Jesu Oyingbo’s daughter they call God
By Dipo Kehinde
Twelve years ago, Irene Udeagha, who is grinning in the picture above, was just an impressionable 12-year-old girl who had lost her twin sister.
At that tender age, all she was expected to do was look up to her parents to get a full grasp of the world around her.
But the parents had a situation to contend with.
Eke Udeagha and his wife, Grace, held conflicting opinions on the membership of a strange Lagos church where a woman is worshipped as God. Her title is the Queen of Glory. She says she is the incarnation of the Almighty God. And every adherent of her teachings must not only worship her as such but must also vow to do so. “Anyone who declines may be put to death,” said Mrs Emilia Onwuamadike, who fled from the church after her husband died mysteriously in 2001.
Irene’s mother also had a lucky escape, after she was taught the lesson of her life.
Queen of Glory’s real names are Ola-Oluwa Fanawopo. She is the daughter of Mr Ibukunoluwa Ibirogba, who was at one time a follower of Mr Funmilayo Odumosu, the man who saw himself as the reincarnation of Jesus Christ and thereafter adopted the names Jesus of Oyingbo fondly called by his followers as Jesu Oyingbo.
The Queen of Glory herself lived in the commune of Jesus of Oyingbo. When her father travelled abroad, he left her and her mother in the commune. Jesus of Oyingbo allegedly expropriated her mother as the wife under the general understanding that the entire commune’s women and their daughters belonged to him alone as wives and were to bear him children who, because of his assumed divinity, were to regenerate new and pure human species. The Queen of Glory grew up in this environment, and after the demise of the Jesus of Oyingbo in the 1980s; she left the commune to join the Worldwide Church of God (WWCG) in Lagos.
Fourteen years ago, at the age of 33, she parted with the church to set up her own on Musa Akor Close in Awuse Estate, Opebi, in Lagos, where many adults and children were kept in bondage, according to the revelation of apostates of Glory Ministries.
The church targets, for prime membership, the first children of wealthy families. And once they got in, they were obliged to bring their families in tow. That was how Irene’s mother, walked into the net. But, unlike her husband, she declined to take the vow to worship the Queen of Glory. But, then, there was the devil to pay.
At the age of 38, in 1999, Mrs Udeagha was captured by the sect and imprisoned inside a well-fortified room, on the church premises at Musa Akor Close, for two years. Sometimes, she would stay without food for as long as 10 days, simply because she would not, unlike her husband, accept that the ‘Queen of Glory’ is God and worship her as such.
It was not until May 2001 that she had a lucky escape when she cut through the network of barbed wire on the window of her closely guarded cell.
But some detainees were not that lucky. They allegedly died due to such treatment, and the police even rescued a 70-year-old German woman, Mrs Ingeborg Helene Afolabi, who died while receiving medical attention at a top-flight specialist Lagos hospital.
Mrs Udeagha claimed that her husband, Moses, who is a member of Glory Ministries, lured her into the trap in August 1999.
She said she was never allowed to step outside the queendom and she only stepped out of her cell whenever the guards took her to the toilet or the backyard where, according to her, they usually poured water on her to wash her body.
“Sometimes they would starve me for eight days,” she said, “sometimes for 10 days, but when they did not give me food or drink for 12 days that was the height of it.
“I asked them what I’ve done; they said I was the daughter of the devil. They asked me to co-operate. I asked them what they meant by cooperation. They said I should bow before the Queen and vow to serve her.
“I said if this is God, God won’t lock you up. God doesn’t lock anybody up. And I said to their Queen, I will not worship you, you’re not God. God is not wicked.”
Shortly after her liberation by the police in 2001, Mrs Udeagha told this reporter that Irene, who was 12 then, was abducted, and held in captivity. Her stunning revelation, at first, came as a complete riddle, even to the police who, nevertheless, invited her husband for a chat.
Moses admitted that his wife was incarcerated, and told the police at Area ‘F’ in Ikeja, Lagos that she was locked up because she was insane and receiving medical treatment.
The police discharged Moses and recommended that his wife be taken to a psychiatric hospital, apparently judging by her scraggy skin and her ranting which could have been likened to that of an insane woman.
The story would have ended there but for the son of the German woman, Andrew Afolabi, who persuaded the police to raid the queendom and rescue his mother, who had been in Nigeria for 45 years and had worked with the Swiss Airline for 30 years.
Andrew said his mother was captured, when her first son, David, who changed his name to Israel, as a member of the sect, lured her into captivity.
Andrew said: “My brother was one of the first businessmen to set up a software company in Nigeria. He sold all his property, only to give the money to the sect.”
When this reporter broke the story of Glory Ministries in 2001, some families in Lagos, Owerri and Aba made efforts to rescue their relations who were allegedly living under the spell of the sect.
Fresh revelations, 12 years after, have shown that most of the efforts were in vain.
Some relations, according to the families’ testimonies, were mysteriously killed while some were made to sell all their property, then give the money to the sect. They changed their names and withdrew their children from schools to stay permanently in the queendom, worshipping Ola-Oluwa who they revered as the Queen of Glory.
While investigating these alleged atrocities cloaked in a shroud of mystery, this reporter combed three states —Lagos, Imo and Abia, infiltrating the sect, looking for tell-tale clues that might open a can of worms.
His first encounter with the sect was at the hospital, where three of the members had come looking for Mrs Afolabi, who was receiving treatment after she had been rescued by the police.
