By Augustine Omilo
There cannot be gainsaying the fact that Nigerians are currently facing challenges of all sorts, ranging from economic, health, education, security to socials. In an attempt to resolve the challenges, especially at personal levels, many citizens have resorted to whatever is meaningfully affordable and reasonable to them. Though their actions sometimes complicate matters for them, with proof of errors, more people are still falling pray due mainly to their gullibility and acts of desperation. They thus commit time, energy and finances to complement the efforts.
The cases on record so far show that the action of most of those affected, especially spiritual ones are as a result of pronouncements from native sooth Sayers (voodoo men and women) representing traditionalism and other religious adherents. Though victims sometimes become worse off in the condition that led them to embrace ‘visions’ from seers, they continue their search for solutions along the same pattern as they move from one solution centre to another. Many of them, for example, would not take a pastor who does not ‘see vision’ serious.
Sharing his views on the matter, Tom Edga, a Pentecostal Pastor based in Asaba said, each time people talk about foundational problems, some folks only understand that to mean that the person involved has a bewitched background or probably comes from a fetish witchcraft background.
While these are possibilities, the greatest foundational problem of man has been found to be the information made available for him to work with right from birth. Even when a mention is made of the case of Jabez and his name as recorded in the scriptures, many seekers of truth tend to forget that he only prayed to God for an enlargement of his coast, not change of name. And God answered, and made him more honourable than his brethren. The name remained his.
Speaking further, Pastor Tom said, though Jacob changed his name to Israel, till date God remains known as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, not Israel. Yet, this is another reference point used as a basis for some self-acclaimed Prophets to convince their victims to break ties with family names. In the case of Abraham, he was not asked to change his name from Abram. God Himself changed it. And he heard Him, not through a third party.
Spiritual foretelling is not limited to Nigeria as it also has global dimensions. Not too long ago, a South African preacher, Joshua Mhlakela, predicted that rapture would take place on the 15th of October, 2025. Like his first two failed predictions earlier, this one did not come to pass. And it was widely reported that many people around the world sold their belongings as they anticipated the return of Jesus Christ.
Despite this false prediction and other personalized ones before it by spiritualists, many Nigerians still fall prey to such deceptions.
This has provoked anger among some men of God who wonder what has happened to Nigeria’s religious class, particularly Christians who are expected to possess the spirit of discernment that enables one to differentiate lies from the truth during conversations. While some attribute this to end-time prophecies, others blame them on desperation, occasioned by the stack realities of hard times in the country.
In Lagos, it was recently reported that the once peaceful home of Mr. and Mrs. John Aigbe who reside in Aguda, Surulere had been torn apart by the action of the wife of Aigbe and their son who had packed away from the family house to somewhere in Kilo, a few kilometres away.
According to Mrs. Perpetua Aigbe, a 63-year old widow, trouble started after Mercy, the wife of her son became her daughter-in-law for about five years without bearing children for her husband. Due to this, Mercy formed the habit of visiting one spiritual home after another until she got to where she (Mercy) was told that her barrenness was due to bewitchment by her mother-in-law, Perpetua.
Narrating her ordeal, Perpetua said neither her son nor Mercy, his wife even bother to visit the family house again, as every member of the home have become suspects in witchcraft activities. Mercy’s pastor told her that 63 years old perpetual used to “eat her babies in the womb any time she conceived”
Recounting her ordeal further, Perpetual said; “Mercy said the prophet saw a vision where I appeared in her dream each time she got pregnant and took the child away. At first, my son dismissed it as nonsense, but Mercy kept repeating it, over and over, until, to my greatest pain, he began to believe her.”
Even when doctors later diagnosed Mercy with hormonal imbalance and prescribed treatment, she rejected it, insisting that the prophet’s claims explained everything.
Perpetua’s story mirrors that of former another family torn apart by suspicion and prophecy. For 36-year-old Abeokuta resident, Olugbenga Ronke, marriage was meant to be a lifelong bond built on love, prayer, and faith. But in her own case, within three years, her once-happy home lay in ruins, wrecked by lies, fear, and the manipulations of a self-acclaimed prophetess who claimed to speak for God.
Ronke met her husband, Johnson Olugbenga, in 2018 during a church meeting in Lagos. They fell in love, convinced that their union was divinely ordained. “We prayed together, fasted together, and believed that God brought us together for a purpose,” Ronke recalled.
But when Johnson’s business began to go down, everything changed. “He started attending special prayer sessions organised by a popular prophetess in our area.”
The prophetess, according to Ronke, told Johnson that she was a spiritual wife sent to destroy his destiny. In her words, “the prophetess said I was the reason his business was collapsing and that I had tied his progress spiritually. To my shock, Johnson believed her.” Soon, her once loving husband became cold and suspicious. He began to record her movements, check her phone, and accuse her of witchcraft.
The prophetess allegedly demanded large sums of money for “deliverance sessions” and even instructed Johnson not to eat any meal Ronke prepared until the spiritual cleansing was over. The humiliation deepened when she was dragged to public deliverance sessions.
“They called me a serpent and forced me to confess to things I never did, and my husband stood there watching. I endured it all, hoping it would save our marriage, but it only destroyed me and the marriage the more”, she lamented.
