Monday, December 9, 2013

Popular Pastor In Fake Miracles And Wife Snatching Scandals

Few weeks after the story of "fake miracles" scandal rocked a pentecostal church in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, the pastor, Bishop David Amoussou, who was singled out as the mastermind of the arranged instant healing scam has again been embroiled in a very messy wife snatching tango.

The City of Truth Chapel International, aka, Holy Ghost Embassy, under the leadership of Bishop Israel Usoro ran into trouble when some pastors of the church resigned and opted to blow the lid off the wind of instant miracles blowing in each of the church service, which they described as fake as beneficiaries of such miracles were hired and paid. They had claimed that the “new form of evangelism” was introduced to the church by Bishop Amoussou when he came as a guest minister early in the year.

While the controversy surrounding the scandal is yet to abate, a man who claimed that Bishop Usoro’s spiritual partner, that is Bishop Davis Amoussou, has destroyed his family, stormed The Sun Newspaper’s office and in tears narrated how the controversial Bishop snatched his beautiful wife...

His words: “My name is Ndifreke Benson, I am reacting to your story in Saturday Sun. When I read through the story, it was talking about a certain prophet, a certain Bishop. I can remember it was this same so called man of God that came with one man that comes from Ghana, called Bishop David Amoussou. Bishop David Amoossou has already taken my wife.

“He called me in May and said when he comes back in September, he would take my wife and I would do nothing. And in September when he came, I got a call from the police. In fact, for the three days that he was in Uyo, my wife never slept at home. I only met my wife in the police station, Ikot Akpan Abia, where she sat down with David Amoussou and the other Pastor of Paul Bassey Street, Israel Usoro . They accused me of coming to the hotel where they lodged with my wife to kidnap them.

"Even the O.C state anti-kidnapping who knows me very well was shocked over such accusation. It was the elder brother of my wife that came to dismiss the case. He was even telling the police what David Amoussou has done to his sister. My wife has three children.

“I brought her up 16 years ago before she got the job at NEPA. And just because they have paid her severance allowance, David Amoussou, got the information through the other Bishop, who brought David Amoussou to come and cast a spell on my wife and took my wife.

“Right now, my wife is half mad. She does not even know the brother or the sister or listen to anybody or want to see me right now. My wife has gone and they have rented a house somewhere and she is living with David Amoussou. She is even planning to marry him. She had called my friend to tell him that she would be sending a wedding card to him. So, this is what these people are doing in Uyo. I am a victim and the story has to be investigated properly.”

Asked whether he had ever made attempt to harass Amoussou over his alleged relationship with his wife, the distraught Benson said “I never knew him at all. All I knew was that my wife did not sleep at home for three nights. And the day my wife was at the police, I was in a business centre typing a document, and they claimed it was at that time that I went to the hotel to kidnap them. I was shocked. That is to show you that David Amoussou wants to kill me in order to take my wife.”

He said the police had to quickly dismiss the kidnap case because Amoussou himself said that somebody told him that he (Benson) is a very dangerous person that was why he went to the police.

“My wife is under his custody. For over two months now, I have not set my eyes on my wife. I have made all efforts to trace where she is but she does not want to see anyone that knows her. The only call I got was that of my friend who told me she was ready to print a wedding card with David Amoussou. Some other people are even telling me now that she has changed her name from Esther Ndifreke Benson to Esther David Amoussou”, Benson lamented.

He said he had approached the Christian association of Nigeria, CAN, and other notable Christian leaders like popular Rev Uma Ukpai to help him retrieve his wife from the stronghold of Bishop Amoussou.

“I am handing everything to God. I have already discussed with CAN to try and plead with David Amoussou to remove the spell he has cast on my wife so that my wife can return home to take care of the three children. I have talked to many high Bishops. I have talked to Uma Ukpai as well as many others to help me talk to David Amoussou to leave my wife alone.” Benson also said he was considering taking a legal action if all other methods fail.

But reacting to the allegation:
The woman at the centre of the storm, Mrs Esther Ndifreke Benson, said she is no longer married to Benson because he has been accusing her of infidelity even when he does not have money to take care of the family as a man. She vowed to go ahead and marry Bishop Amoussou if Benson does not stop looking for her.

According to her: “The man, Ndifreke Benson, who came to you was my husband, he is no more my husband. What really happened is that, we got married in the year 2000; everything was going well and before he met me, I am a Christian. We went to church together; I embraced him because we were from the same place. But it is not everything, because the Bible says that we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers, against spiritual wickedness in high places. It is not everything that I saw through my marital life that I complained to anybody because it is for better, for worse.

“I have passed through all kinds of things which I cannot just start saying now but the one that pained me most was on the 7th of October this year. He doesn’t go to church. He has been accusing me of being impregnated by one pastor Enono of Life Builders Assembly, Uyo.

“I don’t really know what happened because I was a nursing mother then. They went to the police station then and I was called to testify. You understand what I am trying to say. Is it a crime for me to worship God? Is it a crime for me to go close to men of God? Or is it a crime to worship God. I thought that he should be happy that I am worshipping God. But at the end, what he will say is that I am sleeping with these men of God.

“I endured it and never told my people what I was passing through. The only person who knew what happened was my younger sister. It is not just something that you will start telling people; that you are being accused of adultery. I kept quiet. My mother was married till death did them part and I had to stay in my marital home, which I did. A lot of things happened, but I endured.”

She said it is the threat to her life that made her abandon the marriage. “The only one that pained me most was on October 7, he started beating me. If not by God’s grace, I would have been a dead person by now. He started beating me that I was going out with one Amoussou. That in fact, the man charmed me, that the man has been using magical oil.

“Okay, I am going out with this man of God as you said, why not release me to go, but you just wanted to kill me. He strangled me and would have killed me if not for the knock on the door by my neighbour? My neighbour knocked and he thought that it was the landlord, he left me. At this stage, this is no more spiritual, I am above it because I know that he that is in me is greater than he that is in the world. But by strangling me, I was afraid.

“So what happened was that I used wisdom; I did as if I had settled with him. He took me to work, I left. I had to run for my dear life. I went to the office and took permission to go on leave, because I have seen as they say death is not far.

So I decided to leave, I left everything I had toiled and labored for. What he is thinking that is maybe I am going out with the pastor, but if he should tempt me, even though I don’t want to marry again, if he tempts me, I will go on and marry that man and he can’t do anything."

When contacted on all his three GSM lines, the man at the centre of the storm, Bishop Amousou refused to pick his calls.