Concerned elders kick against plans to impose senior pastor on First Baptist Church Garki

There is a looming leadership crisis at the First Baptist Church Garki over the alleged refusal of the outgoing Senior Pastor, Israel Akanji to allow a laid down procedure of choosing his successor to come into play.

Pastor Akanji who was elected the President of Baptist Convention last year was also alleged to have gone contrary to the church constitution to initiate a process of electing deacons in the church.

A group of concerned elders in the church told Nigerian Tribune that after Pastor Akanji was elected the President of Baptist Convention, it was expected that he would leave office and allow the Pulpit Committee to take over the Church as they would start the process of ‘recruiting’ his successor.

Pastor Akanji instead requested for a 3-month extension from the Church in Conference (highest organ in the church) to prepare a handover note, pray for the church and elect deacons and do transfer of service.

Speaking with Nigerian Tribune on behalf of the other concerned elders, Ambassador Akin Oyateru said “when Senior Pastor Akanji was elected the President of Baptist Convention, he came to the Church in Conference, notified them of his new position and requested for 3 months extension him to prepare his handover note, pray for the church and elect deacons; he said he would like to transfer his service.

“The Church in Conference acceded to the 3 months for him to prepare his handover notes, but there was silence on the issue of transfer of service and the issue of election of deacons.

“There is a church constitution and bylaw, and by normal judicial practice, an organ of an organization cannot preach its own constitution, that was what led 8 of us to raise these observations and our objective to remind the church to ensure that those actions to be taken are in conformity with the constitution of the church.

The elders said on 14th June last year, a member convened a meeting between the elders and the pastor after they had written the church secretary, and there were decisions reached at the meeting.

Oyateru said one of the decisions reached at the meeting was for the Senior Pastor to publish the constitution of the church before leaving office, but he never did, secondly, that it was not proper for the Senior Pastor to be signatory to the church account, that it was improper for him to select deacons for the incoming Senior Pastor.

Others are that it is not proper for him to hold two executive positions at the same time, he cannot transfer service to another pastor, because the constitution said when there is a vacancy, the Pulpit Committee takes over the running of the church, set up the Search Committee to get a new pastor.

The elders said surprisingly “the process for the election of deacons was instituted, the search committee was formed by the Senior pastor, and he refused to publish the church constitution, then after his 60th birthday, all we saw was that he anointed his successor by pouring anointing oil on his head, these are unusual and strange practices in the Baptist Church, and he now became Acting Senior Pastor which we felt was contrary to the constitution.

In their demands, the elders said Pastor Akanji cannot be signatory to the Church’s account, cannot transfer service to another pastor, cannot appoint new deacons because the serving ones have not rotated out, and the First Baptist Church cannot continue to pay him salary.

When Nigerian Tribune reached out to the Chairman of the Church BOT, Pastor Bamidele Solomon, said, “there is a procedure for everything in the Baptize church and normally you first of all go through the church council and the final authority in the church is the church in conference and that was where the decision was taken. I don’t know what it is again.”

No system is perfect, but people will always have their own feeling, we are all human but then everything will be resolved by the grace of God”, Pastor Solomon said.

When Nigerian Tribune called Pastor Akanji, he said the issues raised were internal issues and supposed to be handled internally.

He said the church adopts congregational polity whereby the members of the church take decisions as a congregation and it is implemented. He said all the actions taken were based on the decision of the congregation.

“This is the issue of the body of Christ, and it is not good for such issues to begin to gain public rouse in such a time we are in as a nation.

“Even if these people feel unhappy about anything, they should not make a public show of things that have to do with the church, they are internal matters that should be handled internally, and they are no serious issues to be taken to the public.

“I have my response to every single matter that was raised, I have been going to the church for programmes, and it is not as if anything has happened.

“Our denomination is strangely a congregational polity, decisions are made by members when they all gather, everything we did in church was properly done by approval of the congregation, it is just that some few individuals wanted something differently, and the congregation said no.

“Our church government is called congregationalism, and everything we did was done by the congregational decision”, he said. (Nigerian Tribune)