October 20, 2009
By Lekan Otufodunrin

LAGOS, Nigeria – The newly-elected leader of the (Anglican) Church of Nigeria, the Rev. Nicholas Okoh, has rebutted his being labeled "conservative" on matters such as homosexuality, same-sex marriage, women's ordination and other issues.

"The liberal and conservative classifications are invented by the West to really demoralize the Church of Nigeria and others. When you disagree with them they find a convenient label for you," Okoh said in a recent interview with This Day, a Nigerian national newspaper.

Okoh, a retired lieutenant colonel in the Nigerian Army was on September 15 elected as the country's new Anglican primate, or leader, to take over from Archbishop Peter Akinola when he attains the retirement age of 70 in March 2010.

Akinola is noted among leaders in the 77-million Anglican Communion for his strong opposition to homosexuality and to the ordination of women, which opponents assert is unbiblical.

"The Church in Nigeria, whatever anybody thinks, has a position agreed to by the church leadership and our members are very happy about it. It has not always been just the primate who is conservative and is leading people along conservative lines," said Okoh, in the interview.

"Our church is an evangelical church; our church is Bible-based, our church is missionary in outlook and care oriented. It is along this direction, God being our helper, we will move," said the primate-elect.

Okoh maintained that the Nigerian church, like others, is opposed to the position of the U.S.-based Episcopal Church on issues of human sexuality but he did not say if this could lead to a break up of the Anglican Communion.

"We are a people that take our past into consideration. We take the orthodoxy of the Scripture into consideration and we are not going to do anything that will undermine the orthodoxy of the Scripture," he said. "That is the position we have taken."

The man who will head Nigeria's Anglicans from 2010 said the church's bishops and elected clergy and laity know what they are and that they "don't want anybody locally or internationally to push them around."

Okoh ruled out the possibility of women being ordained in Nigeria's Anglican church, and he said that the number of those who want this is "quite negligible."

Ecumenical News International