''In the case of the State and Rev. Chukwuemeka Kingsley Ezeugo,
the Supreme Court a few days ago, upheld the rulings of the lower courts and
ruled that the bearded, self-styled “little god”, “Jesus Christ of our time”,
and founder of the Lagos-based Christian Praying Assembly (CPA), deserves to be
hanged, for enacting a form of horror movie which resulted in the death in 2006
of Ms Ann Uzoh.
The simple import of that ruling is that no man is a king before
the law, and that the law is no respecter of persons including those who
describe themselves as anointed men of God, and who on that account use
religion to commit atrocities.
But the most bizarre development since that ruling last Friday has
been the intervention of a group called the Ndigbo Cultural Society of Nigeria
(NCSN). The group says Nigeria has nothing to gain by shedding Rev.
King’s blood and that President Muhammadu Buhari should grant the convicted
murderer state pardon because “he is still a spiritual leader to many
Nigerians.” The Ndigbo Society is indirectly saying that Rev King’s life should
be spared because he is Igbo, and a religious leader. This is nothing but
arrant nonsense. It makes us wonder what happens to people’s heads once they
are in the grips of the disease of ethnicism.
Has anyone told the Ndigbo Cultural Society that Rev. King’s
victim, Ann Uzoh, was also Igbo? Or is Emeka Ezeugo’s Igbo life more important
than that of Ann Uzoh? Or the lives of the others: Jessica Nwene, Kosiso
Ezenwankwo, Chiejina Olisa, Chizoba Onuora, Vivian and Uche?
We keep encountering this kind of absurdity. Crime is excused on
the grounds of ethnic affiliation. My-brother-can-do-no-wrong-once-we-are-from-the-same-village:and it is
this that has created a web of conspiracy whenever and wherever the ethnic game
is at play, and that conspiracy is against the state and decent values of
national togetherness.
But we thank God for the courts of law, which in this case
have brought the Rev. King saga to a closure. And please note that if the
victim in this case had been of non-Igbo extraction, perhaps the Ndigbo Cultural
Society would have been more strident with their appeal. They’d do well to keep
quiet and not further insult the memory of the dead.
They are right on one score though: that Rev King is still a
religious leader to many Nigerians. It is one of those funny things about the
scope and spread of superstition and religious fanaticism in Nigeria that there
are indeed persons who worship their fellow human beings and turn them into
their gods. It is precisely this same form of delusion that led to the crime
that is taking Rev. King to the gallows in the first place.
It is why he still has followers who believe that the Supreme Court
ruling is a joke and that “Rev. King is superhuman, he can’t be killed by
mere mortals”. Members of the Christian Praying Assembly are still
reportedly awaiting the return of the man they call “His Holiness”. One
Sunny, acting as their spokesman, says: “His
Holiness cannot be killed. He is more than a mere human being and cannot be
killed by any mortal…He will come back home at the appointed time and by then,
the people behind this whole thing will bury their heads in shame…” These characters imagine that the people who will bury their heads
in shame include the Justices of the Supreme Court?
Apart from ethnicity, religion is another major source of crisis
in Nigeria. It turns people’s heads, turns them into zombies and forces them,
in many cases to worship man instead of God. Across the country, every
day, there are millions who have turned religious leaders including herbalists
into “Little gods”. Among Christians and Muslims, widespread confusion over the
interpretation of the doctrine has created such complexity that continues to
lead people astray. Poverty and the scarcity of opportunities continue to drive
people to places of imagined salvation.
The pastors promise miracles: they not only preach the gospel,
they claim all kinds of powers including the power to make the blind see, to
make the lame walk, and to help the unmarried find husbands and wives. Some of
the pastors add a touch of the melodramatic to it: they give out clothes, cars,
houses, and free food.
But it is the people’s money being recycled and given back as
token. The lifestyle of many of the religious leaders would make the Pope
cringe. They preach salvation and divine protection, for example, but
they live as if they are afraid of their own shadows. The poor members of the
congregation relate with the anointed man of God from a distance because they
are not rich enough to get close to him, but from the pittance that they manage
to make, they contribute tithes unfailingly, to make the man of God and his family
live it up and boast that their “Lord is Good!”
