The political face-off between Governor Godwin Obaseki and his reinstated deputy governor, Philip Shaibu, seemed unending as Shaibu called religious leaders to strip political officeholders, including Governor Obaseki, of their unearned divine titles.
Speaking to journalists on the sidelines during the ongoing 2nd Plenary of the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria (CBCN) in Auchi, Shaibu said as leaders, they must be responsible to the people as expressed during the sermon by Rev. Fr. Gabriel Dunia who said one of the challenges in Nigeria is because the leaders see themselves as lords to the people instead of servant leaders as ordained by God.
Shaibu said “All of us whether Christians or Muslims when we are saddled with authority, it is expected that we hold that office on behalf of the people and allow God’s doctrine to be our guide.
“For me as a Catholic, I am always conscious not to disgrace the church or Christianity and my family, we need to imbibe the culture of God in our offices and if we do that, the issue of corruption will be a thing of the past, empathy will be there, there will not be a governor that will be called a wicked governor but we will have governors that will do the will of the people.
In Edo state, we have a governor but he should not use the office as a tool to be wicked to the people, a tool to annex our collective responsibility as if it is a personal responsibility.”
“A God’s Servant Governor will have empathy to the people, a God’s Servant Governor must do the will of the people, a God’s Servant Governor must do all the promises that he made, if he cannot meet them, he should go back to the people and say this is why I cannot meet those promises, a God Servant Governor must not take our collective wealth and reduce it to private use, so for me, Christians leaders should be careful in giving our leaders names that they don’t deserve,” he added.