VIDEO: Four years after, Mbaka says Ohakim never flogged any reverend father
It must be one of the most popular myths ever.
As preparations for the 2011 elections went into top gear and politicking took the centre state, a report surfaced on the social media that Chief Ikedi Ohakim, the then governor of Imo State who was seeking re-election, had committed a sacrilege: stripping and flogging a Catholic priest.
According to the report, which later made its way to the mainstream media, in the evening of Sunday, August 8, 2010, Rev. Father Eustace Okorie was arrested by Ohakim’s security aides for blocking the governor’s convoy.
He was then taken to Ohakim, who ordered him detained, stripped naked and beaten.
The Catholic Church, a very powerful political bloc in south-eastern Nigeria, rose in unison against Ohakim and asked its members to vote him out.
Rev. Fr. Ejike Mbaka, the charismatic preacher, leader of the Adoration Ministry, Enugu, and the most popular priest in the south-east, led the campaign against Ohakim.
A song was composed against Ohakim, which was rendered at Mbaka’s crusades and at church gatherings, asking people not to vote for someone who has beaten a reverend father.
Ohakim, who was the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), eventually lost his re-election bid, as Owelle Rochas Okorocha of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) benefited from the protest vote.
In a video that is now going viral, Mbaka has openly recanted, saying Okorie has confessed to him that nothing of such ever happened.
Mbaka said: “Some things which when done publicly but happen to be lies should also be publicly recanted.
“When Ohakim was accused of beating up a priest, the whole Roman Catholic Church was outraged and that was his doom.”
He said Ohakim swore before the “blessed sacrament” that it was a false allegation, but by then it was too late to undo the political damage done.
Mbaka said he later called the reverend father in question who confessed to him that the incident never happened.
“I don’t need one kobo from Ohakim to say the truth. My God is the King of kings. And our prophetic message is unbribeable,” he said.
So it was just one man’s accusing finger against another; no investigation, no proof. Even from the church where Ultimate Justice should reside this type of autocratic stench oozes out. What now? ‘Victim Father’ has confessed and all is forgiven? Wow! Ohakim who,by the way, is no gubernatorial material, should, all the same, seek redress. ‘Touch not the Lord’s anointed,’ applies not here. This anointed has very sacrilegiously chipped away at his integrity. And that of the Catholic Church! And is he even still a ‘Father?’ And what next for Mbaka? To mount the same podium to campaign for Ohakim as redress?!!! Politics. Religion. Power. Money.Corruption. Greed. Etc. Now interchangeable. Still God Rules here.
Truly, I have stopped trusting ‘hearsay’. It is possible that Rev Mbaka has not said exactly what was reported. Internet renditions can make me concerned. If it is true that the Rev lied or rather, said nothing against the allegation, Ohakim’s name should be cleared o! What is true in this world?
Its shameful that Mbaka could accuse a man without verification. This same Mbaka stayed on the pulpit to castigate Ohakim and went as far as doing a song to celebrate Ohakim’s ouster from office because he beat up a priest.
Mbaka should be derobed. He openly castigated a man for beating a priest without hearing from the said priest. he composed a song and became an anthem in the east warning people not to vote for ohakim because he beat up a priest and now he is saying that all he said on the pulpit were untrue. This is another error on the part of the clergy in Nigeria
what is even wrong with him?