerics, and then return to government to preside over the very system that is impoverishing the people. Sometimes, the religious establishment even helps him do it. That is the uncomfortable truth we must confront.
Our problem is not that Nigerians lack religion. Our problem is that too many Nigerians have separated religion from consequences. We preach against corruption but celebrate corrupt politicians when they belong to our ethnic group, religion, or political party. We condemn vote-buying in principle but quietly justify it when our preferred candidate is the one distributing the money. We demand justice when we are victims and invent excuses when our political allies are responsible. We have turned religion into an identity badge rather than a moral discipline. That is precisely why clerics must be extremely careful before entering partisan politics.
The moment a religious leader becomes a political candidate, his moral authority becomes negotiable. The politician needs votes. The cleric needs political structures. The political godfather needs loyalty. The party needs money. The candidate needs financiers. The financiers need access. The political machine needs compromise. And compromise, when repeated often enough, becomes surrender. This is the point where the Nigerian political system has swallowed many idealists before.
Our politics is not a Sunday-school classroom. It is a brutal contest for power, influence, and resources. It is driven by patronage, money, networks, ethnic calculations, religious mobilisation, and political survival. It is a process of “anything goes,” and one needs to be psychologically prepared and develop shock absorbers.
A cleric entering that environment should not expect the environment to become holy because he has arrived. The more realistic possibility is the reverse. The system may make him political before he succeeds in making the system moral. And once that happens, the transformation is complete: the preacher becomes the politician; the sermon becomes campaign rhetoric; the congregation becomes a political structure; and the sacred becomes another instrument of electoral mobilisation. That is not spiritual leadership. That is politics wearing religious clothing.
The danger becomes even greater in a country as religiously and ethnically diverse as Nigeria. If every religious community begins to believe that its own clerics must occupy political office, elections will increasingly become contests over religious and communal ownership of the state. That road leads nowhere good. Nigeria is not a theocracy. Nigeria is a constitutional democracy. The President is not the Imam of Nigeria. The Governor is not the Bishop of a state. Government belongs to citizens of every faith and of no faith. Public resources belong to the people. Political office is a public trust—not a religious reward.
Some may argue that the venerable Sheikh Usman Danfodio was able to establish the Sokoto Caliphate. But Danfodio cannot simply be removed from his historical context and transplanted into twenty-first-century Nigerian party politics.
He lived in a pre-colonial political environment. His movement emerged from a particular intellectual, religious, and political crisis and ultimately produced a new political order.
That is profoundly different from a contemporary cleric seeking a party ticket from the APC, PDP, Labour Party, or any other political organisation. Danfodio was not negotiating for a party primary. He was not lobbying delegates. He was not hiring campaign consultants. He was not negotiating campaign funding with political financiers. He was not seeking endorsement from a political godfather. Therefore, his is a different ballgame.
The lesson of Sheikh Usman Danfodio is better understood as a lesson about intellectual preparation, moral authority, organisation, justice, and statecraft—not as a blank cheque for modern clerics to pursue political office.
There is another lesson that should not be ignored: leadership is not acquired simply by occupying an office. It requires preparation. A person may be spiritually knowledgeable and still be a poor administrator. A person may be morally upright and still misunderstand public finance. A person may be an excellent preacher and still have no understanding of infrastructure planning, economic management, public procurement, security policy, institutional reform, or the complexities of governing a modern state. Each one of us knows how best to contribute, bearing in mind the circumstances under which they operate.
Nigeria cannot afford to confuse piety with competence. We have paid too high a price already for making that mistake. Look at the history of clerics who have entered Nigerian politics.
Reverend Jolly Nyame entered the political arena with the moral expectations that accompanied his clerical background. Yet his political career eventually ended in a corruption conviction and imprisonment. His story should not be weaponised against Christians, nor should it be used to claim that clerics are inherently corrupt.
The lesson is more uncomfortable: a religious title does not vaccinate anyone against the temptations of political power.
The same applies to Reverend Moses Adasu in Benue. Whatever one’s assessment of his intentions or legacy, his experience demonstrated that entering Government House does not magically eliminate the structural problems of governance. Political office remains political office. Bureaucracies remain bureaucracies. Public finances remain constrained. Political opposition remains political opposition.
Today, Benue provides another instructive case through Father Hyacinth Alia. His emergence generated enormous expectations. Many supporters believed that a priest entering Government House would necessarily produce a fundamentally different political culture.
