Precious Okafor, a 16-year-old student has narrated how a pastor in Anambra State sexually abused her under the guise of a deliverance session.
The teenager shared her experience in an interview with The PUNCH following her rescue by operatives of the Anambra State Special Anti-Touting Squad Agency in Onitsha.
“My aunt said her pastor told her I was possessed and needed deliverance. She brought me to his house at night and left me with him,” she said.
Precious claimed the pastor later started making inappropriate advances toward her.
“Later, while I was asleep, the pastor came into the room and started touching me, but I pushed his hands away. After several attempts, he eventually left. I later overheard his wife asking him where he had been, and he told her he was ‘checking on the children.
“The following day, he took me to his church in Amichi to carry out a ‘special deliverance’. He told me that I urgently needed God’s special intervention to be freed. But while the deliverance was going on at the altar, he attempted to force himself on me, but I resisted.
“For days, he didn’t give me food. At one point, I became very weak due to hunger, and the pastor overpowered me and started forcefully having intercourse with me. He did that several times on the altar during the deliverance session.
“He forcibly had intercourse with me, both in the church and sometimes at his poultry farm in Igboukwu, a neighbouring town in Aguata LGA.”
Meanwhile, the suspect simply identified as evangelist Ezani reportedly admitted wrongdoing but attributed his actions to external influence.
He said: “It is the devil’s handiwork. I didn’t know what came over me.
“I was arrested on my farm. The security operatives took me to their office in Onitsha, the same day and later transferred me to the State Criminal Investigation Department in Awka.
“I appeal to the security operatives to temper justice with mercy. It is not entirely my fault, as the girl was brought to me. I also promised to cover her medical bills if I am released”.