The more stylish a religious leader is, the more popular. And some
have even gone from being stylish to being practically unusual. There are
churches where the Pastors slap, beat, and kick members. In some other places
of worship, the Pastors are reportedly romantically involved with female
members of the congregation, including married women. There is freedom of
religion and freedom of worship and association and so, anyone can call himself
a Reverend, a Prophet, a Spiritualist or God’s Deputy, erect a tent and turn
himself into some people’s God. Rev King actually lived like that, like a
mini-God. He built a large cult-like followership and exercised near-absolute
powers over his besotted followers.
Ann Uzoh was one of his victims. Sometime, in 2006, he had set her
and six other members of the church ablaze for allegedly committing
fornication, witchcraft and other offences. He sat in judgment in his own court
and issued a death sentence. Ann and other ladies in church were Rev. King’s
sex slaves, and according to one account it was the rivalry between Ann and
another sex slave that led to the dousing of Ann and others with petrol, their
being set ablaze, and Ann’s death.
Ann Uzoh is better remembered as one of those promising young
Nigerians whose life was derailed by religious hypnotism. Young ladies
who are still today selling themselves to churches and pastors should be
reminded of her story and there is no better person to offer a reminder than
the father of Ann Uzoh, Mr. Raphael Uzoh.
In 2006, the Nigerian Tribune (August 9, 2006) interviewed him and
reported, in part, as follows:
“The
decision of Miss Uzoh, a Higher National Diploma graduate in Accountancy from
the Institute of Management and Technology, Enugu State, to pack out of her
parents’ house at the period without telling anybody, was said to have shocked
everyone. According to the father of the deceased, during a chat with Mid-week
Tribune, when he could no longer withstand the pressure being mounted on him by
his daughters suitors who had sought her hands in marriage, shortly before she
eloped with Rev King, he began the search for her until he was informed by some
concerned family members that she had been sighted at the Christian Prayer
Assembly belonging to the suspect.
“To my surprise, when I got there, based on the
instruction of Rev. King to my daughter, I was told by some insiders that my
daughter had changed her name to Ann King. And she told me that I was not her
father, that she had started bearing Ann King, said Mr. Raphael Uzoh. He stated
that despite this strange behaviour by his daughter and her unusual and sudden
rudeness to him, he did not relent in trying to re-assure her that she was
still welcome at home if she could still change her mind and come to her
senses. Rather, he expressed regrets that his late daughter who was his first
child remained adamant and unrepentant.
“However, the bereaved father, in tears, noted that
sometime on Saturday, July 22, 2006 at the church’s premises, the accused
person was said to have called the deceased and some other five members of the
church into his residence and levelled some accusations against the worshippers
who saw him as a little god. Mr Uzoh, now left with two children, said he
learnt that once anyone was summoned by the pastor, that person, out of fear,
must kneel down before the pastor, no matter how old he or she might be. There
and then, the suspect was said to have passed death sentence on the girls for
perceived fornication and witchcraft. He ordered for fuel and it was brought to
him by one Kelechi because the first gallon of fuel brought by the accused
person to sprinkle on the unfortunate worshippers was not enough, he recalled.”
That is not the end of the story. Mr. Raphael Uzoh, while trying
to rescue his daughter, was ordered to join Rev. King’s church. He did and was
given the assignment of lacing Rev. King’s shoes (!). Rev. King definitely
lived like a king, and here are some of his followers still insisting that the
hangman cannot kill him, even after the Supreme Court had spoken. It won’t be
long before they start claiming that he will resurrect! But what on earth
could have turned a graduate of Accountancy into a willing sex slave in a
church? Unemployment?
We need to worry seriously and do something about the growing
hordes of young men and women who have turned themselves into slaves of
churches, other religious groups, pastors and clerics. Nigeria is losing
too much talent and national productivity time to places of religious worship.
It is sad that political leaders also patronize these haunts and their
managers. Nigeria has become one big theatre of religious ritual. The name of
God is the most abused name in Nigeria today. The resultant tragedy and hypocrisy
are astonishing.
For now, we can only hope, that all the religious
leaders who use religion as a vehicle of abuse will learn the appropriate
lessons from the saga of Rev. Chukwuemeka Kingsley Ezeugo a.k.a. Rev. King. And
I am not in any way saying all clerics are bad; but that the likes of Rev. King
bring the calling to disrepute and sadly, their population seems to be
increasing. Rev King has had his day in court. The law has taken its course.
Now, let justice be done according to the existing law, even if the heavens
fall, quake or wail''.
Reuben Abati
