Religious leaders should tell politicians the truth

Mr. President in his address at the inauguration of his campaign team had this to say,  “The world is watching, will Nigeria get it right? My categorical response to that is yes, we must. And surely, we will. It is your duty to ensure that through your campaigns and activities, this primary objective is not […]

Mr. President in his address at the inauguration of his campaign team had this to say,  “The world is watching, will Nigeria get it right? My categorical response to that is yes, we must. And surely, we will. It is your duty to ensure that through your campaigns and activities, this primary objective is not lost. Our commitment to free, fair, credible and violence- free elections remains unshaken”(Our Stand: Leadership editorial: Jan. 8th,2015, pg.3).
Free and fair elections are the foundations of the democratic process and they include the following:
• Periodic national elections of candidates emerging from a genuine multi-political party system, conducted by observing principles that ensure that all candidates and their parties have an equal chance of competing in the process,
• getting their messages heard and canvassing support,
• ensuring that neither the candidates nor their supporters will be subjected to bodily harm or intimidation and
• that all political actors are willing to accept a rotation of government if that be the popular will.
These are the foundations of the democratic process (Dr. Sakuntala Kadirgamar-Rajasingham, 2005). The catchwords are “free and fair elections” and we can not conceive of the democratic process without free and fair elections.
Elements of Free, Fair and credible elections depend on:
1) An enabling legislative framework,
2) The impartial and neutral practices of election administrators, the media and the forces that maintain law and order and
3) The acceptance of the competitive electoral process by all the political forces in the country.
The perception that an election has not been free, fair and credible develops where there is fraud, violence and intimidation at any of the stages critical to the electoral process. It can also be undermined if the process is chaotic and poorly organized leaving large numbers of voters disenfranchised and confused about the process, issues and candidates. So even if there is no clear criminal intent in the process it may still lead to a lack of credibility in the process.
(The problem I perceive in the Nigerian peculiar situation is that of the negative use of religion, it has been extraordinarily applied in this electioneering period and it needs to be honestly faced and addressed if “Nigeria Must be the Winner in 2015 Elections”. Here are basic truths Nigerians -Muslims and Christians must as non-negotiable scriptural  truths -accept and work with:
Nigerian Christians and Muslims must, as a matter of scriptural truth, accept that there is only One God. “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one” (Dt.6:4).
The Qur’an, on the other hand,  goes further to affirm: “ Say, He is Allah, the one and only”(Q.112:1). The Qur’an goes further to confirm that irrespective of what the practitioners of these two faith traditions think, this God we profess in One:  wa-ilâhuna, wa ilâhukum wahidun (And our God and your God is one (Q:29:46).
i). This God created everything that is not God;
ii). He is radically different from everything that is not God;
iii). God is good;
iv). He commands that we love God with our whole being; and
v). He also commands that we love our neighbours as ourselves (Volf. 2011:110).
Nigerian Christians and Muslims must accept and respect their differences in their approaches to this One God.
Religious leaders must put a stop to deceiving their followers that the Muslim community is not worshipping the only One God but worshipping an idol. Similarly, Muslim clerics must stop teaching their members that the Christians are worshipping three gods!
Nigerians must stop campaigning on the basis of religion and ethnicity; these two as campaign issues are driving neighbours apart and creating enmity between people created by One God for understanding and even development.
The second reality Nigerians must accept is that both the Bible on one hand and on the other, the Qur’an and Hadith have similar teachings on leadership.
Leadership roles from a Christian and an Islamic perspectives
According to the teachings in Christianity and Islam, the two primary roles of a leader are those of servant-leader and guardian-leader.
First, the leader is the servant of his followers (sayyid al qawn khadimuhum). (Kasule:1998:3). He is to seek their welfare and guide them towards the good.
The idea of a leader as a servant has been part of Christianity: (Isaiah 53) and Islam since their beginnings, and has only recently been developed by Robert Greenleaf:
The servant-leader is servant first. It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first… The best test, and the most difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? (Greenleaf:1970:7)
A second major role of the Christian ( Ezekiel 34, John 10), and the Muslim leader is to protect his community against tyranny and oppression, to encourage God-consciousness and taqwa, and to promote justice.
A commander (of the Muslims) is a shield for them. ( Sahih Muslim: 4542)
Islamic moral character as well as that of the Christian require that leaders emphasize the following four key parameters of behaviour: justice, trust, righteousness, and promise-keeping.
(1) Justice.
Justice is a dynamic characteristic which each Muslim must strive to develop whether he is a leader or a follower.(Umar -Ud-din:1991:24)
O you who believe! Stand out firmly for God as witnesses to fair dealing and let not the hatred of others to you make you swerve to wrong and depart from justice. (Al-Maidah.:5:8)
Do not put your hand with the wicked to be  an  unrighteous  witness.. You shall not follow the crowd to do evil, nor will you testify in  a dispute so as to turn  aside after many to pervert justice…keep yourself far from a false matter  do not kill the innocent  and righteous….  (Ex. 23:1-2, 7-8).
The need to achieve a balance and to take a middle road is quite important in a leader, and is stressed repeatedly by God in the Bible and the Qur’an. The Qur’an describes those “who will be rewarded with the highest place in heaven” as:
Those who, when they spend, are not extravagant and not niggardly, but hold a just (balance) between those two extremes; (Al- furqaan,25:67-68).
Application of justice to leadership
The principle of justice must be observed by all Muslim-leaders and followers alike. For example, God admonishes Muslims thus:
God does command you to render back your trusts to those to whom they are due; and when you judge between man and man that you judge with justice (An-Nisaa.4:58)
You shall not pervert justice; you shall not show partiality, nor …you shall follow what is altogether just, that you may live and inherit the land which the LORD your God is giving you ( Dt. 16:18-20).
This is why the Prophet (saw) emphasized that justice must never be compromised by personal affiliations or other considerations.
(2) Trust.
This concept of trust stresses the idea of responsibility towards organizational stakeholders, and holds true whether those entrusting something to Muslims are themselves non-Muslims.
O you that believe! betray not the trust of God and the apostle nor misappropriate knowingly things entrusted to you. (Al-Anfal.8:27)
As a core value, trust fits within the overall Islamic etiquette governing social relationships.
Application of trust to leadership.