The three members, who identified themselves as Moses, Israel and Ojinma arrived the hospital at Ikeja on August 6, 2001, at about 2 p.m, in a cobalt blue Mitsubishi colt (AG 535 FFF).
They found their way to the patient’s ward. But as they stood at her bedside, a suspicious nurse dashed out to alert a notable doctor and co-owner of the hospital who was taking care of the patient.
Like a serious play with moments of comic bathos, the doctor rushed to the ward with the Holy Bible in his hand.
He challenged the strangers and chased them out of the ward, with the exception of Israel, who he had recognised as the patient’s son, and who, according to him needed deliverance.
The doctor invited Israel to his office on the third floor of the highbrow hospital and called another prayerful colleague to help cast out a perceived demon in Israel.
Standing like a spirited pastor on the pulpit, the doctor raised his big bible before Israel and read, loudly, verses from Psalm 94.
“O Lord, avenging God shine forth… Lord, how long shall the wicked triumph? How long shall they utter and speak hard things? And all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?
“They break in pieces thy people, O Lord and afflict thine heritage. They slew the widow and the stranger and murder the fatherless. Yet they say, The Lord shall not see; neither shall the God of Jacob regard it…”
While the prayer lasted, Israel’s eyes were wide open, cold and stirring. The doctor told him that the woman being worshipped by the sect “is not God”.
That was when the half-caste with a squeaky clean image dropped a bombshell.
He said, with a distant look on his face: “She is God… She has come. She has a Fallopian tube that is like the River Niger and Benue coming together to form letter Y.”
Israel stressed that God could come in any form and told the doctor, “If you find out that what I’m saying is right, promise me that you will apologize.”
The doctor declined. “I know he will never be correct,” he argued, adding that every woman has a Fallopian tube that is like letter Y.
Andrew, who had called in the police to rescue their mother, said, at the early stage of this investigation, that Israel was no more his cheerful self.
His words: “He doesn’t have a smile on his face any more. He acts like a robot and looks as if he has been hypnotised. He has sold his property — six plots of land on Allen Avenue; two plots on Etim Inyang Road, Victoria Island; a foundry at Ikeja; his shares in a software company and he gave the money, his wife and three daughters to the sect.
“The children have not gone to school for three years. My brother’s wife is no longer his wife. The children are no longer his children. Once you join the Glory Ministries you lose everything.”
The children, whose ages were 16, 14 and six in 2001, are now grown-ups, who have kept their relationship with the Queen of Glory, and other members of her ministry, as seen on their Facebook walls.
Andrew presented a note, which the sect allegedly sent to his mother requesting her to furnish them with information concerning her last trip outside the country and a brief profile of her host there.
She was also asked to give a profile of her farm manager, indicate if he had any relationship with one of her four children whose names were mentioned and that if a relationship existed, she should give a brief detail of it alongside a brief history of her farm, especially about the land being used, its purchase and the earlier owners.
The note ended with a tailpiece: “Please note that these questions and what they demand have strong pulls to your life and must be provided in vivid details.”
He also presented the copy of a letter dated July 12, 2001, which the Queen of Glory allegedly wrote to the German woman.
She addressed herself as Quinne of Salem and the letter says: “It is important at this point of activities to unveil part (the main) action that has consistently hindered the progress of your health.
“Indeed, it is of great value to have a knowledge of the truth, the necessity for truth and the freedom that comes from truth. Fortunately for humanity, for this course, the Almighty (Quinne of Salem) is revealed at this time.
“It becomes imperative that the issue of truth and consequent openness that it brings and the freedom that attends to it must be established.
“In seeking for life, truth is absolute and secrecy is stoutly shinned. Retaining secrets hinders life and stands against the nature of God as revealed.
“In the course of your treatment certain secrets that you have kept over time appear to militate against the progress expected of you and the time has come that such secrets be eradicated from your life so as to facilitate your health.
“This secret relates to a certain relationship that had existed between your child and your daughter-in-law. Indeed, that you may be helped to be bold and courageous to extricate your life from such entanglement, this time of relief has been given to you.
“You are therefore required to give full details, as it is available to you and forward same to Her Majesty.
“You must know that in the place you are, no secrets are kept and nothing is secret before Almighty. Indeed you can be sure that no harm will be done, except that lives might be saved. Salem.”
Then the Queen of Glory made an additional statement: “You can be sure that, in this circumstance, your life is secured.”
She signed off: “Quinnedom Salem, Office of Her Majesty.”
The genesis of the Glory Ministries was traced to the exodus of its members from WWCG.
The WWCG, which tied together all the dramatis personae, has its roots in about 33 countries worldwide and nine states in Nigeria.
The rot allegedly set in, when a group within the church began to teach a different doctrine from the normal practice.
Godwin Iweajunwa, a leader in the church identified the area pastor, Mr Chukwuma Ojinma, as the person who broke the church in two, so that he could penetrate and spread his own belief.
Iweajunwa, who claimed that the sect was having a vice-like grip on his first child, said it was enticing people with the assurance that it would provide all their needs and could cast out demons and give its members spiritual powers.
“And they began with Olaolu who they said possessed nine demonic spirits,” Iweajunwa said, adding that, after the so-called spirits were said to have been cast out, “they told us that Olaolu has spiritual power”.
The superintendent of WWCG allegedly called all members to ask them what was going on.
“They won some followers,” said Iweajunwa. “They came to my house on a Sabbath day and they prayed. They said they had come to pray for us, that someone had cast a spell on my wife.
