It was a little past mid-day when they filed into the office of Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, tucked inside the 30,000 capacity Word of Life Bible Church headquarters in Warri, Delta State. Thirty-three of them, drawn from dif­ferent parts of Northern Nigeria; all of them, members of the Arewa Commu­nity in Delta State. And their mission was unambiguous: They were con­cerned about the precarious security situation in the land.
Leader of the team and Special Adviser to the Delta State governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, on Special Duties, Alhaji Au­walu Tukur, told the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, national leader that the visit was to thank him for his bridge-build­ing efforts to unite the country despite the differences in creed, tongues and tribes.
Although Tukur hails from Kano State, he told the cleric that he knew very little of the ancient city, ‘because I have been accepted here.”
Leader of the Muslim community in Asaba, Alhaji Aminu Abdulkadir, reechoed the governor’s aide when he noted that most of them were born in Delta State. Be­yond that, he said they had been part of all political processes, leading to the creation of the state.
“We are indigenes of Delta State and will do everything to make Delta State free from every form of terrorism,” he vowed. He said the Central Mosque in Asaba was as old as 115 years, adding that their fore­fathers had enjoyed cordial relationship with their hosts.
The Chief Imam of Kakaudu Commu­nity, Asaba, Alhaji Habib Faruk, frowned at activities of the Boko Haram insurgents, which he said was un-Islamic. The Quran, he noted, was very clear: Nobody has a right to kill any soul. Prophet Mohammed fought idol worshippers but he maintained a very cordial relationship with the Chris­tians, he intoned, stressing that Issa in the Quran means Jesus.
“We name our children Issa. Any Mus­lim, who doesn’t believe in Issa, as one of the foremost messengers of God to this earth, ceases to become a Muslim. You can’t say you accept all tenets of Islam and disagree with Issa. This simply means Islam and Christianity go hand-in-hand. Nobody is allowed to take anybody’s life. When you take a human life, apart from the repercussion on this earth, God shall ask you why you killed that person and if you have no reason, you’ll serve the punishment,” he explained.
Continuing, he told their host: “As you see us here, from the youngest person to the oldest, our parents were born in Delta State. Our Chief Imam was born and brought up in Delta State and became the Chief Imam. He is the oldest person in our entourage. Most of us don’t have anywhere else to go. We are torn between the irony of indigeneship and citizenship. We are in Delta State and we believe in the right of citizenship. We believe we have a right as every other citizen in this country. Delta State is a special place.”
Also speaking, Omachi Attah Igala and Onu Igala, Hon. Francis Salifu, who hails from Kogi State, reminded the CAN presi­dent of an incident in 1985. “As a small boy, I came to you and you laid hands on me. Today, your son is a minister under Bishop Kadiri in Warri. I had all my chil­dren here. We don’t have anywhere else to go. I left here in 2008 for Kogi State to be a Special Adviser to the then governor. I found that I could not settle back in Kogi State because my home is in Warri. After four years, I told the governor I had to go back home. So, Warri is home for me and so also for thousands of Igala.”
“I schooled here, learnt a trade, worked in the oil industry and retired. This is the only place I can claim. We will not fold our hands and watch people come to destroy it. That is our decision. That is why we have come to you to help us talk to our governor and our president to carry us along in everything. I am really thrilled and tears are almost falling out of my eyes. My prayer is that what has happened here today, I wish it’ll happen in every state all over Nigeria.”
Pastor Oritsejafor said he was com­pletely dazed by the outpouring of love. “You’re my people. My heart is very open. If my heart is not open, then I am not fit to preach the gospel. I have read some things in the newspapers where people say I hate Muslims. How can? It’s not possible. I’m glad that you are here to testify to it. To me, that is very important”.
He told his guests that some persons misunderstood him because of his blunt­ness and penchant to say the truth no mat­ter whose ox was gored.
“As we have embraced you, continue to help us to talk to your friends and brothers in the North to embrace our people, to take them as part of Nigeria. It is very impor­tant. Every year, I do poverty alleviation every December 26 where I give free cars and lots of other things to people. At one occasion, a Muslim boy won a car. This is what I’m saying, in the North; so many churches have been destroyed. So many lives lost.
“I am asking; there are many Muslim traditional rulers, Muslim religious schol­ars and Muslim politicians there. I have taken time to go to these people to tell them, ‘please, this thing is not good.’ If we want to make Nigeria great, we must build trust. To build trust, we must do certain things that will show that we love and appreciate one another. It is not enough to condemn Boko Haram. Everybody can do that. They must go beyond condemning Boko Haram. Boko Haram is an ideology. It is not about poverty. If you give every one of them one car each and one house each, it will not change them. It is the doctrine.
“Some people tell me there is Salafi doctrine and Wahabi doctrine; Salafism and Wahabism. These doctrines have been overstretched on some of these people. They’ve misinterpreted it and used it to indoctrinate these young men. And this is what is pushing them to kill human beings. What I’m saying to these Muslim political leaders, religious leaders and traditional rulers is that you only defeat a wrong ideology with a superior ideology. The military are trying. They must continue to try. But you cannot totally win the war just by bullets. You win ideological war by superior argument,” he maintained.
Boko Haram, he contends, will not listen to him; but they have certain clerics they listen to. “I have an organisation, Think Nigeria, made up of Christian and Muslim scholars. We have met three times in Abuja and we sit and talk. We agreed to tell one another the truth. They tell us what we are doing that they don’t like, we tell them what they are doing that we don’t like; and we are making progress. We are discussing very fundamental things that make people united, things that can join people together and make us strong.
“When people say Boko Haram mem­bers are not Muslims, I don’t want them to talk like that. We are not the ones, giving Islam a bad name, it is all these people. You have to identify them and deal with them; you need to talk to them, you need to deal with them,” he said pleadingly.
“Let’s be honest with one another. Let’s look at these things passionately and try to solve this problem the way it should be solved. Let us build trust. Let them go into the mosques and tell the people that Nigeria belongs to all of us; that Nigeria loves them and Nigeria is good to every­body. They must change the mindsets of the Boko Haram people. These things will help us forge one united front.
“There’s no difference between us. We are the same. So, why are we doing this kind of nonsense to ourselves? Religion must be expressed in different ways. Whatever way you decide to express your belief in God, it is your choice. And we must maintain that choice, it is important that we live under that choice so that we do not cause unnecessary problems.”
He drew attention to the situation in Iraq and Syria where militants have formed an Islamic state. “And that is what Boko Ha­ram is trying to do here, to form an Islamic state. That is what they have in mind. But it’s not possible. Not in a country like Nigeria. Nigeria is for all of us.
Everybody must be free to worship God the way he wants to. These are the things we are saying. We can never harm you in any way. I say this with all sense of re­sponsibility; I will never ever do anything against the Islamic religion. You have my support and goodwill.”
He assured the Arewa Community in Delta that he and his fellow Christian lead­ers in the state and indeed in the nation, would continue to restrain Christians from taking up arms, adding “they will not do the wrong thing.”
“I’m hoping that the international com­munity will praise us a little bit because we are restraining Christian youths, telling them they cannot do these kinds of things because it is totally against the word of God.”

Oritsejafor’s sermon to made-in-Delta Arewa