Religion and region are deep in the Nigerian heart and cannot be swept away by fiat (Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande, former Federal Minister of Housing).
Obasanjo was the beneficiary of a negotiated pact among the country's political elite. At the heart of the compact was a design to placate the western political establishment which was still seething over both the annulment and the subsequent death in jail (in 1998) of its putative winner, Bashorun M.K.O. Abiola. The presidential election that resulted in Obasanjo's victory was contested by two southern Yoruba Christians, Obasanjo himself, and Chief Olu Falae, a former Secretary to the Government of the Federation during the Ibrahim Babangida era. Although this was a result of elite consensus, it was also a measure of how deeply ethnicity and religion have penetrated social and political culture in the country.
My aim here is to employ a critical sociology to examine the impact of religious discourse on the self-presentation of the Obasanjo regime, while paying attention to the use of the same ideology as a tool for socio-political legitimacy. The discourse in question is Pentecostalism, what Gifford (2004) calls the ‘New Christianity’, defined by Habermas as a combination of ‘biblical orthodoxy and a rigorous morality with an ecstatic form of worship and an emphasis on spiritual healing’ (2005:3). He adds that,
Such born-again Christians share the opposition to cultural modernity and political liberalism, but they comply more easily with motivational requirements for modernisation.
The ‘Theocratic Class’: Towards a Conceptualisation
Despite being a key sociological concept, class has always evaded critical capture. To complicate matters, its linguistic currency appears to have declined somewhat in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet bloc and the global intellectual crisis of marxist theory. Yet, it is hardly open to conjecture that profound social and economic inequalities continue to determine social intercourse, not least in the ‘developing’ world where state power has been historically controlled by a small segment of the society. In a work which emphasises religion, ethnicity and politics, Haynes borrows the term ‘class’ to describe religious leaders joining together in a ‘“theocratic class” which seeks to advance their personal and institutional position in relation to competitors’ (1996:9); it is this conception which I employ to look more closely at religious ideology in Nigeria.
A Weberian conception of ‘class’ is rooted in an understanding of social agents as being fundamentally driven by economic interests (1948:181). Other than economic interests, the category of people I am describing here as a ‘theocratic class’ also share other important attributes, among them enjoyment of a social standing that derives from a variety of traditional sources and common endorsement and usage of salvationist discourse to analyse Nigeria's political process. Falola, grappling with the conundrum of how religious leaders apparently acquire power and influence without the police, army, or money on their side, argues that:
The power comes instead from traditional religious sources – the power to preach, teach, dogmatize, and lead congregations. They depend on perceptions of moral uprightness and justness, opposing themselves to the corruption of those in political power. They also rely on their charisma, their ability to arouse, inspire, and stimulate a crowd (1998:104).
the prospect of prosperity with deliverance from evil forces such as witchcraft, ancestral spirits and other demons … [They] have had tremendous appeal for people, and in particular young men and women, who desperately seek to make progress in life (Larkin and Meyer, 2006:290).
The rather sudden and radical political changes in Africa in the 1990s encouraged the irruption of spiritual movements into political space as people sought alternative sources of authority and at the same time were freed from institutional constraints previously imposed by single party governments (2004:100).
From Apathy to Engagement: The Emergence of Political Christianity
The emergence of the ‘theocratic class’ is enfolded in the larger process of Christianization of politics in Nigeria, what Adogame has described as ‘a Christian scramble for a role in national public life’ (2005:130). This, in turn, is enclosed in the global dynamic which has seen, first, ‘an increase in concern on the part of ostensibly religious collectivities with governmental issues’, and second, ‘an inflation of interest among those with declared religious commitments in coordinating the latter with secular-ideological perspectives and programmes’ (Robertson, 1989:12).
Writing in 1986, Bienen made an observation that was basically correct in the context of that period in Nigeria's political history. ‘So far,’ he observed, ‘the impact of Christianity in Nigeria has been less directly consequential for the struggle for political legitimacy and control of authoritative roles at central and state levels than has been the impact of Islam’ (1986:60). The history of the intervening period can be described as one of the metamorphoses of Christianity in Nigeria. At the heart of this transformation is the evolution by Christian leaders of what Kalu captures as a ‘theology of engagement’ (Kalu, 2004:259). This transformation is indexed by two broad attitudinal shifts: the first from a basic insistence on the secularity of the Nigerian state to an affirmation of the imperative to Christianize it; and second, a quiet but significant abdication of the former position on Christians' involvement in public office. The following statement by the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) illustrates these shifts:
Truly politics may be a dirty game – but who will make it clean? If Christians distance themselves from politics that leads to leadership, then demons will have a field day as had been the case with Nigeria up till today. If demons govern and rule us and burn our churches and marginalise us and treat us like second class citizens in our country of posting, then why should the Christian complain?… When will the righteous be in authority? Is it only when Christ comes? We do not think so … The righteous cannot rule if he is taught not to be interested in governance. Christians ought to be interested in politics which is the vehicle used in reaching the position of leadership in this country. Genuine, properly born-again Christians, filled with the Holy Spirit should come and contest elections (CAN, 1989, cited in Adogame, 2003).