“We served them kola nut, they did not eat. All that they wanted was to initiate me and my wife into the sect.
“They caused a commotion at a church service when they shouted the pastor down when he boldly condemned what they were doing as ungodly.
“They brought Olaolu before the congregation and told us that she is God.
“Olaolu stood before us and said ‘I am that I am’. For 30 minutes the church was in a state of confusion. Some members wanted to know if her claim was true; others kicked against it and that was how the church was divided.”
Followers of the new doctrine were kicked out by Mr James Henderson, WWCG’s Regional Director for Africa, who allegedly came over from his base in South Africa on three occasions to mediate before he finally decided to expel the erring members.
In Aba, 494 kilometres away from Ikeja where the drama was unfolding in 2001, the reporter located one of the actors, Mr Sylvia Ugorji, a top official of NITEL, who claimed that it all started in his house.
He also located Mrs Udeagha, who had been examined at Kalunta Memorial Psychiatric Hospital to see whether she was actually insane as her husband claimed. She was given a clean bill of health.
And her sanity was not in doubt when she gave the lurid details of her horrid experience.
She was most gracious to her visitors, smiling and thanking them, including Ugorji and Mrs Onwuamadike, who claimed that her husband was killed by the sect.
It was 8 p.m when everyone gathered round Mrs Udeagha as if she was about to tell tales by moonlight.
And she spoke, in slow measured cadences and well clipped English, with the narrative coherence of a master storyteller:
“I was kept at Musa Akor for almost two years, under lock and key, and under guards. I was never allowed to come out of the compound or step out of my room except twice when I was led to their service in one storey building,” she began.
“The two guards, James and David, I called them my warder since I was in prison. Once in a while they brought me out and poured water on me.
“I won’t tell you what they were doing there, since I was incarcerated. I already believed that God was on. Your nature has to conform. I didn’t believe in the wickedness in their action.
“They were bringing food in August 1999, but everything changed when two of their captives, Mrs Ichagha and Chioma Opara escaped.
“Then they begin to feed me on mostly garri and soup in the afternoon and evening. And it was not free food. I used to suspect that there was poison in it; spiritually.
“I wasn’t into spiritualism. I didn’t have the sight and the ears, but my mind told me: eat this, don’t eat this, my stomach was closed up. I was always getting sick, so I stopped eating for some time.
“My window was sealed with 52 nails and barbed wire. I was experiencing so much pain. Something kept telling me: ‘You’re dead’.
“My 12-year-old daughter was taken away from me. I only saw her twice through the window. If I called her, she would not respond; instead, she would run.
“In November, they would lock the door but the key would not be removed. One day, I asked them what I had done; they said I was the daughter of the devil.
“They said the woman they worshipped was God. I said if this is God, God won’t lock you up. God doesn’t lock anybody up…
“In January, they removed the key from my door whenever it was locked. They said God asked them to lock me up.
“They used barbed wire as a burglar-proof on the window and nailed it in a way you can’t remove it if you’re not strong.
“…When they did not give me food for 12 days; that was the height of it. As they took me out to bath I managed to sneak a stone into my room. I kept it in my pocket. That was what I used to break the barbed wire from the nails after I had removed the louvres.
“I had a white bag that I passed through the window. I got out around 2 a.m. I found a cube of sugar in my bag and said let it be the strength till I find food.
“At the back of the building was a canal. I passed through a place where the wall had collapsed. The fence itself was as high as a prison wall. You can’t just climb it.
“I found my way to the Hilton Hotel, off Allen Avenue. I told the night watchman who I am and asked him to help me. They went to their manager and I was allowed to sit with them through the night.
“I know two persons at Citizen Bank, in Ikeja and in the morning I called their numbers and they told me to report to the police. The guards took me to Area ‘F’. The police couldn’t believe what they saw. I stayed with them for two days while they tried to get in touch with my relations.”
Mrs Udeagha’s escape bid was a near tragedy as she walked through a dark and dangerous snake invested valley after she jumped out of the window of her cell. She inched her way with an indomitable will, through a narrow, damp and smelling corridor that was fenced with wire netting behind the building.
In the gathering gloom, it was hard to see anything distinctly, but she navigated her way with her instinct as her pilot.
Like a heroine in the final acts of a mystery thriller, her legs were shaking like jelly as she staggered towards the mushy and marshy valley that was like a larger than life crater left behind by aliens from outer space.
Looking grey and hollow-eyed, she glanced nervously in every direction. There was nobody in sight. She looked into a small bag she had with her, found a cube of sugar and threw it in her mouth. Then she peered through the murmuring murk and plunged into the seemingly impenetrable grove that fringe the edge of the valley.
At a point, she slipped and was hurtling down the valley when a reed bed suddenly cushioned her frail body.
Huffing and puffing, she crept through the weeds and reeds as she climbed out of the yawning valley.
She became so frightened that she began to hyperventilate; that was when she saw the part of the fence which had fallen apart. There was no looking back. She quickly passed through the opening, which led her into the open.
Moments later, Mrs Udeagha found herself at the Lagos Hilton Hotel on Allen Avenue, where she narrated her ordeal to nightwatchmen whose faces were powdered with incredulity as they heard the gory tale.
Help me! She implored and the guard took her to the Ikeja police station.
When Mrs Udeagha returned to her family in Aba, on May 5, 2001, she was quickly taken to the hospital for medical treatment.
