NIGERIAN WATCH

10 KASUMUWAtCh
NIGERIAN WATCH
28 Aug - 10 Sept 2015
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Samuel KaSumu Column
We need a credible Labour leader
As a paid up member of the
Conservative party, it is easy
for many people to believe I
would be supporting the
current Labour party
leadership favourite, Jeremy
Corbyn MP. But that’s far
from the case. Labour’s
demise is bad for democracy.
For one, it means that those
who are already relatively
apathetic will believe that they
do not have the benefit of a real
choice and further disengage
with politics.
The wider ramifications of
this could be that the progress
made in regards to making
politics more representative
could disappear overnight.
The very essence of having a
healthy democracy is choice. In
every area of life competition
breeds innovation and, with all
due respect, a Corbyn front
bench is highly unlikely to bring
that with it.
The necessary competition
that will inspire those on the
other side to bring world class
ideas to the table will be missing
for a generation.
Let’s remember that politics
is first and foremost about great
ideas that present themselves as
alternatives to the status quo.
What is scarier is the fact
that the few talented and experienced
Labour front benchers
that survived the events of May
2015 have said that they would
not serve in a Corbyn led cabinet.
So a party that already has
limited talent would now face
the likes of Cameron, Osborne,
and May with no Umunna,
Cooper or Hunt. Let’s be honest,
it would have been difficult
for any Labour leader to win in
2020, but a Corbyn socialist
revolution would make it even
less likely.
We should all be
watching with great
interest in regards to
what will happen on
September 12. If you
are a Labour supporter,
you should
ask yourself what’s
more important; a
credible opposition
or the opportunity to
become the go to
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place for protest votes. The
Conservative party found ourselves
in opposition for 13 years.
It was a place where great debates
and intellectual questions
could be asked, but was not a
place where we could ever
make things happen.
We eventually had to go for a
leader that could not only bring
about some much needed
changes in the party, but also
someone that could realistically
win an election. That’s what
Labour need to find a way to do
in the coming weeks or they
will find themselves waiting a
very long time to govern.
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The church must
engage more if
it wants people to
keep the faith
I’ve been a committed Christian
since the age of 13 and
have gone through many
stages as I work out my salvation.
Seeing how the mood
of the nation has continued
to shift in regards to how
they view faith has been interesting.
There are some
that believe faith, and in particular
the Christian faith,
should remain an integral
part of what defines Britain
as a nation. When you walk
into Central Lobby in the
Palace of Westminster, seeing
the enshrined words from
Psalm 127 – ‘Unless the Lord
builds the house’ – on the
floor is a constant reminder
of the Christian origins of the
British legal system. Having
prayers before Parliament
begins is also a reminder of
our Christian history.
There are others, however,
that believe the time of
having faith at the epicentre
of our culture has since
passed. Church of England
pews are emptying and secularism
is the theme of the
day for many. We need only
look at the public reaction to
the recent deaths of the
French journalists in Paris at
the hands of the Islamic fundamentalists.
Instead of
there being a debate in respect
of the reasons behinds
such tragic events, the ‘right
to offend’ those of faith
seemed to have been the
most important moral message
that many people
adopted as they rallied to ‘Je
suis Charlie’.
Many people therefore
ask themselves if faith still
has a part to play in society
today. In my eyes this is a
non-question, because faith
is still something that the
majority of us have in some
shape or form. For me a
more interesting question is
what role should the church
play in tomorrow’s world,
and more specifically what
should the black majority
church be doing to ensure
they don’t suffer the same
challenge for relevance that
their C of E counterparts are
facing today?
I believe the role of the
church must always be to be
a light where there is darkness.
This means that just
like Christians played a part
in helping to abolish slavery,
and just like the church was
the first to provide free education
at a time when it was
still viewed as a privilege, we
must now provide that love
expressed through public
service where there are gaps
in provision.
This means that we
should be opening free
schools where the education
system is failing, providing
care to the elderly where
public finances are strained,
and ensuring that every child
can have the love of a parent
through foster care and
adoption. The church must
be the true expression of love
in its purest form, but today
it will require us to be wiser
in how we go about expressing
this at scale.
With regards to the black
majority church, I genuinely
believe it will struggle in the
decades ahead if it does not
focus on a message that goes
beyond the basics of seed
time and harvest. We as a
black community are evolving
and my generation in
particular is progressing both
in our academic achievement
and economic condition. Our
parents were the ones that
sacrificed significantly to give
us a platform to perform.
We now need a message
more relevant to where we
find ourselves in order to stay
plugged in to the church. Our
leaders may not realise the
extent to which they are losing
this battle because
charismatic churches remain
relatively full from Sunday to
Sunday.
But a closer look will
probably shock them into
seeing that just like the
Church of England, their
congregations are probably
becoming a little older, a little
less engaged, and maybe
more focused on other
things.