Underlying Christian advocacy of a ‘theology of engagement’ and a more vigorous political agenda was a suspicion of Muslim political ambitions, plus a recognition of their relative success in achieving political dominance (Kukah, 1993). This suspicion has been fuelled by the perceived electoral majority of the north, and the subsequent number of Muslim presidents. More recently, the decision in 1986 by the Babangida government to make Nigeria a full member of the OIC (Organisation of the Islamic Conference), as opposed to its previous observer status (Oyebade, 2002); statements by former civilian president Shehu Shagari and military ruler general Muhammadu Buhari respectively to the effect that Muslims should refrain from voting for a non-Muslim; and the adoption of Shari'a law in some northern states have aroused Christian protest. Conversely there was the Muslim furore over the Miss World beauty pageant (2002) which was eventually cancelled following violent protests in Abuja and various parts of the Muslim north (Obadare, 2004).
The crisis that ensued after the annulment of the 12 June 1993 election opened the road to political agitation (and a greater say in political matters) for several Christian clerics, among them Bishop Alaba Job, Archbishop Anthony Olubunmi Okogie, Archbishop Sunday Mbang, Rt. Revd. Emmanuel Gbonigi, and Revd. Ayo Ladigbolu (Adebanwi 2006:4). This is not to suggest that that they had been apolitical before then, but it was in this context that ‘The status of PFN and CAN as important political voices became apparent’ (Adogame, 2005:132). This voice definitely became louder as the society came under more severe repression under the succeeding rule of General Abacha. The smouldering controversy over the adoption of Shari'a criminal law by several northern states (Uroh, 2002) also sharpened political mobilisation among the Christian community.
Obasanjo: The Making of a ‘Born-Again’ President
By 1999, the entwinement of religion with the tissue of everyday life could be seen in every facet of society, and the rise of Islamism and Pentecostalism which had begun in the late 1970s and early 1980s was an established fact of social praxis (Ruth Marshall, 1991; Larkin and Meyer, 2006). President Obasanjo's victory at the polls and his eventual swearing-in as president on 29 May 1999 was heavily steeped in Christian Pentecostalist symbolism. To many Christians, Obasanjo's ‘second coming’ was a spiritual metaphor, one that went beyond the ordinary fact of his fortuitous emergence as a beneficiary of political compromise between the country's geo-political power blocs. The northern power elite had acquiesced to this ‘power shift’ in a desperate attempt to bury the ghost of ’12 June’ and bring down the rising political temperature. For Christians, it was a fulfilment of God's promise to liberate his children (southern Christians) from the yoke of northern (Muslim) leadership (Ojo, 2004). A politically exigent ‘second coming’ was therefore invested with a spiritual halo, and Obasanjo himself became transformed into a virtual ‘messiah’ almost overnight. It was pointed out that between 1979, when the same Obasanjo handed over power to civilians, and May 1999 (minus 84 days of the Ernest Shonekan-led Interim National Government), no Christian had occupied the highest office in the land (Agbaje, Okunola and Adebanwi, 2005), and hence Obasanjo's ‘second coming’ was part of a ‘divine plan’ to adjust the imbalance.
