By Adeola Akinwummi
There was a certain young man who was going through a lot financially, and because of that, he decided to seek divine intervention by visiting a prophet, who told him that God was working on his matter and that in a short while, things would become better for him.
With joy in his heart, he left the prophet’s place like a fulfilled young man, raising his shoulders and imagining the kind of vehicles he would drive when his miracle happened. He thought of the embarrassment his mother-in-law gave him a few days back and thought within his mind that he would show her ‘pepper’ when the miracle eventually happened.
However, two months down the line, he still had to beg his friends for data and food money, and in frustration, he started calling out the prophet on social media for being a fake man of God because what he said hadn’t come to pass in two months. To cut the story short, three years later, he got a contract worth millions of dollars; his miracle came, and he became rich. In that moment, he remembered the words of the prophet, regretted ever calling him out, and asked for God’s forgiveness.
This best explains the situation between the prophetic warning Primate Ayodele shared on Saturday regarding Super Eagles’ Ademola Lookman, his performance during the first AFCON match against Tanzania yesterday, and how people are already judging the prophet for his words.
On Saturday, while talking about the tournament, Primate Ayodele mentioned that some players shouldn’t be relied on in the tournament, and among them was Ademola Lookman. He also mentioned that there is a need to find another alternative for Nwabali and that Osimhen shouldn’t be allowed to play full-time. He also mentioned that Nigeria would not be eliminated early if some of the instructions were well listened to.
These were his words:
“The coach doesn’t have luck, and that will affect us. Meanwhile, we are not going to be eliminated early if they put the right people there. Ademola Lookman will not help them… they need an alternative to Nwabali; we can get to the final….”
Yesterday, Nigeria won 2–1 against Tanzania, and truthfully, Ademola Lookman did well for the squad and even scored one of the goals for the Super Eagles team. But is that enough to judge the prophecy of Primate Ayodele? Absolutely no!
The Super Eagles have just played one match out of several others; there are still group stage matches, round of 16, quarterfinal, and semifinal matches. It’s still a very long ride, which makes a single-match performance inconsequential to the scheme of things.
There has been so much noise since yesterday about Primate Ayodele’s statement regarding Lookman, many of which grossly misinterpreted the statement and, out of sheer ignorance, called the man of God fake because Lookman scored a goal.
I need to understand how scoring a goal in yesterday’s match could secure the cup for the Super Eagles. If the team had lost yesterday, it doesn’t mean they still couldn’t meet the required points to scale through the stage, so how has this conquered the prophecy?
Primate Ayodele didn’t talk about just one match; he was talking about the tournament as a whole. How then has he become fake when we have just played one match out of several?
I just wonder: what if Lookman flops in the remaining matches or during our important matches? Would they still have the mouths to speak against the prophet? This set of people would be the first to call the player out for not representing well. Wouldn’t they be filled with regrets like the man whose story I narrated earlier?
Humans can be very impatient sometimes, and that is why it’s difficult to get any tangible results—because of early celebration and gross impatience.
