Religious swindlers: How fake pastors, imams entrap desperate miracle seekers for financial, sexual gains

Agatha Tuotamuno was not born deaf. One Saturday in 1986, two days after her sixth birthday, she felt a tingling sensation in her ear that made her uncomfortable.

According to her, it was as though there were tiny stones in her ears and she shook her head tirelessly in an attempt to get it out.

“I didn't tell anyone because I lived with my stepmother then. My mother left me and my siblings when I was barely three years old and my father married another woman almost immediately.

“So, when the sensation in my ear began, I didn't pay much attention since I felt no pain and it didn't affect my hearing,” she said in an interview with Sunday PUNCH.

However, after a few weeks without remedy, things got worse. Agatha began to hear a long, unending sound that crescendoed mostly at night when everywhere was quiet.

At that point, the ear had also begun to produce puss-like liquid mixed with blood and was accompanied by a gnawing pain.

“I remember that day like it was yesterday when I put my fingers in my ears in an attempt to silence the noise and saw blood. I ran to my stepmother since my dad was at work. He used to work with an oil firm that operated offshore.

“My stepmother just gave me some paracetamol tablets and told me to tell her what I put in my ears. I explained to her that it just happened and she started hitting me.

“She called me all sorts of names and asked me to tell her what coven I was in. Before my dad could return, I was taken to a church where I was tied and asked to confess,” she added.

When her father, Gregory Tuotamuno, returned home days after, the situation had worsened.

She said she was dragged from church to church with promises of her getting better from age six till she turned 10.

At that point, Agatha had become completely deaf in both ears. Her dad also took ill and joined her in search of solutions from one prayer house to another.

She added, “There was no place we (my dad and I) did not go. We spent thousands of naira. We paid N20,000 for some liquid and another N25,000 for prayer. The value of N10,000 at that time should be equivalent to N200,000 now. So, it was a lot of money.

“We paid a pastor and their team to fast for us and we were still forced to pay another money for deliverance.

“One of the pastors took me to the river and stripped me naked. He fetched water from the river and poured it inside my ears. He said he was rinsing my ear from the evil forces. With different pastors came different prophecies.

“One told me it (deafness) was from my biological mother's side and that I needed cleansing. He didn't even know my mother had died because he was asking that we bring her for deliverance, too, until we told him that she died when I was way younger.

“The other one said it was from my father's elder sister. My father has only one brother. He doesn't have a sister. There were a lot of inconsistencies in the prophecies but my parents believed so much in them.”

But it did not stop there. At age 16, after her father's death, Agatha said her stepmother got a wave of a popular preacher visiting Port Harcourt, Rivers State, for the first time from South Africa where the ministry was based. She was asked to attend the cleric's event.

She said after spending so much on transport from Omoku, which is about an hour to Port Harcourt, they had to lodge themselves in an expensive hotel where the pastor was said to be lodged as well.

“We just wanted to see this man. We wanted to touch him and receive our miracle. I remember very well how my stepmother gave all the money in her savings then. She was still working at the Ministry of Education, had worked for more than 20 years, and was due for retirement soon, but she wanted me to be healed.

“She gave all her money when the man mentioned my case and she was expecting a miracle which never happened.

“As I chat with you, I am still deaf. Those things did not work. We even paid for a counseling session; the pastor's team said it was N12,000 for a session and N2,000 to get one anointing water they claimed was from Jerusalem or Jordan.

“But, after all that, we heard that the man scammed some people by collecting their cars and even slept with some people's wives before leaving back for South Africa. It was a serious scandal then in the South-South,” she noted.

All that didn't stop Agatha from attending another crusade in Lagos in another popular Pentecostal mission that had started to become popular. After all the payments and buying all the ‘materials' for the prayer and deliverance, she did not get well.

Instead, she claimed the pastor had made some sexual advances at her by touching her breasts during the prayer. By the time she went to hospital when she was almost 25, the doctors said it was too late, as she had an advanced case of tinnitus.

“Surgery, according to them, would not help. After I drank all that those prophets recommended, washed my ears with all sorts of liquid, and spent millions, I still did not get the so-called healing and miracle they mouthed.

“I have come to understand God on my own, and I am ashamed to even admit I ever paid anyone money in the name of getting healing. God has healed me. That is what I believe. Even though I am still deaf, I don't need any healing that I would have to pay for,” she said with a soft sigh.