Everybody was concerned about her health, but she was concerned with just one thing: The safety of her child, Irene.
“I want my child back. The other side of me is still there. My child,” she cried.
Chief Kalu Agu, the relation, who accommodated Mrs Udeagha at house number 122 Ehi Road, Aba, said: “If we had not gone to Lagos on time, they would have killed her. She came out a walking skeleton.”
Back in Lagos, the reporter had to confirm what Mrs Udeagha said about her torture in the sect’s “chamber of horrors”. So, he paid a visit to the Glory Ministries, on Musa Akor Close at about 9 p.m, with a little camera.
The commune, he had learnt, had relocated to the sect’s new site at Oko-Oba, on the outskirts of Lagos; but a few guards were left behind to keep watch over the abandoned premises flaunting a To-Let sign on its gate.
Undercover of the night, the reporter sneaked into the large and sleepy compound. He saw a lonely, and isolated pure white storey building sitting a few metres into the yard. And there was a sprawl of bungalows.
The lights were out. He moved towards the extreme end of the compound, hoping to find the quarters by the valley, where Mrs Udeagha claimed that she had been incarcerated.
At one extreme corner of the compound to his right hand, he saw a little quarter nestling at the edge of a vast valley. He went in.
The quarters had four rooms, in a row, facing a narrow corridor. He went from door to door.
The first door stood ajar, and the room was illuminated by a small lantern placed at a corner.
Two of the three other rooms were shut with small padlocks so he only opened the third door that was not.
He peeped into the room that was dimly lit by the moonbeam streaming in through a small window that had no burglar-proof.
Suspecting that that could be the window through which Mrs Udeagha escaped, he walked back to the first room to pick the lantern and get a clearer picture of the setting.
It was a small room redolent of mystery. The light green face of the walls was pockmarked with little holes in which tiny tissue and scrap papers were stuffed.
The window frame had 52 nail marks as Mrs Udeagha had said. Two of the louvres, which she had removed, were back on the window. There was no sign of the barbed wire.
He noticed that the door was unusual. It was made of very thick planks; not less than four inches thick.
A trip to Owerri, the Imo State capital, also provided some information about Ojinma, who was described as the mastermind behind the sect.
It was confirmed, at the Alvan Ikoku College of Education, that Ojinma was a lecturer at the geography department until 1994 when he left to go into full-time ministry work.
He was with the Seventh Day Adventist Church, but the romance didn’t last long.
According to Mrs Onwuamadike, Ojinma was expelled from the church.
On enquiry, it was learnt that the name Ojinma, in Igbo, means: “The one that holds the knife.”
The Glory Ministries was gradually flowering in Owerri. The members were holding their fellowship on Sundays at the premier secondary school, in the heart of the town.
It was revealed that members had to stand for a moment and say “Queendom peace,” when entering the church.
But many things appear to have changed in the ways of the new church, Golden Age Tabernacle, which has opened a Facebook page, just like Ola-Oluwa Fanawopo and members of the old brigade, who now post pictures for the world to see.
In the past, photographs were seen as demonic objects. The only thing that a member could paste on the wall was the sect’s emblem and worshippers had to lie on their belle during service.
Some of Ola-Oluwa’s Facebook contacts still use the word: ‘Quinnedom peace’.
When approached in 2001, Ugorji, who said the sect took off in his house, condemned the practice. He said that he had been having a running battle with his wife who was a member, and who appeared to be teaching their children the doctrine of Glory Ministries.
He said: “It started at my house. When it came up, I was enjoying the teaching. Now I don’t consider what they’re thinking appropriate. They say the Bible is obsolete; they say Jesus has come in form of a woman. I know the woman since the days when we were holding singles fellowship. She was small. Now they call her God, Queen of Glory.
“They said God is incomplete without a woman and that anybody outside the sect is in Babylon.
“They asked people not to pay tithe; that they would pay it for them. My wife is an ardent member, irrevocably committed to them. I’m praying to God to teach me how to handle the situation.
“The little I know; it is inimical to my family. Members of the ministry said they were undergoing teaching; that when they come out from training, they would turn the world upside down.
“Let us adopt Gamaliel principles. If it’s the work of God, there’s nothing anybody can do about it; but if it is the work of man, it will crumble.
“When I learnt of a plan to arrest members of the sect. I asked those who were making the move if they had consulted a lawyer because everybody has freedom of worship.”
Quoting copiously from the Bible, Ugorji cited verses from John 17 and First Corinthians, Chapter 2, to reinforce his arguments, concluding that the sect could be left alone provided the members didn’t hold anybody to ransom.
A letter, dated June 18, 2001, which Irene’s father, Moses, wrote Agu, made it easy to appreciate the anatomy of his problem with his wife.
He stated in the lengthy letter: “Since I lost my job four years ago, I have not stopped serving and worshipping my God. Though I am not on a regular salary and also do not have any substantial fund of my own, my God has been taking care of my needs and that of my family including Grace.
“All our food, clothes and shelter have been supplied by my God. Initially, Grace was in agreement with me, but after sometime, she decided not to obey me and be under my authority. She also decided not to continue to marry me and began to take steps to break our relationship…
“So for the past 18 years of our married life, Grace has always insisted on having her own way; until I finally made it clear to her that she can no longer have her way—that she needs to obey and be under my authority.,.
“She wanted to have her way. She employed different tactics: verbal insults, spitting on my face, pouring her urine on me, and starving herself by throwing her food away.
