…Decries Inaction Amid Global Challenges
By Toby Chuks
Onitsha based journalist and cleric Evangelist Theo Rays Ejikeme who is championing what is called Youth Rendezvous For Greater Igbo Advancement along with other interest groups has called on leaders in all sections including religious and political leaders such as Bishops, Pastors, President and governors as well as community leaders such as heads of town unions and traditional rulers to expand the scope of activities of the people into more domestic work, spiritual work and economic work so as to utilise the people into more opportunities and possibilities in today’s world. Ejikeme in a Blueprint tagged Agenda For Greater Igbo Advancement presented to journalists during a meeting with interest group at Onitsha, traced the cause of the current insecurity and economic hardship to inability of the leaders to utilise the people into more stronger works noting with dismay that people are confined and bottled in situations where they are left in gap with the programs and activities of the global world.
According to the blueprint as presented by the Onitsha based Man of God, “in Igboland particularly people are confined and bottled in various situations where they make up for large markets, large churches and schools everywhere but they cannot make up for they cannot make up for food production, they cannot make up for good spiritual service, they cannot make up for Olympic medals, you find out that a lot of opportunities and possibilities are not there for the people because the scope of activities is not wide enough. As we can observe, there is lack of opportunities and possibilities in agriculture, in sport including football, in media, tourism, science & technology, textile and garment, indigenous medicine, chemical, designing, managing, branding and construction among other areas of businesses as obtained in the developed countries”
In view of the Blueprint, there are three major things that all leaders in various sections have to do which include expand the scope of daily activities and improve on working time up to 15hours daily, second is to embrace unity of purpose to work as a team and three to work in sequences by identifying areas of priorities. It reads “In the beginning of life, God wanted to confine and bottle Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden but it did not work out. Again God also wanted to use Law to do the same thing with the Israelites but it also did not work out And God subsequently gave us Jesus Christ to save us against being confined and bottled in a particular situation. And Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to guide us to the right knowledge, to be righteous and to enjoy eternal freedom to do all things good to the point that we can even do more things than Jesus Himself as written in John 14:12, John 14: 26-27 14”
On the other hand, the Blueprint called on the leaders as Bishops, Pastors, Presidents, Governors and community leaders to embrace unity of purpose and work as a team bringing all hands to work out good programs into domestic, spiritual and economic lives of the people targeting security, food production, job creation and steady power supply. It reads “all leaders as religious, political and community leaders have the same purpose to bear on the people which include to oversee the security and welfare of the people with availability of food, water and power supply as key needs. Security and welfare are not limited to political leaders, it is for all leaders. There is a popular impression that it is the responsibility of political leaders (government) to provide for security and welfare of the people, that impression is wrong, therefore all leaders have to work as a team with unity of purpose”
On the third hand, the Blueprint asked leaders to retrace their steps and work in sequence by appropriately placing each of the sections of works like domestic work, spiritual work and economic work among others where they suppose to be. It reads “the works are in sequence starting from domestic work to spiritual work and then to economic work. Domestic and spiritual works are meant to prepare people for economic work but people misplace domestic and spiritual work thereby turning domestic and spiritual work into economic work. “Today, many economic works like farming, sports, artisans are no more on the card of daily activities in most places in Igboland because of misplacement of service on the side of the leaders. Religious leaders have wrongly converted church and school to economic work and so doing channel resources to building churches and schools for business. Church and school suppose to represent domestic and spiritual work that prepare people for economic work but they have mounted church and school as direct economic work”
It reads “Church and school are basically meant for domestic and spiritual works to prepare and equip people to be truthful, lovely, discipline, principled, vigilant, creative, selfless, hardworking and visionary into economic work such as farming, trading, sports, artisans, transportation, designing, branding, packaging, managing, construction and others. Take schools for instance, schools have been converted to direct money making business by church leaders and private businessmen. Schools are no more used to develop sport unlike in those days where schools were used to develop sports. Can you imagine that today many schools do not have playing field for sports development unlike in those days when every primary and secondary school have a playing field and a game master.
The blueprint in its bottom line reads “what we are saying is that leaders have to go back to the drawing board to get things in right direction. We acknowledge that leadership is the overall power of services in our system and that leadership is to work more and not to eat more. Some leaders and institutions are very large at eating but too weak at working. We have rich leaders that are comfortable leading poor people. We also acknowledge the fact that we have religious leaders, political leaders and community leaders what we are saying here is that all the leaders have to face the same work and ensure that people are safe and secured anywhere they are. The idea of some leaders focusing on building churches and schools while expecting other leaders to provide for security and welfare of the people is wrong because people are left in the gap when leaders face different works”.