Like Agatha, like Madam Toyo

A restaurateur in Lagos, Madam Toyo, got the shock of her life when a pastor in the Ikorodu area of Lagos asked that they spend the night together to ‘enable the Holy Spirit to breathe' upon her.

“He told me with so much confidence as if he knew I would give in. I was married but had no children. It happened in 2014, and I was already nine years into my marriage.

“My family had begun to complain. My husband's people, I am sure, also complained but he kept on shielding me from them.

“So, when I heard that a ‘powerful man of God' was in Ikorodu and that he had the gift of vision, I told my husband that we should go. After much pushing, he followed me there on one of their Tuesday services, and the man told my husband in a prophecy that his boss was sitting on his promotion,” she said.

“My husband owned his own business. He sold books and stationery in various places around Lagos and Ogun. So, it couldn't have been true that his boss – which he did not have – was sitting on a promotion – which he did not need,” she added as she chuckled at intervals.

But that was the last time her husband followed her there. He had also warned her to stop attending the services but Toyo said she did not stop. She said she wanted to look beyond the obvious glitch and get her ‘miracle baby'.

As she became consistent, she said some women in the church began to get closer to her and ask her some questions about her family and home. She said she became more open to them because she thought they were in the same situation. She had no idea it was all part of a grand plan to financially extort her.

“After a while, the pastor started borrowing money from me with promises to pay back. He borrowed N200,000 at first and then said I should make it N500,000 by adding N400,000, which I did.

“I also started giving donations. I was paying tithes. I gave ‘sacrificial seeds'. Even after he asked me to sleep with him and I said no, I continued to go to church. I didn't think anything was wrong.

“His slogan then was, “God can use anybody.” So, I thought adultery was just one of his flaws and it would not stop God from using him.

“Sometimes, I even closed down my shop for days and joined them in their prayers there in Ikorodu. My husband became really concerned and begged me to stop. My desperation did not make me see that I was being used,” she added.

Toyo said the day the pastor said God told him that it was her mother-in-law who was responsible for her barrenness was the day the scale fell off her eyes.

“My husband's parents died long before we got married. In fact, my husband's mother had no siblings who were still alive.

“I stood there as he gave me those prophecies and I was crying because I knew my husband had warned me from Day One. I stopped going to the church but asked the pastor for a refund of the money he owed me. He owed me N1.24m.

“At first, he told me he would pay me in four days. Four days became four months which became four years. I had to involve my husband before he paid N100,000 as the first instalment and then disappeared.

“We used the police to find him and he paid another N50,000 twice and began to beg us that there was no way he would be able to pay up all the money if we did not allow him to operate his church. We had locked him up at that time,” she added.

Within two months, Toyo said the pastor paid N200,000 in two instalments and refused to pay the rest.

“My husband just asked me to count my losses and forget about it. My friends in the church told me that he would mention my name during service and ask the congregation to pray against me, saying that I wanted to close the church of God. He knew he was not a true prophet of God but it was not my place to say. I am sure God will judge him on the last day.”

After undergoing fertility treatment in 2017, Toyo told Sunday PUNCH that she became pregnant and had a baby girl who would be six in July.

When contacted on Thursday morning, the pastor, who gave his name as Paul, said he did not know Toyo nor did he remember owing her money or asking to sleep with her.

When probed further with the breakdown of the debts, he said, “I did not say I will not pay Mummy Toyosi. I even told the police that I would pay but she stopped coming to church. My brother, maybe we should talk later in the evening. The place I am in is noisy.”

Fake prophecies

Agatha and Toyo's cases were not the first time a ‘man of God' would give false prophecies about a situation, claiming that he was instructed by God to say so.

In May 2023, a clergyman in Delta State was caught on camera begging a man he had contracted to help get information on his church members. The contract had gone south after he reportedly refused to complete payment for the job and the mercenary had visited his home with some men to disgrace him.

In the now-viral video, the angry man alleged that the clergyman contracted him to go about picking sensitive information about his church members which he then used during his ‘prophetic' teaching.

The revelation left church members who thought the ‘man of God' was genuine in shock.

The clergyman, however, refuted the allegation, stating that he would ‘call on the holy spirit' to deal with his ‘business partner'.

He said, “I am not a fake pastor. Na God call me.''

Responding, the accuser said, “Which God called you? Na you call God? See Bible, see Jack Daniel (a brand of alcohol),'' he said, pointing at a half-empty bottle of alcohol in the pastor's room.

In November 2020, a pastor at Glorious Mount of Possibility Church, Yaba, Lagos, David Elijah, was criticised on social media following his prophecy that President Donald Trump would win the 2020 presidential election in the United States of America.

