by Mohammed Bello Doka
4 August, 2026
There is a peculiar tragedy unfolding in Nigeria, one that reveals more about the moral decay of power than about the institution it seeks to destroy. The All Progressives Congress and its army of social media foot soldiers have declared war on the Catholic Church, and in doing so, they have exposed a spiritual bankruptcy that no electoral victory can cure. The Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria recently did what too many politicians are afraid to do: they told President Bola Tinubu the truth. They walked into the Presidential Villa and said what millions of Nigerians know in their bones, that the nation is bleeding. They spoke of worsening insecurity that has turned highways into killing fields and communities into prisons of fear. They spoke of economic hardship that has pushed 139 million Nigerians into poverty, according to the World Bank, with 61 percent of the population now living on less than three dollars a day. They spoke of food insecurity that now threatens 30 million Nigerians with crisis-level hunger, with the FAO projecting that 34.7 million people will face critical food shortages by mid-2026. They spoke of a security crisis that claimed 4,654 lives in 2025 alone, with 3,141 people kidnapped in 1,274 incidents, banditry accounting for 2,724 deaths, and farmer-herder clashes rising to 322 fatalities. They spoke of extrajudicial killings, of unarmed women protesters gunned down in Adamawa, of human rights violations documented by Amnesty International and the National Human Rights Commission.
This was not an act of political opposition. This was an act of moral duty. The Catholic bishops have always been the conscience of this nation, speaking truth to power regardless of which party occupies Aso Rock. Senator Orji Uzor Kalu was right when he described them as “the conscience of the country.” They told the president what the politicians around him will never say, that the emperor has no clothes, that the renewed hope has become renewed hunger, that the nation is not healing but hemorrhaging.
And how did the presidency respond? Not with engagement. Not with reflection. Not with a single policy change to address the crisis the bishops identified. Instead, presidential aides launched a coordinated attack on Cardinal John Onaiyekan, one of Nigeria’s most respected clerics, a man whose moral authority spans four decades of speaking truth to power. He was accused of abusing “clerical privilege,” of dabbling in partisan politics, of deliberately misrepresenting the president. He was subjected to insults, to AI-generated defamatory images that portrayed him as a devil with horns, to accusations that he was working for Peter Obi, as if a man of God cannot speak about national crisis without being reduced to a political pawn. The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria condemned the attacks as “disrespectful” and “amateuristic.” Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar demanded an apology, describing the presidency's response as “arrogant, disrespectful and unbecoming of a democratic government.”
But here is where the tragedy deepens into farce. The APC is attacking an institution that represents approximately 35 million Nigerians, roughly 12 to 15 percent of the country's population. These are not fringe voices. These are voters, taxpayers, citizens whose moral and spiritual leader is being dragged through the mud by a government that claims to represent all Nigerians. And yet, within the very ranks of the Tinubu administration, there are Catholics who have remained silent. They have gained the world, but they have lost their souls.
Senate President Godswill Akpabio has declared himself “happy to be a Catholic” and the “most ranked Christian in government.” Secretary to the Government of the Federation George Akume is a Catholic Knight of the Order of St. John International. Former Minister of Labour Simon Lalong is a staunch Catholic and a Papal Knight. Governor Hyacinth Alia of Benue State is an ordained Catholic priest. Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra State and his wife are described as “strongly rooted Catholics.” Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State has been publicly praised by the Apostolic Nuncio for exemplifying Catholic values. Governor Hope Uzodinma of Imo State is a devout Catholic who has built churches and been honoured by Catholic bodies.
Seven confirmed Catholics in the highest echelons of power. Seven souls who have watched their Church, their Cardinal, their bishops, their faith, be publicly humiliated by the very administration they serve. And they have said nothing. They have traded their moral courage for political survival. They have exchanged their prophetic voice for a seat at the table. They have gained the world, but they have lost their souls.
What is even more troubling is the army of social media supporters, many of them Christians themselves, who have engaged in the most vile attacks on the Catholic Church. They have insulted bishops, circulated AI-generated images of Cardinal Onaiyekan burning in hell, portrayed him as a demon with horns, and done all of this while collecting their 20,000 naira monthly data stipends. How does a Christian, a man or woman who claims to follow the Prince of Peace, engage in such vicious attacks on the leaders of their own faith? How does a person who professes to believe in the Gospel participate in the crucifixion of the very institution that gave them their identity?
