On Reverend Father Mbaka, By Pius Adesanmi.

APC southeast zone has been very loud in condemning the transfer, labeling it a politically-motivated move. If you read various statements and Freudian slips from APC people, you are left in no doubt that they believe that they are defending a prominent party member who is being victimized by the Catholic church.

The head of APC southeast zone is not correct.

The head of APC national is not correct.

APC, exactly what is your business with a routine transfer of a Catholic priest?

When I was young and growing up in Lokoja Diocese – I was an altar boy for nearly 20 years – transfer of priests was routine. It is pure Church business. They serve at the pleasure of a Bishop who can move them around.

I repeat: what is APC’s business with the routine transfer of a Catholic priest? Father Mbaka may be a national political celebrity. All that celebrity nonsense stops at the doors of any Catholic church. He is just a priest. His Bishop transferred a priest, not a celebrity or an APC asset.

And, Father Mbaka, you should be extremely worried that a political party is so openly aggrieved by your transfer. Check yourself. Examine yourself. You need to urgently revise your modes of engagement with project Nigeria and be an equal opportunity koboko wielder on the backs of that country’s disgraceful political elite.

There has to be something wrong with your approach for one party to feel so wounded by your transfer. They are even weeping louder for you than they would have wept for Odigie Oyegun, their national chairman.

Look at the history of the long succession of Roman Catholic clergy who have publicly wielded koboko on Nigeria’s back. Which one of them can be claimed by any political entity? Which party is going to claim Olubunmi Okogie, John Onaiyekan, etc?

Even my man, Bishop Kukah, who of recent dangerously made himself claimable by a party instead of remaining a transcendental pan-Nigerian voice of equal opportunity chastisement, and burnt his fingers very badly in the process, has been very quietly recalibrating.

Father Mbaka, when a party is wearing ash and sackcloth over the routine transfer of a priest in the Catholic church, the said priest must examine himself and his strategies.

Reposition your voice.

When next you go to the Villa, tell Baba to sell his harem of planes.

When next you go to the Villa, tell Baba to change Nigeria’s budget philosophy in 2017 and stop perpetuating the Dubai of the belly that he inherited.

You can do that and still remain a powerful force in helping us crack the stubborn coconut heads of the herdish enablers of our recent corrupt past.