Trust is explicitly linked to leadership in the Qur’an. We refer to the story of Prophet Joseph (as). After the king had indicated that he placed great trust in him, Prophet Joseph (as) deliberately asked to be put in charge of the granaries and storehouses, and the demanding task of establishing them and guarding them. As one translator of the Qur’an, Abdullah Yusuf Ali, points out,
Prophet Joseph (as) understood the need to build reserves better than any one else, and was prepared to take on this task himself rather than throw on to another the burden of restricting supplies in times of plenty. (Ali, comment1716)
Once an individual has accepted to be the leader of a group or organization, he has become their trustee. In a for-profit Muslim organization, the management of the organization is entrusted with the shareholders’ investment. In a nonprofit organization, the management of the organization is charged with watching over the properties in the trust. Consequently, any managerial decision must be balanced with respect to this trust. The concept of trust can be extended to other dimensions of one’s work as a leader or a follower. Should one be wasting time or organizational resources in performing one’s task, one is violating his/her employer’s trust.
(3) Righteousness.
Righteous behavior is described as follows:
It is righteousness to believe in God and the Last Day and the Angels and the Book and the Messengers; to spend of your substance out of love for Him for your kin, for orphans, for the needy, for the wayfarer, for those who ask […]; to be steadfast in prayer and practice regular charity; to fulfil the contracts which you have made; and to be firm and patient in pain (or suffering) and adversity (Al-Baqarah.2:177)
Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people (Prov.14.34)
Application of righteousness to leadership.
Based on the above verses, several moral attributes of righteous leaders become salient:

They act justly and do not allow their personal feelings to hinder justice.
They have iman,
They take care of those in need, and do so for the love of God,
They are steadfast in prayer and practice charity,
They observe all contracts, and
They are patient no matter what type of adversity they may be experiencing.
In general, then, organization participants of all faiths are entitled to be treated with basic human decency and dignity and with the maximum of fair play and justice. In an Islamic organization, a leader is expected to be sensitive to their needs.
(4) Promise-keeping.
All Muslims-whether leaders or followers-are urged to keep their promises. They also cannot make promises that are unislamic in nature.
O you who believe! fulfil (all) obligations. (Al-Maidah.5:1)
Whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, Whatever things are just, Whatever things ae pure, whatever things are of good report, meditate on these things (Phil.4:8).
Keeping one’s word characterizes a Muslim. Breaking one’s word is tantamount to hypocrisy.
Application of promise-keeping to leadership. Based upon the above discussion, keeping promises is very important for all, and a leader is not exempted from this important principle.
I bought something from the Prophet (peace be upon him) before he received his Prophetic commission, and as there was something still due to him I promised him that I would bring it to him at his place, but I forgot. When I remembered three days later, I went to that place and found him there. He said: I have been here for three days waiting for you. (Abu Dawud)
Summary: What we are saying to all Nigerian Christians and Muslims is this:
• We have One God to whom we render our worship and to whom all will be accountable.
• Our revealed scriptures teach the same lessons on: leadership especially characteristics of leaders and the led, and expectations from both categories. Most importantly and frighteningly, we will give an account to this One God Omnipotent, Omniscient and Omnipresent!
Permit me now to specifically, in light of these points address a few specific stakeholders who are responsible for making Nigeria the Winner in  2015 Elections!
Politicians
Exclusive politics and lack of internal democracy among the political parties were blamed for the violence Nigeria experienced in the last elections. There were, for example, allegations of lack of internal democracy in the political parties which led many of aggrieved members to defect and join other opposition parties. Some of those that decamped adopted unorthodox means such as engaging the services of idle youths against their perceived enemies, in expressing their grievances and in seeking redress.
Similarly, there were also allegations that State Governors determined the fate of almost every politician in their state with the same experience replicated at the Local Government level. This led to frustration and increased the desperation of politicians and their tendency for unethical maneuvers which may also have ignited violence with a view to causing instability in the polity.  This lack of internal democracy in the political parties and domination of a party by a few must be discouraged this time for us to have a violence-free elections.
Another practice that needs to be stopped among this class of stakeholders in 2015 general elections is political intolerance  characterized by, among others, retaliatory and reprisal destruction of campaign posters by rival party supporters; the hiring of thugs to intimidate opponents or unwholesome strategies to woo voters by giving them money; and refusal to respect other people’s rights to vote for candidates of their own choice. These  were amongst the principal causes of the post election violence experienced in the last general elections and the primaries that preceded this process now leading to the general elections in twelve days’ time.