Obasanjo's messianic status had been enhanced by his personal circumstances before his election as president. Jailed by Abacha on charges of plotting to overthrow the government, Obasanjo languished in various jails in the country until his eventual release by General Abubakar following Abacha's death. Following his release, Obasanjo went public with the fact of his ‘spiritual rebirth’ in prison. He had, to use the popular Pentecostal parlance, become ‘born-again’, and soon commemorated his new-found freedom with a mandatory church service. Although he was following a path already taken by other Nigerian leaders such as Chief Akin Omoboriowo, Professor Ishaya Audu and Chief Solomon Lar, all of whom had made public their conversion to the ‘New Christianity’ (Gaiya, 2002:26), Obasanjo's status as a former military ruler and one-time advocate of the potency of African juju meant that his conversion was of far greater import. For many Christians, his survival of the terrible living conditions in Nigeria's jails was itself an indication that God had preserved his life in order for him to ‘accomplish great things’. In the thinking of some, the fact that he was jailed was itself part of God's ‘master plan’ for both Obasanjo and the country. Oby Ezekwesili, then Minister for Solid Minerals, now Minister for Education, was quoted in The Guardian on Sunday:
And so God took that person, took him away into jail and the enemies thought they were the ones doing it: they took him into jail and when he was there, he had an encounter. The President had an encounter; he had an encounter all in the agenda of God to resurrect the nation. He brought him out after the encounter and then orchestrated a lot of things. God himself orchestrated a lot of things and took a person, who now had understood what total submission to the Almighty really is: that no matter your height or position, there is none greater than the Almighty God. At that place of revelation, he could use him. He now set up events and got him back into the covenant of the nation. What do you think it was about? It was for the re-building to start (‘A daughter of Zion: Oby Ezekwesili speaks on what it takes to be a Christian in public office’, Lagos, 1 January 2006, emphasis added).
At the same time, Christian Pentecostal leaders (many of whom had personally visited Obasanjo in jail while he was serving his sentence for coup-plotting; Gaiya, 2002:26) were racing to ‘claim’ him as a personal embodiment of divine response to their prayers and prophecies for the nation. As Ojo puts it, they collectively ‘adopted Olusegun Obasanjo as a symbol of the Christian control of the political sphere, believing that he was an answer to prayers about the ending of oppression and mis-governance and the ending of a Muslim political dominance’ (Ojo, 2004:2). In addition, such was their joy about the election of a Christian President that they gathered in Abuja for an all-night prayer to usher in a new (spiritual) dispensation (Ojo, 2004:2).
A notable exception to this evangelical hysteria was Pastor Tunde Bakare, founder and leader of the Latter Rain Assembly who, very much against the grain, declared even before the election that Obasanjo was ‘not the messiah’. Although other Pentecostal leaders immediately denounced Bakare's prophecy, such was the seriousness with which Obasanjo himself regarded it, that he convened a congress of sympathetic pastors in his Ota farmhouse to pray for him (Obasanjo) and apparently to nullify its negative impact (The Sun, Lagos, 10 April 2006). The incident thereby illustrated important divisions within the ranks of the ‘theocratic class,’ but also its emergent solidarities.
The ‘Theocratic Class’ & the Obasanjo Presidency
In Haynes' view, ‘leading religious figures are very often class actors in partnership with political elites to seek to achieve mutually advantageous goals’ (1996:6). Such goals include, but are definitely not limited to ‘the tendency for politicians to seek spiritual power, and for spiritual leaders to develop substantial material power’ (Ellis and Ter Haar, 2004:99). The social proximity between religious and political leaders in Nigeria is a genuine and long-standing one. For example, studies of the patterns of insertion of Christianity into Yoruba land (Peel, 2001) confirm that the emergent Christian clergy soon formed ‘an important component of the super-elite’ (Adebanwi, 2006:3). And today, amid all too familiar existential rigours and spiritual vulnerabilities, religious functionaries ‘including Pentecostal/Charismatic pastors’ remain important ‘as purveyors of powerful prayers, potent medicines, and amulets for protection against evil’ (Asamoah-Gyadu, 2005:93). The late General Abacha famously surrounded himself with a retinue of Islamic marabouts and spiritual hangers-on who became centres of power in themselves.
Although I contend that the Pentecostal/Charismatic ‘theocratic class’ has had a clear influence on the Obasanjo presidency, particularly in securing a form of moral legitimacy, especially amongst Christians, that has to be seen within a history of alliance between secular and spiritual figures. What seems to be new however, is a determination (as part of a project of ‘winning Nigeria for Jesus’) to embed the New Christianity into the heart of the state. As Larkin and Meyer have noted, this symbolises a clear philosophical congruence in the attitudes of Islamism and Pentecostalism towards (state) power. For Islam, ‘religion has never been something outside of state structures, but is profoundly intertwined with them’ (Larkin and Meyer, 2006:310), while Kalu argues that state power is perceived ‘as central in promoting religion; thus, control of the centre of the federal government remained a cardinal goal’ for Muslims (2004:246). Pentecostalism's new ideological turn also consummates Ellis and Ter Haar's forecasts, first, of the likelihood of ‘unprecedented configurations of power’ between African politicians and charismatic religious leaders, and two, that ‘the search for spiritual power, so prominent in Africa's new religious movements, must find institutional channels if it is to endure’ (Ellis and Ter Haar, 2004:101).
