By Christopher Oji
The Lagos State Police Command has commenced investigation into the allegations of fraud and obtaining by false pretence made by a businessman against a popular pastor, Chris Okafor.
Regardless, in a swift reaction, the pastor has told the police and members of the public to discountenance the petition being circulated by a former member of his church, alleging that he was defrauded by the church, recently.
Mr. Omolayo Ibukun Michael, had petitioned the Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Mr Adegoke Fayoade, alleging that Pastor Okafor, founder of Grace Nation Church, with headquarters at Ojodu Berger, Lagos, obtained money by false pretence and two of his vehicles totalling N106, 178, 000,00.
Giving vivid details of how he was allegedly swindled, Michael alleged that, as the Managing Director, Blessed Energy Resources Limited, he was introduced to the pastor by one of his friends, Ayobami, who died in 2021. He alleged that the pastor brainwashed him with fake miracles and asked him to supply 42,000 litres of diesel valued at N50 million.
“After that, he refused to pay me a dime up to this moment, and he also brainwashed me by collecting my two vehicles: Mercedes Benz M-Class with registration number:KRD 575 HH, black in colour, and Mercedes Benz ML350 with registration number: KTU 546 HE, also black in colour, all valued at N30 million. I, also, transferred the sum of N14.378 million into his Zenith Account Number 1002770081 and ECO Bank account number 3302012345, and the sum of N11,800 million in cash.”
The business man claimed that his attraction to the pastor was because he did a contract for the Lagos State government, but the government has continued to owe him a huge amount of money, prompting his resort to prayers.
He alleged that the pastor warned him not to reveal the secret to any other person and, if he did, it would be the end of his life.
“To my utmost surprise, a woman, Bose Olasukanmi, used by the pastor for fake miracles to deceive me, was arrested by the police. It was then that I realised that I had been duped by the pastor, and all efforts made for him to return my vehicles and pay my money proved abortive.”
The business man, who said he was in the protocol department of the church, further alleged that the pastor also threatened his life by warning that he should stop demanding a refund of his vehicles and payment of his money. However, the police said one of the vehicles had been recovered from the person the pastor sold it to, while frantic efforts were in progress to recover the second vehicle. The police said all efforts to invite the pastor failed, but he only sent a legal representative to deny all allegations against him.
Meanwhile, the church, in a statement signed by its spokesman, Mr Henry Okoduwa, vehemently denied the allegations against the pastor stating that the cars in question were voluntarily offered by the complainant, who joyfully presented them as offerings to God during a service broadcast live, approximately three years ago, adding that all financial transactions with him had been settled.
“There cannot be anything farther from the truth. For the records, the said cars were willingly given as an offering to God by Ibukun who, joyous and in an expansive mood for the blessings he received from God, decided to drop the car keys on the altar after giving a testimony during one of the church’s services that was broadcast live about three years ago.
“Ibukun had, particularly, been enamoured by the fact that God broke the jinx of no male children in his lineage when his wife conceived and bore him a son following the prayers of Dr Chris Okafor, the church’s head pastor. That is why we find it particularly strange that the same person, who willingly gave his cars with the original documents attached, would turn around a few years later to demand that they be given back.
“The church is also scandalised to hear him allege that he was being owed N50 million for the diesel he supplied, when, in actual fact, he was paid all the monies owed him for the few times he transacted business with the church.
“It, therefore, does not need high intelligence for anyone to fault Ibukun’s debt story because it’s illogical for him to have recently gone to Dr Chris Okafor, the church’s patriarch, to make a request of a N10 million loan, when all he needed to have done was demand that part of what was being owed be paid.
“He had asked for a loan which, he said, he wanted to re-inject into his business, and despite being unable to offer the assistance because of the enormous resources that had been sunk into the rebuilding and expansion project the church undertook in 2023, God’s servant, Dr Okafor still sought for a way out by referring him to his bank.
“That the bank could not help at the end was not because the man of God did not want to. Mr Ibukun failed to convince the bank that he would be able to repay the loan. They said he was not credit worthy. Thankfully, we run live telecasts of all our programmes/services and our mantra is to always allow people to give what they can afford at any given time. The church does not monitise its services or the blessings derived therefrom, nor does it compel people to give what they are not led to give.
“Since we abhor the practice of making altar calls, in which members or visitors are asked to drop their cars and landed properties, it is sheer contradiction to imagine that Ibukun was asked to. Ibukun, who is presently on the run for defrauding two of the church’s members of the combined sum of N11 million, recently, do not appear to us as someone who is qualified to cast aspersions at an organisation as ours that is Godly, honest and law abiding.
“More than anything else, Ibukun has proved, with his latest fraudulent activities, that he does not deserve the sympathy he has desperately sought from the public with his tissue of lies and deliberate falsehood. This is why it will be in the interest of those who might be tempted to be hoodwinked by his story and join him in his current campaign of calumny against the church to desist,” the statement further said.