The pastor, as shown in a trending video on X, also prophesied that a popular politician would die upon Trump's victory.

“If care is not taken and prayer is not made, I see a politician in America committing suicide because of Donald Trump,” he told his congregation.

He assured his church members that “God is behind Donald Trump”.

Contrary to Pastor Elijah's prophecy, former United States Vice President (now President), Joe Biden, won the historic election, gaining 273 electoral votes against Trump who had 214.

Before the Trump prophecy, Elijah had said he would travel to China to ‘destroy' the coronavirus, claiming that the Chinese lacked good prophets to help them combat the deadly disease.

To date, there was no news of him visiting China for that purpose or ‘destroying' coronavirus which led to the death of millions around the world at the peak of the 2020 pandemic.

On July 15, 2020, a Cross River State-based preacher and head pastor of ‘prophetic and deliverance ministry' in the state was shamed after he was allegedly caught planting a charm in his cousin's land in a bid to extort money from him.

A member of the family, Juliet Wonah, shared on Facebook, how the pastor told his cousin that he needed money to uproot a charm someone planted in his land.

However, the pastor, unknown to him, was traced and caught red-handed with some fetish stuff at a shrine in the Itigidi area of the village in Ugeb after a resident of the community saw him planting the said charm in the land.

Several persons in the comment section of the post by Wonah alleged that Abam was known to always give prophecies and extort people of their hard-earned money after each prayer session.

Pictures and videos circulated all around social media at the time showed the pastor covered in charcoal and dried plantain leaves, carrying the charms on his head, as the villagers accompanied him around the community.

There have been several videos of how pastors claim to have printed international passports and visas right on their churches' premises.

In one, which has now gone viral, the pastor was seen shaking his right leg and speaking in tongues for some minutes before asking a member to take off his shoes.

To the amazement of many, there was a copy of a passport inside his shoes, which he claimed the holy spirit had printed in minutes.

Another pastor in another video was seen bathing his members with soft drinks in bottles, telling them that it would make their lives sweet and give them favour before all men.

The soft drinks, our correspondent learnt, must be bought from the church.

Why pastors get away with fake prophecies – Pastor Tunde Bakare

The Serving Overseer of the Latter Rain Assembly, Pastor Tunde Bakare, has said many Nigerian pastors got away with fake prophecies because their members failed to challenge them when the prophecies didn't come true.

Bakare, who said this on a Sunday in July 2019 during a service at his church, added that materialism had been masquerading as prosperity in the churches and lamented that materialism had eaten deep into the soul of the church.

He said, “People don't know the difference between materialism and prosperity. Men become so materialistic that the size of their accounts and the number of their congregation give them a platform, whether God is with them or not.”

Bakare also warned pastors from merchandising the ‘anointing of God'.

Islamic clerics

In June 2019, an Islamic cleric, Abdulsalam Salaudeen, was remanded by an Ikeja Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Court for allegedly raping a five-year-old girl in a mosque.

The prosecutor, Olanrewaju Dawodu, told the court that the suspect committed the offence on December 22, 2018, on the premises of Olorunbabe Mosque at 15, Palace Road, Igando, Lagos.

Justice Abiola Soladoye, who obliged the prosecutor's request for the remand, had adjourned the case until October 14 2019 for trial.

The accused, 43, was tried for allegedly defiling the child, who was under his tutelage.

Dawodu said that the accused, popularly called Alfa, was caught in the act via the footage of a hidden camera that was installed within the premises of the mosque.

The prosecutor said the offense contravened Section 137 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State (2015).

Meanwhile, in April 2014, another Islamic cleric was accused of duping worshippers to the tune of N1.2m.

The accused allegedly induced one Adam Iginla to part with money on false pretence.

For allegedly duping a prospective businessman of N1.2m, an Islamic cleric, Abdullakeem (surname withheld), was arraigned in an Ota Senior Magistrates' Court in Ogun.

The suspect, 33, stood trial on a three-count charge of obtaining by false pretense, stealing, and conspiracy.

The prosecutor, lta Ebibomino, told the court that the cleric and one other person still at large committed the offenses on December 18, 2013, in the Joju area of Sango-Ota.

Ebibomino said that the offences committed contravened sections 390, 419, and 516 of the Criminal Code, Vol. 1, Revised Laws of Ogun State (2006).

Also, in December 2019,  the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, said it has arrested a fake Muslim cleric, Mallam Abdulrashid Imam, over allegations bordering on fraud to the tune of N3m and $24,000.