The answer lies in two satirical political conditions that have come to define the pathology of the APC's digital army. The first is Chronic Bwala Syndrome, a condition characterized by the shameless maintenance of irreconcilable public positions, habitual denial of documented facts, and refusal to accept responsibility despite overwhelming evidence of contradiction. The sufferer holds contradictory positions simultaneously, denies previous statements despite recorded evidence, refuses to acknowledge errors or apologize, blames others for failures within their own responsibility, persists in falsehoods even when publicly disproved, and prioritizes political convenience over consistency and accountability. In short, it is contradiction without conscience.
The second is Comprehension Deficiency Syndrome, a more paradoxical clinical picture. The sufferer acknowledges the severity of the country's condition. They agree that poverty is widespread, that more people are dying from insecurity, and that inflation is eroding purchasing power. They concede these realities without hesitation. Yet remarkably, they fail to understand why anyone would conclude that the government has failed. They listen to the bishops say the nation is bleeding and nod in agreement. They look at the World Bank data and accept it as fact. They watch the news of mass kidnappings and express appropriate horror. But when the conversation turns to accountability, they retreat to a familiar defensive posture: “It did not begin with Tinubu.” This is the defining symptom of Comprehension Deficiency Syndrome, the ability to perceive the crisis but the inability to comprehend why the crisis should be attributed to the current administration. They can see the darkness but cannot understand why the man holding the torch is being blamed for the absence of light. They can feel the heat of the fire but cannot grasp why the firefighter is being held responsible. Acknowledgment of the problem and exoneration of the leadership coexist in perfect contradiction, producing a political amnesia that renders every failure someone else's fault.
These two syndromes are frequently comorbid. A sufferer of Chronic Bwala Syndrome denies reality because it is politically convenient. A sufferer of Comprehension Deficiency Syndrome acknowledges reality but denies the implications because they cannot separate the crisis from their loyalty to the administration. Together, they form a perfect political pathology: the leader who contradicts evidence surrounded by supporters who accept the evidence but refuse to connect it to the leadership.
And this is the motivating factor behind the attacks on the Catholic Church. Tinubu and the APC are not working on winning the 2027 election. They are working on rigging it. The bishops warned the president not to use state institutions to predetermine the outcome of the 2027 elections. They called for free, fair and credible elections. They asked the president to listen to honest assessments rather than positive reports. And for this, they were attacked. Not because they were wrong, but because they were telling the truth. A government that plans to rig an election cannot afford to have moral voices speaking truth to power. A government that has failed the people cannot afford to have the people's conscience reminding them of their failure. So they attack the messenger. They silence the prophet. They crucify the cardinal on the altar of lies.
But here is the irony that the APC has failed to grasp. The Catholic Church has survived empires. It has survived persecutions that make today's attacks look like child's play. It has outlasted Roman emperors, medieval kings, colonial powers, and military dictators. It will outlast the Tinubu administration. It will outlast the APC. It will outlast every politician who thinks that power gives them the right to silence God's voice. The Church has been here before. It will be here long after the current occupants of Aso Rock have been forgotten.
The question is not whether the Church will survive. The question is whether the men and women who call themselves Catholics but have remained silent will survive their own consciences. The question is whether the social media soldiers who have insulted their own bishops will ever find their way back to the faith they have betrayed. The question is whether the APC, in its desperate pursuit of power, has gained the world but lost its soul.
When the bishops told President Tinubu that the nation was bleeding, they were not being political. They were being pastoral. They were not attacking the government. They were saving it from itself. A president who refuses to hear the truth is a president who is doomed to fail. A government that attacks the messengers of truth is a government that has chosen lies over light. An administration that silences the conscience of the nation has already lost its moral authority, regardless of what happens at the polls.
The Catholic Church will continue to speak truth to power, as it has done for decades, because that is its calling. Cardinal Onaiyekan will continue to be the voice of the voiceless, because that is his vocation. The bishops will continue to tell presidents what they do not want to hear, because that is their duty. And the APC, with its army of social media trolls, its AI-generated defamations, its verbal assaults on the sacred, will continue to reveal its own moral bankruptcy.
But let there be no mistake. History will remember this moment. History will remember which side stood for truth and which side stood for power. History will remember the men and women who remained silent while their Church was being attacked. History will remember the social media soldiers who sold their souls for data stipends. And history will remember the administration that gained the world but lost its soul.
The Catholic bishops told the president the truth. The question is whether the president, and the party he leads, will ever have the courage to listen. Or whether they will continue down the path of denial, of deflection, of destruction, until they have nothing left but the hollow shell of power, empty of principle, devoid of conscience, and abandoned by God.
Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via [email protected]
Abuja Network News
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