The founder of Citadel Global Community Church, Dr. Tunde Bakare, has revealed that he is under intense pressure from political stakeholders urging him to join the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
Bakare made the disclosure on Saturday during the maiden edition of the Citadel School of Governance Dialogue Series held in Oregun, Lagos. The event, themed “Nigeria at 65: Historical Reflections, Futuristic Projection,” focused on the nation’s political evolution and future prospects.
According to Bakare, several influential figures — including a former governor and a former minister from the South-West — have approached him to align with the ADC.
“There has been a lot of pressure on me from prominent people to join the ADC. They visit my home, and even when I was abroad, the party’s hierarchy kept calling, saying they needed my voice,” he said.
He also noted that one of his younger political associates, who had benefited from holding key positions within the All Progressives Congress (APC), appealed to him to lend his influence to the ADC’s rising movement.
However, Bakare firmly dismissed the idea of joining the party.
“I am not going to take part in ADC. The last time I heard about ADC was about a plane crash. I wish them well because we need a robust opposition. But you don’t birth a child called APC and then try to kill it yourself. We are not going to have another Awolowo–Akintola crisis in the South-West,” he stated.
The cleric, who played a key role in the formation of the APC, maintained that President Bola Tinubu’s emergence was a product of divine providence.
“If God wants to remove ‘emilokan’, He knows how to do it. You can’t get the kind of thing Tinubu has brought without God’s support,” Bakare added.
Also speaking at the dialogue, guest speaker and former Nigerian Ambassador to Germany, Professor Akinjide Osuntokun, identified corruption and tribalism as Nigeria’s greatest challenges.
“The two problems our country faces are corruption and tribalism. If these two evils are eradicated, Nigeria will thrive. Corruption is the father—or mother—of tribalism. If the money being stolen was available for development, Nigeria would be far better,” Osuntokun said.
He further argued that the ethnicity of the president should not be a determinant of development outcomes.
“The fact that Tinubu is president does not automatically improve the life of the average Yoruba man, just as an Igbo presidency won’t automatically benefit the ordinary Igbo man without genuine development,” he added.
