As Nigeria celebrates its 62nd Independence anniversary, the General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry, Pastor Williams Kumuyi, has said it is the desire of Nigerians that the country should rise again to take its position of leadership on the continent of Africa.

According to a video shared on the Facebook page on Saturday, Kumuyi said this while addressing journalists after his arrival at the Ibadan Airport for the his programme, “Global Youth Convention, Impact scheduled to run from Friday to Monday.

The cleric also called on the youths to participate in politics and to vote for the candidates of their choice in the 2023 elections.

Kumuyi said, “It is the right of every citizens as well as the responsibility of everyone to participate in politics. We desire a better country we want Nigeria to rise up again as the giant of Africa to take its rightful place.

“We expect our youths to want to see a Nigeria of thier own dream not by violence but by knowing their rights and responsibilities and to vote for the candidate of their choice, I will not dictate to anyone, they know the best, we all know what we are looking for and the Lord will guide them and make their votes count.”

He said the convention themed, “Transformed to lead” would be watched in over 150 nations, saying participants who are mainly youths would be taught by high-calibre resource persons.

He said further that “we are not here for entertainment, what we want to do is to really impact the lives of everyone that will come from Nigeria and the Diaspora. The youths are gathering together not only in Nigeria but beyond and we want to go through a series to encourage, to lead us, to impact, to inject the young people so that their lives would be transformed by the Lord and their own decisions too as we prepare the leaders of tomorrow for the future.

“We are believing that as the young people come, they come with their hearts and their minds and their vision and the desire to excel. We believe that great things are going to happen in their lives and we are not talking to them like we’ve come to preach to them or come like clergymen. We have come just like they are. We are still young at heart and we have quite a lot of things we want to infer to the younger generation before we hand over to them.”

In his own remark, the Oyo State Commissioner for Youth and Sports, Seun Fakorede, lauded Kumuyi’s enthusiasm to affect the lives of the youths while recalling that he became a commissioner at the age of 27 adding the current administration in the state was not relenting in its effort to build the youths.