“I wanted us to stay married and pass through this period of re-training God was giving us, but she wanted to break our married relationship. So she made plans and ran away from me. It was a plan and a decision she made consciously knowing the full implication…
“I wanted to help and protect her. Her running away caused me a great deal of pain and distress. She did not only ran away, but she also went to the police station and told all kinds of lies including the fact that I was no longer alive.
“As a result of this, I, my daughter and an innocent friend (who came to identify that I was truly her husband were locked up in the police cell…
“It was she who requested from the police to be sent ‘home’ and so the police through the phone calls allowed her to make plans for Kalu Kalu Oji, her brother to come and take her. (I merely accompanied her and her brother to make sure that she and her belongings get home to her people at Aba).
“It is the God I serve and worship who took care of the cost of transportation of the five people (including myself) that travelled back to Aba on that day…
“Concerning Grace in the Psychiatric Hospital, I want to state the following: Grace is not mentally sick and should not have been sent to the Psychiatric Hospital in the first place.
“She has a ‘spiritual’ problem predicated on Greed and Egocentricism which cannot be healed in Psychiatric Hospital.
“Only the Living God can heal and bring Grace out from what she has consciously put herself into, if she is willing… The money I have spent, so far, was supplied by my God, and that was to help alleviate the burden on you…
“If, and whenever in future, she decides to return to obey me and remain under my authority; then we can talk about our relationship. For now, I have a job to do for my God. I cannot allow anyone or anything to come between me and the Living God.”
In Lagos, the reporter came across other letters with strange revelations. One was sent by the Queen to Pius, Mrs. Onwuamadike’s husband, who was said to have died under mysterious circumstances.
The letter addressed Pius as Silas, the name which the Queen allegedly gave him.
The Queen stated in the letter that it was clear that members of Pius’ family would be his greatest enemies, as she warned him to be wary of his wife.
She said: “Even as Micah spoke and partially quoted by Jesus Christ: “Do not trust… Even her who lies in your embrace; be careful of your words… A man’s enemies are members of his own household (Micah 7:5-6: Matthew 10:32-39). I think these scriptures are fulfilled in your life. That the one who brought you also betrayed you.
“Yet, you have a responsibility to pray for her, not that she might be visited by the spirit of the Lord or the mother. But that she may be touched, by love that for once her focus may come out of food and the cares of this hopeless passing life.
“For it is obvious that except a conscious effort is made towards renouncing man’s desires for food as in gluttony, mankind can’t grasp the depth of spiritual truth contained in the message of the Mother-Queen of Glory.
“This is the essential reason why the end-time work is based on ‘fast’ for progress.
“I wish, however, that Emilia may decide to keep all the children and take care of herself. This will offer you the needed and necessary opportunity for spiritual focus and concentration.
“For when such goals are accomplished, it will be necessary for them to appreciate and probably return to join you in celebrating the Mother who in truth reigns in the Father.
“One thing though is that every man shall receive a just recompense for that committed in this body. Let her not call out for help, when the recompense for her reviling and decision of the Queen Mother visits her.
“Have your peace and be thankful. For he who started the good work in you will bring all things to accomplishment if you remain faithful.”
Mrs Onwuamadike is not happy with the sect as she is persistently blaming it for the death of her husband, who she was trying to withdraw from the Glory Ministries.
In her testimonies, Mrs Onwuamadike said that when Ojinma started deliverance service, he claimed that he could send people to the spirit world.
“I volunteered myself to be used. He tried, he couldn’t,” Mrs Onwuamadike said. “I travelled to Aba to meet him. He said my spirit was very strong. I told my husband.
“I went to House Number 10, Ondo Street, Off Allen Avenue, Ikeja, in Lagos, where the sect used as their first base with my husband. Ojinma tried us again and failed. He said our spirit was hard.
“One day we were at a service at WWCG. They said there was a night vigil and special prayer to be handled by Ola-Oluwa.
“During the praise and worship, Ola mounted the pulpit and shouted that she was God. ‘I am that I am’… The church was scattered: five persons, including Ojinma, were dis-fellowshipped because of the act.”
Surprisingly, Mrs Onwuamadike, who described herself as rebellious, followed the sect with her husband.
“We started praying normally,” she said. “At a point, my husband got a job in Kano. They said he should not go that God was against it. Then they told him to sell all his property and join the queendom as a doctrinal injunction. I warned my husband saying I hope we were not joining another Jesu Oyingbo.
“One of my in-laws had a company in Kano. He invited my husband to come over. He gave him N7, 000 to do a computer course and offered to give us accommodation if we decided to live in Kano.
“My husband took the money to the sect. They collected it. When I came back from Kano, my children who were attending the Glory Ministries said they had been told to pray through the Queen of Glory.
“I rejected saying Jesus is the only way. You can’t pray through any human.
“When I saw the caterer of the sect, Mrs Agnes Nduka, she said: ‘You don’t know the latest. Ola is now glorified. I said it was a lie. I can’t pray through Ola or Queen of Glory.
“So when they prayed, saying through the Queen of Glory in Jesus name I pray. I said, minus Queen of Glory in Jesus name I pray, Amen. And Charles Molokwu was laughing. He was the, man who usually stood at the gate to cleanse people before they entered.
“They asked the women to come one after the other to pledge to bow before Ola and pray with her name. They lined up and did it. I refused.
“Other women were annoyed, saying I should have acted like them and bow. I said serving God was a personal thing.