The commission's Head of Media and Publicity at that time, Wilson Uwujaren, in a statement signed disclosed that the arrest followed a petition by one Mohammed Dewu.

According to the statement, Dewu alleged that the fake cleric fraudulently collected money from him claiming to have the supernatural ability to impact Qur'anic knowledge on him through the aid of Jinns (spirits).

EFCC's statement read that the petitioner claimed that the suspect induced him to purchase two bottles of perfume at N70,000 each, one bottle of special perfume at N160,000, and another bottle of perfume for the treatment of his mother's leg at N550,000.

The statement further read that the petitioner was made to pay for a set of 60 perfumes to activate the Qur'anic verses that would be implanted into his brain by spiritual means at N1,680,000, two mobile phones and SIM cards at N20,000, and 30 buckets of honey that will enable him to transfer the Qur'anic verses to his brain at N900,000.

Dewu also alleged that Abdulrashid compelled him to pay the sum of $24,000 for prayers to neutralise the forces preventing him from getting an appointment that the government had planned for him.

The EFCC disclosed that upon the arrest of the suspect, a fake blank Qur'an and keys to the room he had been using to con the victim were recovered.

Fake Imams giving Islam bad name – Scholar

An Islamic scholar and Vice-Chancellor of Ahman Pategi University, Patigi, Kwara State, Prof Mahfouz Adedimeji, told Sunday PUNCH that some fake persons masquerading as Imams were giving the religion a bad name.

In an interview with our correspondent, he said, “It is true but disheartening that fake leaders and pseudo-clerics are posing as scholars of Islam these days.

“Anyone with some cheap data on social media can claim what he is not and still gain the following of the confused or ignorant lot. It is one of the signs of the end time foretold by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).”

According to him, the situation imposes the responsibility of being wary of their antics on Muslims especially and the society at large.

He added, “The message of Islam is complete and whoever attempts to bring what doesn't belong there into it will be rejected.

“Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) warned that a time would come when nothing would remain of Islam except its name and nothing of the Qur'an except its text, meaning that people would only be paying lip service to Islam without truly understanding or practicing it.

“This explains why we can still find imposters here and there who tarnish the name of Islam and commit atrocities like duping and exploiting others.

“But Islam denounces whatever is inconsistent with its pristine teachings as enshrined in the Qur'an and the hadith of the Prophet Muhammad.

“So, in Islam, there is no controversy about what is right and wrong as the two primary sources of Islamic law lay the terms. No one can hide behind a finger to justify misdeeds because the evidence is clear.”

Nigerian spirituality

Nigeria was ranked number one in the world as the most religious nation in 2023, according to a report by the PEW Research Centre.

The centre also ranked Nigeria second in the world of prayerful nations, with 95 per cent, trailing Afghanistan with 100 per cent.

PEW said Nigeria's affiliation with religion for 2023 was 100 per cent while weekly worship attendance was 89 per cent. The percentage of people who prayed daily was pegged at 95 per cent and the perception of religion as very important at 88 per cent.

Nigeria is one of the largest countries in Africa, and has a diverse religious demography with about 55 per cent of the population being Muslim, while 45 per cent identify themselves as Christians.

In 2018, Nigeria also topped the chart as the most religious country. Between 2008 and 2017, Nigeria was also ranked as the most prayerful country by PEW.

Based on analysis from the data sourced from PEW, Nigeria is the most religious country in the world, while China is the world's least religious nation, where only 3 per cent of the population regarded religion as very important, and just one per cent prayed daily and attended a religious service once a week.

Jailed for rape

On Friday, a popular pastor, Bishop Feyi Daniels, was sentenced to life imprisonment for raping a co-pastor.

Justice Rahman Oshodi of the Ikeja Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Court found him guilty of rape, and ordered that he be remanded at the Kirikiri Correctional Facility, Lagos.

N310,000 to fly to heaven

In the same month of the previous year, another pastor of a church in Kaduna State convinced members of his church to relocate to a camp in Ekiti State with him, to prepare for the end of the world.

According to several reports, one of his followers said that the pastor first relocated to Ekiti from Kaduna, where he was formerly based, in 2020.

He then later returned to Kaduna in April to ask each member of his church to pay him N310,000 before they would be allowed to follow him to Omuo-Ekiti, where “the gate of heaven will open for all of them to fly to heaven”.

Several sources said the pastor also assured the members that they would all ascend to heaven together from the location in Ekiti.