But once the priest entered the political arena, the familiar realities of Nigerian politics did not disappear. Political disagreements emerged. Institutional tensions emerged. Accusations and counter-accusations emerged. Political loyalists and opponents emerged. That is precisely the point.
The Government House does not become a church because a priest occupies it. The office eventually demands politics. And politics eventually demands choices. This is why the romantic idea that a cleric will enter Government House, wave a moral wand, and cleanse the political system must be abandoned.
It is fantasy. Governance is not a revival meeting. A state cannot be administered by sermons alone. A collapsed road needs an engineering design, procurement, financing, construction, and maintenance. A failing electricity network needs generation, transmission, distribution, regulation, investment, and technical competence. A hospital needs doctors, nurses, equipment, drugs, financing, and management. A young person without employment needs skills, capital, industries, and functioning markets.
Of course, prayer is important to believers. But prayer does not replace policy. And the demonisation of every policy failure as a “spiritual attack” is sometimes nothing more than an excuse for administrative incompetence. This is where our clerics could exercise extraordinary power without ever seeking political office.
Imagine the combined strength of Nigeria’s major religious institutions if they declared a united war against vote-buying. Imagine every Imam telling worshippers, “Do not sell your vote.” Imagine every Pastor telling congregants, “Do not defend corruption because the corrupt politician is your brother, tribesman, or fellow Christian.” Imagine religious institutions refusing to honour politicians whose wealth cannot be explained. Imagine mosques and churches demanding that government budgets, procurement records, and project locations be publicly disclosed. Imagine clerics teaching citizens how to track constituency projects. Imagine religious leaders asking politicians, publicly and repeatedly: Where did the money go? Who received the contract? What was delivered? How much was spent? Why has the project failed?
That would terrify corrupt politicians far more than another election campaign. The greatest threat to a corrupt political system is not another politician; it is an informed citizenry. Nigeria’s religious leaders have the platforms to create one.
They can reach millions of Nigerians every week. They can influence political behaviour without seeking political office. They can make vote-buying socially unacceptable. They can make corruption morally disgraceful again. They can make competence more important than ethnicity. They can make character more important than religious identity. They can teach Nigerians that the politician who steals public money is not “our man” simply because he comes from our village. They can teach Muslims not to defend corrupt Muslims, and Christians not to defend corrupt Christians. They can tell Nigerians something we desperately need to hear:
A thief does not become righteous because he prays—a concept of *mu’amalat*. That message, consistently preached across the country, could transform Nigeria more profoundly than dozens of clerics occupying political offices.
This is also why attempts to present Saudi Arabia or Iran as straightforward models for clerical governance in Nigeria should be rejected. Nigeria is not Saudi Arabia. Nigeria is not Iran. Nigeria is Nigeria.
We are a complex federation of more than 250 ethnic groups, multiple religious traditions, competing regional interests, and a constitutional order that recognises political equality among citizens.
Importing a theocratic political model into such an environment would not automatically produce moral government. It could instead intensify religious competition for state power.
Once political power becomes a religious prize, every election becomes a potential sectarian confrontation. That is a price Nigeria cannot afford. The greatest danger, therefore, is not that clerics will contest elections. The greater danger is that religion will become another weapon in Nigeria’s increasingly ruthless struggle for political power.
We have already seen how effectively politicians weaponise ethnicity. We have seen how effectively they weaponise religion.
The last thing we need is for the pulpit and the minbar to become permanent campaign platforms. Religious leaders should not become electoral landlords. They should become custodians of the conscience of the electorate. They should not tell Nigerians who to vote for. They should teach Nigerians what kind of person deserves their vote. That distinction is enormous.
This is where Abubakar’s argument becomes more than an objection to clerics entering politics. It becomes a proposal for a different conception of leadership. The religious leader should not ask: “How do I become Governor?” He should ask: “How do I make the Governor accountable?” He should not ask: “How do I get into the National Assembly?” He should ask: “How do I make legislators answer to the people who elected them?” He should not ask: “How do I secure political power?” He should ask: “How do I empower citizens so that political power cannot abuse them?” That is a much higher form of leadership.
Martin Luther King Jr. did not need the White House to shake America. Desmond Tutu did not need the presidency of South Africa to challenge apartheid. Their authority came precisely from their ability to stand outside the machinery of political power and confront it.