“When my mother died, I travelled. By the time I came back, our furniture, TV, typewriter, computer and my bed and mattress were missing. I asked my husband what had happened. He said they told him the Lord said he should sell his property.
“I asked him where he kept the money. He couldn’t produce the money. I nearly cried. We owed about four months of rent then.
“They told him to quit the flat and find one room to squat with his family, that soon he would come and live in the queendom.
“He didn’t even tell me how much he sold those things. 1 wrote to Ojinma to know why my husband should not work, and at the same time sell his property.
“They told him to withdraw his children from school. I told my husband that if he refused to work. I would stop feeding him. When I did, they now gave my husband and children leftover from the food they cooked.
“I told my husband that I would no more follow him to the place. When we were ejected from our flat, Mr Nduka, a member of the sect, accommodated my husband; but I was sleeping in my shop. And when I lost my shop and had nowhere to stay, I moved over to Mr Nduka’s house, but he was not pleased to have me stay with my husband.
“One day he came insulting my husband, asking him why he should allow his wife to stay with him. Nduka’s wife said I could contaminate them.
“Mr Nduka, there and then, sent me packing. I said I would come to their queendom and sleep on the balcony. Mr Nduka said he would tell them.
“I carried my little baby with a wrapper. When we got there I waited for them to end their fellowship around 9.30 p.m. Then they asked me to follow them somewhere. I refused to go with them because it was late and they didn’t tell me where we were going.
“My husband left with some of them. I heard Ojinma say: ‘Beat her up, beat her up.’
“Then Charles descended on me. He gave me a thorough beating and stripped me naked. Guards in the area came out to ask what was happening. A woman resident in the area advised me to leave the area and find a friend’s place to sleep.
“I went to the Shadares, our family friends at Mende. For about four months, I had no place to stay and I walked the street with my son, living on charity.
“One day I found a note in my husband’s bag telling him to send this woman away and come and live in the queendom, to worship the Queen.
“He later told me that he was no longer interested in our marriage; that he wanted to face God. 1 rejected it in the name of Jesus. I said Ojinma could never break my marriage because when we were saying I do, he was not there.
“I said if he really wanted to divorce me, his people and my people must sit and see to that.
“We rented a room at 29, Osborne Street, but my husband would pack his bible every night and a hymn book to sleep in Mr Nduka’s house. I met Nduka’s wife and protested.
“Our son, Uche, stayed away from school for a year. He called me one day and said: ‘Mummy, do you know, you’re not my mother.’ He said that was what they were taught at the queendom, that Ola is their mother.
“I called my husband to explain this development. He said in the queendom, they have foster parents, that I was only a biological parent.
“My husband came home one day with a bottle of water and sprinkled the content on me. I said I reject it in the name of Jesus.
“I told my husband that one day they would reject my son and truly they sent him packing. I also said they would reject my husband, but he told me that I would one day come and bow before that woman. He said I would cry and come to them.
“On June 6, 2000, I had a nightmare in which a beast was fighting me. I screamed. My son came to pet me.
“I told my husband, they’re fighting me because of you, there was a day he came back to tell me he had survived two accidents.
“One, he was sitting in front of a commercial mini¬bus when the door opened and he nearly fell off. The second accident occurred, when a car in which he was travelling almost ran under a trailer. The passengers were said to have shouted and the driver swerved and merely brushed the trailer.
One day my husband left home around 12 a.m. He said he was going to the fellowship. He didn’t come back home, until some days after, when Mr. Udeagha and two other members came banging my door at night only to tell me that my husband was not feeling fine, and that I should come and see him.
“They said he was in their car outside, and that I should bring slippers for him to wear.
“I said, but he wore a shoe when he was going out. I followed them to the car and saw my husband in a very bad condition. He could not move. They wanted to carry him out of the car. I refused. I said he must walk. They later brought him out.
“My husband, at first, didn’t tell me what happened. His left arm and leg was paralysed. He later told me that he was writing, when he suddenly fell.
“I said, Mr Udeagha, with the condition of this man what do we do? He didn’t say anything. For more than a month, he couldn’t move. He would urinate and defecate in the house. One day, members of the sect came to check him. I chased them away and threatened to shatter the windshield of their car with stone.
“I reported the case to my uncle, Assistant Superintendent of Police Anthony Agodi. He didn’t take action.
“It was when we went to the east that my husband s eye opened. He started crying. He saw our daughter and said, so she’s here… Has she been going to school? Who’s been paying her fees?
“My husband eventually died on October 12, 2000. He woke up in the morning, used the toilet, slumped and passed away. He was 50 years and the first child of the parents.”
There was something curious about all the male victims. They were firstborn of their families.
“Chimezie Chilaka, a building contractor, according to Mrs Onwuamadike, was asked to buy some animals for rituals and the wife was to take it to the sect. The wife spent a week in Lagos,” said Onwuamadike. “She brought something back for the husband to use. The man used it and died.
“He told the wife that he wanted to go to the toilet and he slumped and died. He had a house he was building on School Road, in Owerri; the project had since been abandoned.
“When Chilaka died, his corpse was brought from Owerri to Musa Akor Close, in Lagos. It was there for three days, and it was stinking. On the fourth day, they took the body to his village, Amauku Orodo in Mbaitolu Local Government Area of Imo State.
“Members of the sect who took the corpse there arrived at night, dumped it and fled. There was confusion when villagers, who were brought out by the odour, saw the corpse and did not see those who brought it.
