Police in Enugu State have arrested Bishop Ginika Obi for
allegedly defrauding members of the public of over N500 million.
The Spokesman of the Police Command in the state, Ebere
Amaraizu, said this in a statement on Monday in Enugu.
Amaraizu said Bishop Obi, who is in-charge of the City of
Liberation and Comfort Ministry in Enugu, had been trailed by police operatives
for three months.
“Bishop Ginika Obi in-charge of City of Liberation and
Comfort Ministry is now helping police operatives of the Commissioner of Police
Enugu Monitoring Unit following his arrest over the weekend in a Hotel in Enugu
where he has been taking refuge.
“Before now, the suspect who hailed from Umuaku in Uli
community of Ihiala Local Government Area in Anambra was also in-charge of an
alleged financial Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) known as `Build Your
Generational Organisation’ where his victims are made to invest with a hope of
reaping a bumper financial dividend.
“It was gathered that his victims are numerous and with
various degrees of complaints of huge amount of money swindled from them
without anything to show for it.
“The suspect on noticing that police are on his trail
based on complaints of alleged swindling of some suspected members of the
public to the tune of N500 million with his wife and some of his eight alleged
pastors, disappeared for months.
“The bishop, however, left his wife in Enugu Prisons
custody over the matter.
“During his disappearance from Enugu, preliminary
investigations revealed that he escaped and relocated to Asaba in Delta to
avoid being nabbed by police operatives for months.
“It was further gathered that luck ran out of the suspect
over the weekend as he was trailed based on intelligence information to a hotel
at Amechi Road off Agbani Road in Enugu where police operatives acting on a
tip-off nabbed him,’’ he said.
Amaraizu said that the bishop had also revealed during
preliminary investigations that he never knew that his alleged financial NGO
would “turn out in this way”.
“The suspect (bishop) disclosed that the amount he
defrauded was not up to the sum of N500 million but N186 million, while
regretting his action,’’ the police spokesman said.
Some of the suspect’s victims, Blessing Edekin a widow,
Nnenna Okonkwo and Chidiebere Okolo, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that
the bishop had defrauded them of various sums of money and disappeared.
They expressed delight at his arrest.
The Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr Danmallam
Mohammed, had directed a full scale investigation into the alleged nefarious
activities of the cleric. (NAN)
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