Nigeria’s religious leaders possess a similar opportunity. But they must choose. Do they want the privileges of political office, or the independence of moral authority? They cannot always have both.
Once a cleric becomes a partisan politician, he should not expect Nigerians to continue treating every political pronouncement as sacred. If he enters politics, let him enter fully. Let him be questioned. Let his finances be scrutinised. Let his record be examined. Let his competence be tested. Let his policies be debated. Let his failures be exposed. Let him stop hiding behind religious credentials when the political heat becomes uncomfortable. If a cleric chooses politics, he must be judged as a politician. No special immunity. No sacred shield. No “man of God” exemption. No “Sheikh” exemption. No “His Holiness” exemption. Public office is public office.
If he chooses to remain a religious leader, Nigeria should demand something equally important from him: independence. Speak truth to the government. Speak truth to the opposition. Speak truth to your own followers. Speak truth when your tribe is wrong. Speak truth when your religious community is wrong. Speak truth when the politician funding your mosque or church is wrong. Speak truth when the person standing beside you is wrong. That is what moral leadership means.
The 2027 elections should therefore not become another season in which Nigerians are asked to surrender their judgement to political candidates wrapped in religious legitimacy. The electorate must grow up. We must stop asking whether a candidate is a Muslim or Christian, Imam or Pastor, northerner or southerner, and start asking harder questions: What has he achieved? What does he understand about governance? Who finances him? Who are the people behind him? What is his record? What are his policies? Who benefits from his government? Can he be trusted with public money? Can he build institutions rather than political empires? Those are the questions that matter.
Nigeria is not suffering from a shortage of prayers. It is suffering from a shortage of accountable leadership. It is not suffering from a shortage of sermons. It is suffering from a shortage of consequences for bad governance. It is not suffering from a shortage of religious politicians. It is suffering from a shortage of citizens willing to hold politicians accountable.
Therefore, to Nigeria’s Imams, Pastors, Bishops, and other religious leaders, the message should be clear: do not abandon the minbar for the political siren. The siren of political power is seductive. It promises influence, access, wealth, status, and relevance. But many who follow it eventually discover that political power demands a price. The minbar, by contrast, gives you something politics cannot easily give you: the freedom to speak truth without asking permission from a party leader. Stay there. Stand there. Use it. Mobilise from there. Educate from there. Challenge from there. Hold government accountable from there.
When politicians come seeking your endorsement, ask them not what they will do for your congregation, but what they intend to do for the millions of Nigerians who have no political godfather. Ask them about jobs. Ask them about electricity. Ask them about schools. Ask them about security. Ask them about roads. Ask them about hospitals. Ask them about corruption. Ask them about public debt. Ask them where the money will come from. And when they fail to answer, let the congregation hear the silence. That is real political power. Not a convoy. Not a Government House. Not a party ticket. Not a ministerial appointment. Moral authority.
Nigeria needs religious leaders who can stand above political parties and speak for the people. We need Imams who cannot be bought. Pastors who cannot be intimidated. Bishops who cannot be captured. Scholars who cannot be compromised.
Religious institutions must understand that their greatest contribution to democracy is not to produce politicians, but to produce principled citizens capable of resisting bad politicians. Let politicians fight for power. Let citizens decide who deserves it. Let religious leaders guard the conscience of both. The altar must not become a campaign office. The minbar must not become a party secretariat. The pulpit must not become an electoral podium. And the sacred trust of religious leadership must never be reduced to another instrument for capturing political power.
Nigeria has suffered enough from the politics of ethnicity. It has suffered enough from the politics of religion. It has suffered enough from the politics of money. It certainly does not need the dangerous fusion of all three.
The 2027 elections should be a test—not merely of who wins, but of whether Nigerians have finally learned to distinguish faith from political manipulation, popularity from competence, and religious authority from a mandate to govern.
The cleric who chooses politics must accept the consequences of politics. The cleric who chooses the minbar should use it fearlessly. Perhaps the greatest service a man of God can render to Nigeria is not to become the man in Government House, but to become the man who can stand before Government House and say: “You were elected to serve the people. Now serve them—or answer to them.” That is the kind of religious leadership Nigeria needs. That is the kind of political accountability Nigeria deserves.
That is, in my view, a resounding Amen to Abubakar’s thesis.
…Bello Gwarzo Abdullahi a political analyst based in Gombe can be reached via bgabdullahi@gmail.com
