The Serving Overseer of the Citadel Global Community Church (CGCC), Pastor Tunde Bakare, says the late former President Muhammadu Buhari was far from being a religious fundamentalist, contrary to accusations.
Bakare, who was Buhari’s running mate in the 2011 presidential election, said he only began to see the former Nigerian leader, who died in London on Sunday, differently when he got closer to him.
“I thought he was a religious fundamentalist until I came close,” Bakare said on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Monday.
The former presidential aspirant narrated an encounter which changed his perception of the former dictator.
“After the flag off of our campaign in Kaduna, we rode in the same car, we got home to his place and he staggered, the next word he spoke, God is my witness, was ‘Jesus Christ of Nazareth’.
“And I said, ‘General, what is that?’ He said, ‘You do not have the monopoly of Jesus Christ, I’m thanking God’. He just said that, and then I found out that his bodyguards were all Christians. Not only that, his driver of 10 years asked me to pray with him and I said, ‘I don’t pray Islamic prayers, and he said, ‘I’m a Christian, sir.’”
Bakare said that Buhari never tampered with his Christian faith in any form all the days of their campaign together, but allowed him to go to church on Sundays before going for campaigns.
He described Buhari as a man of few words but of decisive action, saying that once he was convinced you had the right point, he would immediately approve it.
The cleric also said that Buhari was a great leader, adding that he never saw corruption in him in all the years they interacted.
“A lot of accusations went, but nobody could pin any corruption on him. He fought the battle against corruption to the best of his ability. His best may not be good enough for some people, but he has done his best,” Bakare added.
