A Pentecostal preacher and the senior pastor of Covenant Christian Centre, Poju Oyemade, has caused an uproar on Twitter after he blocked a lady who called him out for using football analysis to urge Nigerians to move on from the 2023 presidential election.
The eloquent preacher had a few days ago urged Nigerians who are still disgruntled over the result of the last election to show some level of patriotism. Sharing his position via Twitter, the clergy wrote, “For every one who loves Nigeria, you want the country to win regardless of “who is playing.”
“Just like you want your favourite team to win the trophy even if the coach didn’t field your preferred players, when your team scores, you are happy. Let’s stay focused; it’s all about the country winning, Poju said”
Reacting to the pastor Oyemade’s position, Torty Mercy, in a series of tweets challenged the preacher’s analogy of a football team in defining patriotism.
“Though I’m not big on football, I know that in football, all team members are trained equally. At any point, any player can be substituted, and the team still coasts to victory. Their fans celebrate whether their favourite is featured or not. Now let’s compare it to this scenario,” she said.
“Two football teams were set to have a match; one team believed in their past prowess and rascality; the other team built up from nothing and worked so hard in training for this match. This diligent team played and won the match, but in our very eyes, the umpire announced the other team,” she added.
Questioning the rationality of the clergy’s analogy, @torty_mercy in another tweet queried, “So you mean as a football lover, we should pretend that injustice has not been done and move on? What if FIFA announced France as the World Cup winner instead of Argentina? The world will move on like nothing happened. Enough of the comparison with football; let me bring us back to reality”.
Concluding her thoughts, she noted that, “As regards your illustrations about teams, this is no team business; this is a fight between good and evil, truth and lies, darkness and light. Unless you want us to believe we can mix up good and bad and celebrate bad when it favours us, That being said, let us let the court decide the true winners of the football match, and even if they let evil triumph, we will not be swayed because no matter how long the night lasts, the day will break. Evil is evil, even if it’s adorned with royal apparel. Nigeria is not a football field, Sir,” he added.
Pastor poju, as the preacher is fondly called by his followers, has in recent times come under scrutiny and criticism from other users of the social media platform, most especially supporters of the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi.