The workings of this new power nexus can be illustrated through analysis of two related processes: one of the specific social imaginary which has been produced by Pentecostal/charismatic Christianity in Nigeria; and the other of particular instances of the practice of the ‘theocratic class’. Evidence of a virtual Charismatic take-over abounds – the manipulation of religious symbols, in particular the performance of religious rituals in public offices, institutions and functions (Akinola, 2006), the use of religious (Christian) criteria in selecting individuals for appointment into public offices, a moral triumphalism which seems to draw its oxygen from the demonisation of both Islam and traditional forms of belief, the proliferation of religious groups, especially Charismatic churches, and last but not least, the inundation of public ‘debate’ with Christian rhetoric.
Both the faith-based recruitment of public officials and the demonizing of Islam should be viewed in the context of southern Christians' grudge that when power was in the hands of the Muslim northern elite, both the appointment of officials and the sharing of social largesse were based on the singular criterion of religion. According to this view, an apotheosis was reached during the Buhari-Idiagbon era when the Supreme Military Council included eleven northern Muslims (and one non-Muslim northerner) out of a total of 19 members. At the same time, fears of Islamic hegemony had been fuelled by the building of three mosques by successive Muslim leaders in Aso Rock, the seat of power. A Christian presidency became an opportunity to recover lost ground. One of the first things that the new president did in Aso Rock was to organise regular Christian services to pray for Nigeria; a Christian chapel was also built and a Baptist chaplain, Revd. Aliyu Yusuf Obaje, was appointed. Having regular morning Christian prayers in Aso Rock, attended by many public office holders, was seen as deeply symbolic. After decades of northern Islamic rule, it was imperative to reconstruct the presidency and the presidential villa itself (both materially and symbolically) as a Christian bastion against both ‘Satanic’ and invading ‘Jihadist’ (Caliphate) forces. The account by Ezekwesili (cited earlier) vividly illustrates this thinking and gives us a clue to the spatial organisation of daily life in the Aso Rock Villa:
So, everyday at the Villa, it was like, the two-edged swords being in my hands: one to work, doing my policy thing and everything: the other one, to pray. It has to be a blend of both because Satan had been sitting pretty before. Now, God has dislodged Satan but we needed to clear all the debris that Satan had put in what was his former territory (emphasis added).
Look at somebody like the Minister of Finance. She is a sister. She is a member of the Everlasting-Arm Parish of the Redeemed Christian Church of God. The Parish my husband pastors. She is a sister in Zion. She understands that without God she cannot do anything. She knows that … You think people don't know? They know that what we are it is God that is using the President. The President is a powerful instrument in the hand of God. If it were not for Olusegun Obasanjo, you think the likes of me and … and the rest of us … of this world would come anywhere near this government?
This story cannot be told without addressing the special role of Pastor Enoch Adejare Adeboye and the Redeemed Christian Church of God. A focus on the Redeemed Church is important, not only for the light it helps to shed on the obvious influence of its Overseer, Pastor Adeboye (and how that has been crucial in the government's quest for political and spiritual legitimacy), but also because of the way it reveals the all-important role of the church itself as the hub of a real nexus of what might be described as a tightly linked spiritual family.
Founded in 1952 by Pa Josiah Akindayomi, the Redeemed Christian Church of God is quite easily one of the fastest growing churches in the entire world. It has no fewer than 5,000 parishes worldwide, with a majority of them (4,000) in Nigeria alone (Sengupta and Rother, 2003). The church describes itself as a:
‘spirit filled assembly multiplied in small and large groups all over the world’ 2 and seems well on its way to Adeboye's reported wish to ‘plant’ it, within the next decade, ‘in every nation of the world … every town of the nations, and then in every village of the nations, and then in every home of the nations (Murphy, 2006).
This is not to say that it does not promise its followers spiritual sustenance. In fact, that it is seen as succeeding in doing so (and quite spectacularly too) is one of the reasons behind the church's astonishing spread. More crucial however is the way the Redeemed Church is perceived as the ‘church of power’ (spiritual and material), attended by the powerful. The common attraction to power makes perfect sense in a context in which, to borrow the words of Ellis and Ter Haar, ‘power is located other than where the law proclaims it to be’ (2004:190), and personal security more often than not lies either in personally hoarding that power (using legitimate state resources for personal, illegitimate ends), or, failing that, ensuring proximity to whoever is seen to be in possession of it.