In February 2023, a 43-year-old pastor, Paul Oyewole,  was arrested for faking his death to avoid paying a N3m debt owed to his church members.

According to reports by NAN, the Ondo-based was on Thursday, February 3, brought before the Magistrates' Court for prosecution.

Oyewole, who was arraigned before Chief Magistrate Mosunmola Ikujuni, was charged with fraud and pretence.

According to Moremi Akao, the prosecuting counsel, the alleged offender committed the offence between November 25, 2021, and May 7, 2022, along the Valentino area of Ondo.

First fruit controversy

In the Nigerian social media space recently, there have been several videos of preachers requesting the first salaries or profits made in January from their members, citing the biblical commandment of ‘first fruit'.

This has divided Christians along two lines. On one end are the ones who feel giving one's first fruits has nothing to do with religion. On the other hand, there are mostly Christians of neo-Pentecostal sects who say that the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary is enough to pay up any debts mankind might have.

Miracle scammers merchants

According to Scam Watch Nigeria, religious scammers know no bounds in devising means specially designed to squeeze money out of the pockets of their followers.

More so, according to SWN, such individuals have conveniently created schemes to carry out their illegal trade under the guise of religion.

Faith is such a powerful motivator, but when a healthy dose of gullibility meets with a significantly charismatic and dramatic fellow, it may create a big mess.

SWN stated that religious scammers often exploit the gullibility of unsuspecting followers by brandishing the Bible or Quran or any other Holy book for that matter and quoting texts and verses thereof, in a desperate attempt to make them (their followers) believe that blessings, riches, forgiveness, prosperity, health, success and in fact, all good things, will come to them only if they part with their money or property.

It added, “They search the scriptures, looking for quotable quotes that can be used to make merchandise of men. Some of their favourites are those scriptures dealing with giving first fruits to priests.

“Sometimes, such scammers threaten that God will take away even the little they (their followers) have or even visit them with calamities if they don't obey and surrender their money.

“They sell out healing oils, blessed water, anointed handkerchiefs, sleep well pillows, and stickers for protection, amongst others at high prices.”

It added that when a religious leader is always overly eager to preach about giving out your money or properties, then he or she may be preparing to ‘scam' the followers.

It added, “The spiritual house ought to be a place of worship and not a financial advisory body or an investment house.

“Study the Bible or Quran or any Holy book applicable to you, to know the real truth so you won't be deceived.”

Religion and the law

Churches in Nigeria are usually registered under the auspices of the Companies and Allied Matters Act of 1990, as revised in 2004, issued by the Corporate Affairs Commission of Nigeria.

The body is responsible for regulating organisations that meet the requirements for nonprofit status. The proper registration of a church ensures perpetual legal succession and the ability to acquire, hold, assign, dispose, or transfer properties. In addition, nonprofit organisations are tax-exempt under the Company Income Tax Law of 2004.

A lawyer, Chukwudi Anselm, in an interview with our correspondent, shedding more light on the matter, stated that because of the nature of their statuses, church leaders in Nigeria were not always compelled by law to disclose information about all the enterprises in which they are directly or indirectly involved.

“Therefore, the full scope of their activities is often challenging to establish, even though their popularity is also associated with their ability to participate in so many upper-class settings,” he said.

He, however, said the law did not mandate any member to give to any charity – church or mosque inclusive – out of compulsion, citing the law against criminal deception and stealing by tricks.

“The law is clear in these matters. If a pastor or imam deceives a member to pay any sum for a miracle or any of such spiritual merchandise that does not materialise, the member can take the said pastor to court to answer a case. No one has the right to hide under the law to commit a crime in the name of God,” he added.

Fake prophets, signs of end time – Bible Society

The Chief Executive Officer of the Bible Society of Nigeria, Pastor Samuel Sanusi, said Christians must be wary of fake prophets, adding that it was a sign of the end time.

“There are some trusted churches that have stood the test of time. They preach the gospel of salvation and teach the ways of Christ.

“Follow them and not miracles. When you go in search of miracles, then you will meet those miracle merchants who are ever willing to swindle you of your hard-earned money,” he added.

Also, the Senior Pastor, Refiners Fire Bible Church, Benin City, Edo State, Apostle Moses Jonathan, quoting the ‘Parable of the Tars', said Christendom could get rid of fake preachers.

He said, “Genuine pastors have a lot of work to do by opening the eyes of the people from the lies and deceit they have continually consumed from the mouths of fake pastors. Salvation, healing, and deliverance are not for sale.”