“Among those who took the corpse to the village were Mr Boniface Chimezie, who heads the sect in Owerri; Gideon Odikanwa, his deputy who lived in the same compound with Chilaka and Ojinma Junior, who lived in Aba.
“It was Chimezie that bought my husband’s computer. He didn’t sell his own property. He now uses the computer at the Premier Secondary School, which he runs in Owerri.”
Chibuzor, Mrs Onwuamadike’s 10-year-old son, who once stayed in the queendom, said: “I know Mr Ojinma. When we were in the Church and at the Glory Ministries, he used to stay upstairs. He would hardly come to us.
“Sometimes, they sprinkle blood on us; ask us to remove our clothes. They have different kinds of animals, and birds, goats, fowl, ram, monkey; they put the blood on our heads.
“Sometimes Ojinma will put kola nut in his mouth, and put a hot drink in his mouth; spit it, pour a little on the ground and ask everybody to walk over it.”
When the police visited the queendom at Musa Akor, they saw two large ostriches.
Edokpaiye, an estate agent, who was allegedly in charge of land affairs in Lagos State, in the Jakande administration, was counted among the victims who died in mysterious circumstances; so was Ralph, a NEPA official at Oshodi.
A man, who simply identified himself as Mr Omotoso, and a leader at WWCG, said that Edokpaiye sold his house at Ogudu, claiming that there was a demon in the house.
Edokpaiye’s sister allegedly arrested him, when their mother who was visiting him disappeared and they never saw her again.
Omotoso identified one Dr Uchaga, who worked at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, as the first man to die inside the queendom.
He said the wife had left the sect thereafter to live in Abuja.
Andrew, who rescued his mother from the sect, had said that he was sure his mother was made to take an oath and that Israel who lured her into the sect once told him to wait and see, “you will soon see us on CNN”.
Wondering what could have made a human being so alienated to submit himself to another human being, and unswerving in his belief that there is something phoney about the sect, he handed over some letters which his mother wrote him while she was in the queendom.
In one of the letters which she told her son to “please destroy this letter now,” she said that the son could come to the queendom anytime he wanted to, although he would not be allowed to see anybody else but Moses.
She warned the son not to speak to anyone about her, and that if her son overseas should phone, he should know how to talk to him.
There was another letter to the Queen, in which she addressed herself as “your child”.
She said: “I wish to say first of all that, for the past few days, since I had the privilege to be under your love and care. Her Majesty, I have been thinking over my life and what might have brought on this my illness and any confessions I should make, but nothing more has come to my mind, apart from the two abortions that I had…
Meanwhile, her son in Santa Ana California had drafted a letter, To Whom It May Concern, authorising his younger brother to remove their mother from the queendom.
The letter stated that there were four sons and that the consent to keep their mother in the so-called queendom had not been given to Israel or “the church by the remaining three sons…
“Our mother is ailing in ill health and has been taken by the church and our brother without the family’s consent. She needs immediate medical attention to enable her to regain her health.
“This church is not the appropriate place to deal with her medical needs and I strongly ask that all assistance is given to allow for medical attention in a proper hospital to be granted. If medical assistance is not given priority this could lead to the death of our beloved mother.”
Before he went on the rescue mission, the son had also received a letter in which his mother said she was aware of his demand to see her.
She said: “I will not stop you from seeing Moses, but I tell you very firmly that you or anybody cannot see me until I am well.
“Do not stress yourself or others by disturbing me. I told you on Wednesday, that it is my own wish and desire to come here because I know this is the only place where I have rest, peace, health and life. You just have to accept it. I will never change my mind whatever you do. My mind is not sick.”
But the restless son would not accept any of that, as long as the mother stayed inside the queendom.
As soon as he had read the letter, he began to suspect that there was something funny going on. He took the police to Musa Akor, and 23 members of the sect were arrested and locked up for a week at the state Criminal Investigations Department (SCID) Panti.
The Queen allegedly chided the police for locking up God. They were later released as the investigation into the case continued.
But Andrew seized the opportunity to snatch his mother from the sect and took her to the hospital for necessary medical attention.
She died on Sunday, August 26, 2001, while still receiving medical attention. She was 69.
Mrs Afolabi was buried in her home town, Pforzheim, in West Germany, on August 29, 2001. And a memorial service, according to her obituary in The Guardian, was held for her on Wednesday, September 19, at Our Saviour’s Church, Tafawa Balewa Square, Lagos.
He said: “My mother spent nine days in confinement, and she was not allowed to see her grandchildren and daughter-in-law, who were in the same compound.
“She was not fasting, but they didn’t give her food for 40 hours. She asked the cook to give her food, but the cook said unless the Queen sent her she would not go and get the food.
“They made my mother commit herself in writing that she wanted to stay with them. We were not attending the WWCG or the Glory ministries. We were all brought up in Our Saviours Church in Lagos.
“My mother is a very nice woman, very Godly and very strict. If she tells her driver to resume at 8 a.m., and he is five minutes late, the driver will meet her driving herself out and she will go wherever she wanted to go without the driver, but she will not deduct his pay at the end of the month.”
When the Glory Ministries was to be registered, a small notice was placed in the August 14, 1998 edition of the Vanguard Newspapers with seven persons mentioned as trustees, in accordance with the provision under part C of the C&A matters Act of 1990.
Their names are Mrs Ola-Oluwa Fanawopo, Mr Joel Fanawopo, Mrs Josephine Ichagba, Mr Williams Nwamu, Mr Chukwuma Ojinma, Mrs Ujunwa Ugboko, Mr Usen Akah and David Afolabi.
