Tunde Bakare, Senior Pastor of The Latter Rain Assembly, says “the king may be very cold, may be very old and in need of warmth, but the king is not yet dead.”

Bakare made the statement — believed to be in reference to ailing President Muhammadu Buhari and directed as those seeking to replace him — on Sunday at his church in Ogba, Lagos, while speaking on ‘The birth pangs of a new Nigeria’.

Reminding the latter group that “the next in line does not translate automatically to the next king”, he cited similar scenarios in the Bible, mentioning the likes of Absalom, who, in a bid to overthrow the king, embraced everyone and warmed his heart into the minds of the simple and gullible; and Adonjah, who confused birthright with leadership rights and assumed that the next in line is automatically the next king whenever the current king is no more”.

“The next in line does not translate automatically to the next king. I kept quiet since, because I knew that the day I will speak, all arrows will begin to fly. But guess what? I’m beyond the enemy’s reach,” said Bakare, who was Buhari’s running mate in the 2011 presidential election.

“What is happening in Nigeria is not new; it’s not strange. But if you don’t have the wherewithal, and your wife is in intense labour, you will panic. What is happening in this nation is not new, it’s not strange. Our nation is going through birth pangs; Nigeria is in intense labour.”

He said he had been “bombarded with requests for interview by the organised press for a very long time now, regarding the situation of the country”, but he had deliberately kept mum.

“I hope the message today will answer their questions and allay all our collective doubts and fears,” he said.

“Our president, who I believe is on the path to sure recovery, has recently been serving the nation he loves with diminishing energy due to his ill health.

“As a result of the president’s present condition, all over the land, Absaloms and Adonijahs are springing up. Again this is not unusual…

“One major fact, the king may be very cold, may be very old and in need of warmth, but the king is not yet dead; the final authority is still in his hands. All the actors in the corridor of power can keep acting, but the residual power is still in the man who is cold.”