Ekiti State-based cleric who kidnapped himself to get money from his church members, Peter Adewuyi, has said that he could not believe he did it.
He said he did not understand what pushed him into it and that it was after he was caught that the reality dawned on him.
“I don’t know what came over me. I don’t see it as something that is ordinary. After the thing happened I just discovered this,” he said in an interview with Channels TV.
The development has rattled members of the church and other religious leaders especially in Ekiti State.
It was a major subject of discussion in the church during the June 16 Sunday service.
According to the new minister in the church, Revd Michael Olugbemi, his predecessor’s action is surprising.
“I’m as surprised as any other person here why this has happened at this time,” he was quoted as saying.
An official of the church, Oyedeji Olajubu, said the accused had been perpetuaring forgery for some time – but unknown to him.
Olajubu, who is a signatory to the church’s account, alongside Adewuyi, said he had been forging his (Olajbu’s) signature, adding that it had been discovered that he had withdrawn almost all the N1.6m the church had in its account.
He said Adewuyi had also taken another N150,000 meant for another thing.
Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Joshua Okorige, said Adewuyi’s act of faking a kidnap was ungodly.
But Adewuyi’s wife is hardly surprised because she was said to have known her husband was planning the trick.
‘The Nation’ reports that the woman, Rebecca Adewuyi, said he planned it for three months.
“I had always been stopping him from doing that in the past. It’s the work of the devil,” she was quoted as saying.
Adewuyi, a pastor at Methodist Church, Ado-Ekiti,had arranged with one Oluwadare Sunday to demand N3 million ransom from his congregation.
He was said to have gone into hiding on Sunday evening while there were reports that he was abducted between Esa-Oke in Osun state and Aramoko-Ekiti in Ekiti.
His purported abductors later contacted the church members to demand the ransom, which they insisted must be paid latest by Thursday to prevent the reverend from being killed.
Detectives, however, intercepted the pastor’s accomplice, Sunday, who came to pick up the ransom at Okeyinmi area of Ado-Ekiti, after which he led them to the hotel where the pastor had been hiding.
Detectives reportedly tracked the suspects through the mobile phone that he was using to make contact with the church members.
Amba Asuquo, commissioner of police in Ekiti, confirmed that the command is investigating the incident but refused to disclose the identities of the suspects.