A main part of the attraction of the Redeemed Church, alleged miracles aside, is the opportunity it provides to meet people outside the immediate vicinity of one's social location. Thus, every first Friday of the month, the Church's Holy Ghost Night service, held in the 12,000 acre Redemption Camp, Kilometre 46, Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, draws in excess of an estimated 300,000 people, including successful professionals, bank managers, university professors, business magnates and, most symbolically, leading political figures. In this regard, the Church has transformed into a real space of social and economic networking, an important resource in a context in which official channels for self-enhancement are notoriously clogged. For the Church therefore, the trinity of a ‘driven leadership, loose global oversight and staggering cash flow’ (Murphy, 2006) has become an enviable recipe for success.
At the centre of this burgeoning empire is the revered figure of Enoch Adejare Adeboye, a former university academic, and the iconic figure of Nigeria's ‘theocratic class’. A journalist admiringly refers to his ‘towering spiritual height as a scandal-free, awesome miracle worker and fantastic teacher of the gospel of Christ.’3 The 64-year-old Adeboye succinctly embodies Haynes' insight that ‘leaders of religious institutions are always products of their times and of the particular social class they come from (or grow into)’ (Haynes, 1996:233). Although Adeboye hails from a humble background (his rags-to-riches, Satan-to-Salvation story is the subject of a recent movie, ‘The Covenant Church’ produced by Charles Novia and Ope Banwo), he has ‘grown into’ another social class through a creative re-packaging of both himself and the church he inherited. Part of the public persona of Adeboye is his presentation as a mellifluous, spartanly-clad, but extremely powerful man. Such is Adeboye's assumed spiritual clout that newspapers have reported incidents in which church members scrambled to occupy a seat just vacated by him, apparently to share in his perceived spiritual gifts. Given his Goliath-like presence in the Pentecostal/Charismatic community, Adeboye's initial support for the Obasanjo regime was a godsend. He was among those to whom the new regime turned in 1999 when it was desperate for social legitimacy in the aftermath of a murky presidential election. In the course of his presidency, Obasanjo has attended the Holy Ghost Night Vigil on at least one occasion – with the 2003 elections looming, and his public approval at an all time nadir.
If Adeboye was central to the construction of a spiritual façade for the Obasanjo regime, it is important to note that he is not alone in ‘dusting off the image of the government as God-fearing and righteous’ (Oha, 2005:36). Mention must also be made of other influential figures like Chris Oyakhilome of the Christ Embassy, Mathews Ashimolowo of Kingsway International Christian Centre, Mike Okonkwo of the Redeemed Evangelical Mission, David Oyedepo of the Living Faith Ministries (also know as Winners Chapel), and Taiwo Odukoya of the Fountain of Life Church (Ihejirika, n.d.).
Such is the influence wielded by these religious leaders that private landmarks involving them are turned into an occasion for celebration by the government. For example, when David Oyedepo celebrated his 50th birthday in 2004, part of the president's public congratulatory message read thus:
… you have touched millions educationally, you have crowned it with the establishment of Covenant University, economically, you have provided jobs, morally God has used you to recreate moral integrity among millions. Physically, the grace of God has enabled you to provide infrastructure for a ministry related environment (sic). In all these and many more, we give thanks to God for your life. 4
Continue to pray for religious tolerance and avoidance of any religious conflicts which might contribute to the delay or derailment of our effort to build a greater Nigeria. Continue to pray for all three arms of government for divine wisdom to continue to work together as a team towards Nigeria's greatness.
For Haynes, this alliance between religious elites and representatives of state power comes with mutual benefit for both sides, as ‘being a de facto member of the state framework gives senior religious leaders opportunity to amass personal wealth, in just the same way as other leaders of important societal groups … may do’ (Haynes, 1996:10). At the same time, ‘politicians try to associate themselves with charismatic religious leaders, in the hope that spiritual power will be reflected on themselves’ (Ellis and Ter Haar, 2004:101). As we have seen in the case of the Obasanjo regime, such closeness to charismatic religious leaders is then used as a resource for regime legitimising, with religious leaders sacrificing their right to criticise the same government.
