By Fr. Ugochukwu Ugwoke, Isch
When Fr. Hyacinth Alia, a priest of the Catholic Diocese of Makurdi, Nigeria chose to run for the office of the governor of Benue State in 2023, I watched with cautious hope. I was not overly excited, not because I doubted his capacity to lead, but because Nigerian politics has long been a murky terrain: dirty, messy, and often devoid of conscience.
Truly, politics may be dirty, but abandoning it to the corrupt will not clean it. That is why we need ‘good’ men and women who will enter the system and refuse to be swallowed by it; people who are not afraid to lose power for the sake of truth; people who dare to be different from the rest. This was my expectation of a priest-governor – that he would not blend into the silence and indifference that define much of our political leadership.
But the recent massacre in Benue and the inability of the governor to act decisively to stop these killings, speak volumes. For me, it is a painful echo of the same pattern we have seen from the past governors and other Nigerian politicians. But from a priest-governor, we expect more because we want him to be different. Perhaps his hands are tied as many have said. Perhaps the system is heavy. But leadership demands that in moments of great suffering, silence must break – even if it comes at a personal or political cost. This is where true leadership is tested – in the willingness to sacrifice comfort for conviction, popularity for principle.
Nigeria cannot be healed by more of the same. We need leaders who will dare to be different, who will speak when it is dangerous, who will stand up when others sit in silence. Being different is costly. It comes with resistance, isolation, betrayal, and often suffering. But that is where leadership becomes real – when service becomes sacrifice To our dear priest brother and governor, this is the moment to prove that you are not like the others. Let your priesthood inform your politics. At your priestly ordination, you were already immolated. When you chose to run for political office in defiance of the Church’s law, you already risked it all. There is nothing else to lose. You must choose your people over your party. This is the time to stand out or be counted among the rest.
