Bishop Heward-Mills says also on hit list

Accra, Dec. 21, GNA - Bishop Dag Heward-Mills, Founder and Presiding Bishop of the Lighthouse Chapel International (LCI), on Sunday urged his congregation members to vote wisely in the coming run-off elections, saying that, none of the two candidates should be considered in terms of one coming from God and the other coming from the devil.

"As Christians, we must go to the polls with the understanding that both Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and Professor John Evans Atta Mills are two of the same kind - they are both Ghanaian politicians seeking our mandate to rule," he said.

He told the congregation that he had a phone call the previous week that he would be assassinated should there be a change of government in the forthcoming elections.

"I got a phone call last week from a very important person in society and he told me that I am also on a hit list and that he was on his way out of the country so I should do same," he said.

This comes days after it has been reported in the media that Dr. Mensa Otabil, Head Pastor of International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), was on some hit list for assassination in the event of a change of government.

Bishop Heward-Mills said the caller told him that Dr. Otabil and Bishop Charles Palmer-Buckle, Catholic Bishop of Accra were also on the hit list.

"Why would anybody want to kill honourable men and pastors like us - what have we done to deserve assassination," he asked. He said he would not run away from Ghana on account of that threat because he believed he had done nothing wrong to warrant anybody's desire to kill him.

"Each of the three of us mentioned on that supposed hit list are leaders of churches which have built branches across the nations, provided our country with educational and health institutions," he said. Bishop Heward-Mills said killing good men like pastors amounted to shedding of innocent blood, which God hated.

Bishop Heward-Mills urged Christians to put their trust in God only and not in politicians, saying that politicians have a short term to rule and could do nothing much but God was always there to provide solutions to man's problems.

He quoted from Proverbs 6: 16 - 19 and asked members of the congregation to "go and tell the candidates seeking our mandate that God hates pride and arrogance, a lying tongue, murder, wickedness, mischief, false witnessing and people who sow discord." Bishop Heward-Mills said Ghana had had almost all of the vices mentioned above in politicians, no matter which political party they came from and so it was instructive for Christians not to bank their hopes on politicians.

"We must eschew politicians who seek to divide us as a people along tribal lines and hold on to our oneness as Ghanaians in spite of which ethnic group we belong to," he said.