Although fissures have recently emerged in the alliance between the state and religious leaders, particularly over the government's ultimately vanquished attempt to prolong its stay in office beyond 2007, such is the domination of the public space by religious rhetoric that both the government's position on tenure elongation and its rejection by the opposition were couched in strictly religious terms. Thus, on the one hand, President Obasanjo, obliquely advancing reasons as to why he should be allowed a third term in office, said that ‘I … believe that God is not a God of abandoned projects. If God has a project, He will not abandon it.’5 At the same time, opponents of the so-called ‘third-term’ agenda laced their opposition with Christian parables. The following statement from Femi Adesina, a columnist for The Sun newspaper best summarises this pattern. As he put it,
Jesus came on a divine mission. You know how long it took him? Just three-and-a-half years. Was the job fully done by the time it became imperative for him to leave? Not by any means. But was the job abandoned? Not at all. Since he left over 2000 years ago, faithful disciples have continued with the job. Now if Jesus had said, oh, no one else can do the job, it is only me that can. Then it means he would not have gone to the cross, and the work of redemption would not have been accomplished. This is a vital lesson for Obasanjo, who is attempting to turn himself to Nigeria's God (Saturday Sun, Lagos, 8 April 2006).
Conclusion: Whither the Secular State?
This paper has focused on the rapid ascendance of the Pentecostal imagination, and its virtual capture of the Nigerian public space. The immediate background to this was the innovation of a new theology of engagement within a Christian community that saw the Islamic north as both a political and spiritual threat. For the Pentecostal community, the Obasanjo regime was a godsend, simultaneously encapsulating the desired geographic and spiritual shift in the centre of power in the country. While Christian religious leaders have prayed for the stability of the regime as a way of countering perceived northern/Muslim hostility, the regime has reciprocated not only by milking its endorsement as a way of legitimising itself, but also by regarding religious leaders as de facto members of the state structure.
The capacity of Christian-Islamic rivalry to ‘delay national integration’ because of the ‘negative tendency’ to ‘create competing social orders’ and to define ‘the most basic community’, thereby challenging ‘the national community of Nigeria’ has been sufficiently remarked (IDEA, 2000:80). What I wish to briefly address in this conclusion is the direct implication of the new alliance of political and religious leaders (the ‘theocratic class’) on the constitutional status of Nigeria as a secular state.
Although Section 10 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria states that ‘The Government of the Federation or of a State shall not adopt any religion as State Religion’, religious communities have often argued that this apparent affirmation of secularity is not the same thing as a total rejection of (the validity of) religious practice. In any case, they argue, the introduction to the same constitution mentions the positive resolve of the people of Nigeria ‘to live in unity and harmony as one indissoluble sovereign nation under God’.
In truth, secularism has never enjoyed a good press among Nigeria's religious communities, and when not being equated with atheism, tends to be viewed, especially by radical Muslims, as a synonym for Western civilisation. This position is best captured in the following statement by Lateef Adegbite, secretary general, Grand Council for Islamic Affairs, who insists that ‘Secularism is alien to Islamic doctrine. Islam is a way of life and subsumes both spiritual and temporal matters under its doctrine. Islam necessarily regulates adherents' conduct politically, socially and economically’ (quoted in Uroh, 2002:2). Conversely, Christian leaders have often defended secularism as a state ideology, seeing it as the best way of securing their corner in a multi-religious and poly-ethnic society such as Nigeria.
It has never been possible for what might be regarded as an authentic secularist-humanist perspective to emerge in Nigeria. This is one consequence of the growing religious suffocation of Nigerian public space (Obadare, 2004). Femi Fani-Kayode, Special Assistant (Public Affairs) to Obasanjo, clearly referring to Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, declared that:
It is always very difficult to reason, debate or have any form of meaningful discussion or dialogue with any person who does not believe in God.
In sum therefore, a position of moral equidistance from the two ‘world religions’ seems almost utopian at the moment. In any case, such a position is thought to be odd, if not unsustainable by those who are convinced that religiosity of some sort is genetic to, and constitutive of, the African identity. An idea of how avowed secularists are regarded within Nigeria's religious communities emerged in the aftermath of the recent demise of Beko Ransome Kuti, one of the country's leading human rights and democracy activists. Responding to news of Beko's death and the late activist's insistence on a secular outlook, Femi Adesina wrote in his column as follows:
Nigeria's increasingly religious public sphere brooks no ‘third way’, and one might reasonably expect religion to play a massive role in next year's all-important elections.