Ronke kept enduring the estranged relationship until her once loving husband just returned one day and said they were never meant to be husband and wife, adding that she had since left her fate in the hands of God, hoping that, with her continued prayers, Johnson could still return to his normal senses.
About three years ago, in Anambra State, a middle-aged woman, Mrs. Azuka Emena, was accused of witchcraft and subsequently assaulted, subjected to torture and all kinds of inhuman and degrading treatment in the Uga community. Azuka, whose daughter passed away on Thursday, March 30, 2022 after a protracted illness was accused of being responsible for the illness and eventual death of the young girl.
As in other cases of witchcraft accusations, no medical report was tendered to support the witchcraft claim.
This prompted the Advocacy for Alleged Witches (AfAW) to call on the State Police Command and the government of Anambra State to arrest and prosecute those who accused the woman of witchcraft and subsequently assaulted her, including her first son, Nonso who conspired with others to assault his mother, Azuka and also made away with some of her personal belongings.
Nonso mobilized some youths and elders in the village. They invaded the family compound, forcing the mother to cross the corpse of her late daughter four times. The mob also compelled her to carry the dead body. Two elderly women stripped her naked; they removed her menstrual pad in search of her “witchcraft medicine”.
The mob looted Mrs. Emena’s house and made away with her belongings, including a sum of N7000 that she kept in her room. The elders banished her from the community. They threatened to murder her if she was seen in the Uga community.
Mrs Emena fled to her paternal village, in Ekwulobia.
The AfAW was informed that, while she was leaving on a motorbike, mob were shooting in the air, and booing her. Somebody kicked her, and she fell into a nearby bush.
Like many others, it is not certain whether the perpetrators have been brought to book as requested by AfAW.
The AfAW’s request for the police command in Awka to arrest Azuka’s son, Nonso, Emma Onyeharam, Peter Onyirimba, Chidiebere Madukwe, Izuchukwu Ezenwonye, Okezie, Ngozi Emena and others linked to the accusation, assault, torture, and maltreatment of Mrs. Azuka Emena helped to ensure that Nonso was indeed arrested and detained, but he was later released from police custody.
The witchcraft accusations are not restricted to rural dwellers that are generally referred to as uninformed members of the society. In Yenagoa, capital of Bayelsa State, widespread outrage took place recently after a Police Inspector brutally assaulted his three children over allegations of witchcraft. This led to the arrest of the accused officer. He was identified as John and attached to one of the Tactical Squads – the Anti-Cultism unit of the Igbogene Police Unit.
Meanwhile, various organisations, including the International Federation of Women Lawyers, FIDA, Bayelsa chapter, led by Dr. Bomq Toney Miebai, the National Association of Women Against Gender Based Violence led by Dr. Dise Ogbise Goddy Harry and the Chairperson of the Do Foundation, Bayelsa chapter, Dianna Iluma, have condemned the incident and initiated a case of criminal assault and attempted murder against the Police Inspector at the Akenfa Police Station.
As the Inspector continues to cool off in custody, the Commissioner of Police has assured that no stone would be left unturned in the effort to ensure that justice prevails and the suspect is brought to book.
As the incidences of Boko haram insurgencies continue to ravage areas such as Borno State, the people are equally faced with the challenge of witchcraft. On the 22nd of February 2025, two people were arrested in Biu Area Command Jurisdiction for allegedly killing a woman who they accused of witchcraft practice.
While addressing news men, the Commissioner of Police, Borno State Command who gave the names of the suspects as Ja’o Muhammad, Idrisa Muhammad and Ya’u Muhammad aged between 20 and 30 years assured the public that thorough investigation would be conducted on the matter with a view to allowing the rule of law to take its course on the suspects.
In yet another similar case, the Police in Bauchi state arrested a 50-year old woman, Suwaira accused of burning even-year-old girl’s private parts over Witchcraft Allegations in September, 2025. The victim, a sister of her husband was left in agonising pain after she was attacked by Suwaira.
While reacting to the many incidences of fake prophecies and witch craft accusations, the National Director, National Issues and Social Welfare of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Abimbola Ayuba, cautioned Christians to be wary of heretical preachers who exploit the vulnerable with false revelations and manipulative prophecies.
He condemned self-styled prophets who mislead followers under the guise of divine insight. According to him, “These are the kinds of people the government should penalise for misguiding and misinforming the public. These pastors should be ‘raptured’ into detention,” he said angrily.
He lamented that despite countless failed predictions, including the recent rapture prophecy by a South African preacher, Joshua Mhlakela, many Nigerians still fall prey to such deception. “Freedom of religion, freedom of worship, and freedom of speech should all have limits, especially when they are used to mislead innocent people,” Ayuba warned, urging both the church and government to step up efforts to protect the faithful from manipulations.
Beyond condemnations by Nigerians, it is imperative for the adherents of the various religions to study their guiding books thoroughly by themselves and crave for the spirit of discernment that enables a believer to read the minds of those presenting them with information.
Religious leaders must wake up to the challenge of teaching doctrines that ensures steadfastness in their followers’ beliefs.
