PPA Organises Anti-Corruption Workshop For Pentecostal Pastors

The Palace of Priests Assembly has organized a 3 – day capacity building on Christianity and the Fight Against Corruption for Pentecostal pastors in Northern Nigeria.

Dr Otive Icbuzor, the Programme Director of PPA, said while delivering his opening speech that “Corruption is deep, systemic, and widespread in Nigeria,” a situation which made the Transparency International (TI) categorized the country among the most corrupt in the world.

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He said several governments in Nigeria have launched anti-corruption programmes since 1966 when corruption was first mentioned as one of the reasons for the military overthrow of a civilian government.

Dr Icbuzor said further that despite the plethora of legislations and agencies fighting corruption in Nigeria, corruption has remained widespread and pervasive, partly because the norms and behaviour of citizens have remained unchanged.

The PPA is an initiative of Priest Peace and Justice Initiative supported by the MacArthur Foundation.

Dr Icbuzor said the workshop, which held last week, was a “capacity building programme for Pentecostal church leaders across Northern Nigeria. The programme was conceived based on the knowledge that corruption is a huge problem to Nigeria. For us, we noticed that Pentecostal Christians are not engaged in social issues and the fight against corruption. That’s why we conceived this project to mobilise Christians to fight against corruption.”

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He said the organisers devised ways to relate the anti-corruption fight with the Bible in order to get the buy-in of the church leaders.

“And so our first research was to study about Christianity and Corruption. We identified 115 Bible verses that either speaks against corruption or about the need for Christians to be involved in the fight against corruption. And after that, we got acceptance by Pentecostal Christians across Nigeria,” he said that the participants were trained to also focus “ On issues of democracy, good governance, poverty, corruption and humanitarian crisis health.”

The programme involved sessions on leadership, skills required for leadership competence, and passages in the Bible that speak on corruption.

Other questions answered included the anchor scripture for the fight against corruption, and reasons why accountability is important to Christians.

A post workshop test was also concluded to ascertain the learning outcomes of participants after the training.

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In attendance at the event were several Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) leaders including Rev Steven Dangana, PFN chairman Plateau State, Rtd. Rev. Dr. Janet E. Tonmwaso, PFN Adamawa State, Rev Promise Nuhu Yohanna, PFN chairman Bauchi State and Rev Adetunji from Kwara State.

A representative of MacArthur Foundation, Dayo Olaide said the organisation’s support to PPA is “to be able to support and fight against corruption. When we fail Nigeria, we fail the unborn generation, and this is why this support to PPA is important,” adding that there’s need to “call out” corrupt persons in the society.

He said “The Christian body needs to stand up and make the difference.”

PFN chairman for FCT, Rev Isaac Komolafe, said, “If you are going to correct the wrong in someone else’s life, make sure you correct yours first. And that’s the importance of this programme – to bring true change and life transformation.

“And this is possible when we begin to obey the Bible. Let’s take this as a calling from the Lord. The corruption and lack of accountability should come up with change. This is the election period, don’t collect money and give your voice away. When you collect money you won’t be able to talk again.”

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