Written by Obinna Akukwe
May 2020
Governor Abiodun of Ogun State have hit hard at Bishop
Oyedepo with the new Covid-19 directives which locked down Saturdays and
Sundays only. According to the new directive from the governor “Relaxation
windows will now be observed on all five working days (Monday to Friday), but
the FG-directed curfew from 8 p.m. (night) to 6 a.m. (morning) remains in place
on these days. Total lockdown will be maintained on Saturdays and Sundays”.
Governor Abiodun’s actions have been seen as muscle flexing
with Bishop Oyedepo whose church headquarters, Faith Tabernacle, is at Ota in
Ogun State. The church complex has a seating capacity of 50,000 and overflow
capacity of over one million during Shiloh programmes. The church’s weekly
attendance before the pandemic is close to five hundred thousand.
Bishop Oyedepo from the onset had condemned the closure of
churches in the wake of the pandemics. When the government relaxed the markets,
Bishop Oyedepo said that “For people to be allowed to be in the market for six
hours and can’t be in church for two hours, it’s an upside down way of looking
at things. There is more hope for a poor and wise child than an old foolish
king who would no longer be admonished (Ecclesiastes 4:13),”