Innocent Onoh
Stakeholders of the African Church, a foremost Nigerian indigenous church, have demanded that Primate, Most Rev.Julius Olayinka-Abbe step down as leader of the congregation over an alleged certificate scandal involving him.
They said that the alleged discovery that the primate submitted illicit certificates to gain the primate position has continued to unsettle the Church, with its attendant undervelopment on the body.
Spokesman of the stakeholders, Rev. Cannon Richard Peter, told newsmen in Lagos that, the church’s growth for ten years has retarded because of the fake certificate issue.
Peter, a Uyo Akwa Ibom Province-based leader, said that, due to the inglorious incident the primate could not call meetings for the management of the church.
He said that the Primate was being accused of submitting three Master of Art degrees before his elevation to Archbishop in Christian Religion from the Lagos State University (LASU) that the church suspected not to be authentic or issued by the authority of the school.
He added that the problems started in 2015 when the church introduced the cadre of Archbishop in the clerical order of the church. The body set up a Screening Committee to consider Bishops for election as Archbishops.
He stressed that Primate Abbe first submitted a 2001 master’s degree certificate. When the committee queried the 2001 certificate on the ground that there was no convocation in LASU in 2001 and as such, the university could not have issued any certificate in 2001.
He further said that Primate Abbe was admitted for a master’s programme in 2000 but his classmates graduated and had their convocation in 2004, he noted that when the committee queried its authenticity that Abbe subsequently submitted a 2007 certificate and thereafter submitted another 2007 certificate whereas the university had no convocation in 2007 and that Abbe’s name was not in the list of graduands approved by the senate of LASU at any particular time.
He cited that all the certificates that Abbe submitted to the screening committee of the church, three in all, were signed by Prof. John Obafunwa as Vice Chancellor, whereas Prof.John Obafunwa became LASU Vice Chancellor in 2011 and ended his tenure in 2015.
He noted that Abbe was alleged to have an academic transit of 1999 which translates to having an academic record a year before he was offered admission in 2000.
He said that a very reliable source indicated that Primate Abbe became an Archbishop based on those suspicious certificates and was reported to have privately confessed to Rev. Canon Buki Okunowo after becoming an Archbishop and the grand patron of the church that he does not have the master degree.
According to him, the Church has the Executive Committee meeting, National Conference meeting, Quarterly Management Council meeting, General meeting, and others that the primate has declined to convene.
“The primate lacks the moral strength to seat together with other leaders of the church in those meetings to pilot the affairs of the church and we can’t continue to allow someone’s misdeed to envelope the church to comatose.
“With the police ongoing investigation into the matter, it is good the primate steps aside to enable the proper outcome of the inquest,” he said.
Chief Edward Alani-Amosu, an Octogenarian and the Church Historian, said that, as a member of the archbishop/primate screening/selection committee in 2015, the committee report favoured Bishop Ade Ajayi who is now the Archbishop of Ijabu Province of the church, as the most qualified.
Amosu regretted that the committee report was sidelined to enthrone Olayinka-Abbe as archbishop and then the primate against popular wishes.
He noted that since then the clamour for the primate exit has continued to rattle the stability of the church.
Another stakeholder, Mr. Debo Oduguwa, said that the subsisting leadership of the church by one alleged to have a criminal record belittles the Church and is antithetical to its progress.
Oduguwa, a lawyer by profession, said that the LASU authorities have been contacted for two weeks to clarify the authenticity or otherwise of the certificates.
He appealed to LASU to save the church from further crisis by coming forward with its response on the matter and cleaning its image from the scorn a delay on the matter might smear on it.
When contacted on the matter, the embattled primate said that he has nothing to say on the matter at present.
The police officer in charge of the investigation at the Alagbon Police Station, Insp. Alpha said that the police have written to LASU for confirmation or otherwise of the certificates and would get feedback from the institution by Wednesday.