The notice was signed according to the publication, by the Akani Chambers on 32, Seinde Street, Oshodi, in Lagos.
Iweajunwa allegedly rushed to Abuja to try and stop the registration, but he failed and his first son, Solomon, who was also against the sect, became a staunch member.
“When my son learnt about the sect,” Iweajunwa said, “he condemned it. He said: “What WWCG could not deliver, will the newfangled ministry deliver it? The source of the ministry is demonic.”
“My son was captured in Owerri, where he was allegedly crying during a service.
“Those who have joined the sect resigned from their respective jobs; they sold all their properties and gave the money to the sect, claiming that since the kingdom of God has come, they do not need anything worldly.
“They claim they live in the kingdom and the kingdom has come. They withdrew all their children from schools and changed their names.
“But Ojinma the brain behind it all has four children and none of them is in the sect. They are all in school in Aba.
“My son, who is married with three kids, had stopped seeing me and his family since he joined the sect. He has become wild. I’ve never seen Solomon in that state before.”
Speaking about WWCG and the Queen of the Glory Ministries, Omotoso said she was the daughter of late Ibukunoluwa Ibirogba. He went on to narrate how she became the daughter of late Funmilayo Odumosu who was known as Jesu Oyingbo when he led a sect after which the Glory Ministry appeared to have been patterned.
Omotoso said: “Ibirogba and Jesu Oyingbo were together when the church was founded. When he (Ibirogba) travelled overseas in the early 70s, the wife he had then, and his daughter, Ola-Oluwa, were left with Jesu Oyingbo.
“Ibirogba left our church and was back in the old church, the Church of God before he died.”
After the police had raided the Glory Ministries on Musa Akor Close, in 2001, the sect moved to a new place, 6/8 Ogunseyitan Close, William Elliot Estate, in New Oko-Oba; a twin storey building, well fortified with a high fence that was taped around with an interesting network of American fence wire.
During the interview with Mrs Udeagha in Aba, one of her relations had said she must have thanksgiving at the church.
She quickly replied. “I’ll never go to any church again. I’ve seen hell.”
In November 2013, the reporter returned to Abia searching for Mrs Udeagha; but she could not be found, neither could any relation, at the house on Ehi Road, Aba, where she had taken refuge in 2001.
Another search on the internet threw up her daughter, who is still hand-in-glove with the Queen of Glory on Facebook.
So far, there is nothing to show that Irene has reunited with her mother since 2001. Her world appears to revolve around her father and Ola-Oluwa.
Irene speaks about her father, on her Facebook page, with so much passion.
There is a post on her wall, spiced with few typographical errors, which she captioned thus: My.Own.Daddy! And the message under it is: “..a man of substance and integrity..a man focused n driven to dare what is noble and worthy…a man who has stepped out of his very own comfort zone that others may smile…a man who has given his all to make mi the amazing lady I am today…a man i love above all men…a man Like my daddy!”
But she ignored a request by this reporter who sent a message to her asking about her mother. Attached to the message was the picture in which the mother was carrying Irene and her twin sister, who later died, as a baby.
Immediately she received the picture and the message, she blocked all contacts with the reporter through the administrators of the social media.
Days later, she left where she was working as a Web developer/Graphic designer at 3m4sis Communications Ltd., at River Valley Estate, Ojodu, in Lagos, and relocated to Uganda, to pursue a career in modelling with Crystal Models, a top high fashion, advertising, and commercial casting agency.
In the course of fresh investigations into the transformation of the sect, the reporter visited House Number 10, Ondo Street, in Ikeja, where the activities allegedly started in the late 1990s. The immaculate white one-storey building stands out like an innocent bride, amid flowers growing wild across the high wall with a head-tie band of American barbed wire.
The gates were locked, so the reporter had to locate the chairman of the landlord association, one Chief Awosika, who claimed to be the first settler on street.
When some questions were put to him, he said: “Yes, on that property, tenants have come and gone. There are tenants still living there, but they may have gone out by now.”
He recalled that the building was occupied by some people running a church a few years ago.
His words: “Yes, at about the time you mentioned, but frankly none of us knew that something like that was going on. I think they were some Christian group led by one pastor with some international organization or group.
“That house belongs to a medical doctor. He lives in Opebi area of Ikeja. He is a good friend; I know his house, but I cannot recall the name of the street or the number of the house.
“There was also a man who rented that house; he killed cows and threw an all-night party as if the house belonged to him, and he was carrying out a house warming ceremony. He was finally pushed out because he couldn’t pay up his rent.”
Another trip was made to Gberigbe in Ikorodu, on the outskirts of Lagos, where Ola-Oluwa has advertised on Facebook that the Golden Age Tabernacle is located.
The church could not be found.
Gberigbe community is a small settlement; a mix of the old and the new. One could see a primary school built in 1954 by the Methodist church; a large compound that houses the senior and junior arms of the Community Secondary School, a community transformer, roadside market and a medium-size fuel station which doubles as the motor park.
The community leader, known as Baale Olusegun Ogunlana, never heard of Golden Age Tabernacle.
He said: “Maybe they have been operating underground. Or, probably, they are still new in this community, but we will locate them in due course.”
In an effort to spread some of her teachings to millions of people around the world, Ola-Oluwa has now written a book entitled: Mystery of the Woman, which she is selling on a dedicated Web site.