He has been vilified without a response and therefore caught the image of a molester. However, meeting Dr. Chris Okafor, General overseer of Mountain of Liberation and Miracle Ministry cuts a different picture – sharp witted, cerebral and exuding a high level of both episcopal and philosophical calmness. He effortlessly exhibits control in the sprawling edifice at Ojodu that is the headquarters of his church. Just stepping down from his altar, he clutched the hand of his newly wedded wife, both dressed in white and tailed by a mammoth crowd that are his members. In his office, he calmly took Obinna Chima and Ahamefula Ogbu through his trajectories of life till when controversies found him. The man of God swore his innocence on allegations of molesting women, even his daughters and wondered why it was when it went public that he was remarrying that all the allegations started flying. He spoke of his early life, call, how the hand of God rested on him, chequered marriage, divorce, failed DNA test of two children and recovery to remarry, then the social media draggings… Excerpts:

Can you take us back to your early years—what was life like growing up, and how did your upbringing shape your worldview?

My upbringing was interesting in the sense that it was a humble beginning that shaped and prepared us for today. A lot of people make the mistake of building the future for their children and not building their children for their future. So, how I was raised, I was built and prepared for the future. I was born and raised in Benin City, which was known then as Bendel State and now Edo State. We lived together as a family with my parents in just one room in Benin City, specifically at Number One Emovon Street, off St. Saviour in Benin City.

My parents were and are still very strong Christians, and the way we were raised prepared us for everything you see God doing today. Thirteen of us were living in one room – my parents, my siblings, and my cousins. I recall my mother had her bed on the left while my father’s bed used to be by the right, in the same room. While the girls would lie on the bed with my mother, we, the boys, would put a mat on the floor. Prayers for us were compulsory – morning and night. From there, I attended primary, secondary schools, and the university, where I obtained my First Degree before I came to Lagos. Lagos was the beginning of the journey of this ministry. Meanwhile, I must recall that I had three sisters ahead of me.

So, my mother was under pressure for a male child. Pressure in the sense that in a typical African setting, would always be demanding for a male child. I had two brothers who later died; my father was looking for more male children. So, my mum was praying. She attended a conference where a powerful prophet prophesied to my mother that she would have a son who would become a prophet and would be mightily used by God, and that his prophetic gifts would start manifesting from the age of seven or eight. It was she and my dad who received the prophecy with other men and women of God confirming the same thing. My name was already given before I was born, so they didn’t have to pray or think about a name to call me because it was a thing of the spirit. So, they gave me the native name Ihechukwu, which means light of God; Christian, which means Christ-like.

That was how my name came. So, as I said earlier, while growing up, it was a necessity that you must do morning devotion in my family, and everyone must fast on the weekends; it was compulsory. At the age of six, there was a primary school opposite our house. The late Archbishop Benson Idahosa was holding a crusade, and I went there as a little child. Different miracles happened that night, and when he called those who were willing to give their lives to Jesus to come out, I came out. He saw me and told them to allow me to climb to the stage where he was, and he laid hands on me and spoke prophetically that God was going to use me. To me, that was my encounter with Jesus personally. By the age of seven and eight, my prophetic gifts started manifesting strongly.

On one occasion, as a little boy, I had a dream. I called my mum and dad to pray against a death in my family, and they ignored it. A week later, there was an accident, and my cousin was affected, and she was almost dead. When my parents received the sad news, that was when they remembered what I told them. So, the gift continued to manifest. Sometimes they can be playing football, and God will reveal the final scores to me. I was born into an Anglican family. I attended Ohuoba Primary School at Murtala Muhammed Way, Benin City; attended Edo College, and then proceeded to Ambrose Alli University.

My dad was a carpenter, and my mum used to sell vegetables at Ekiosa market. While we, the boys, would always follow my dad to his shop, the girls would go to the market with my mum. I learnt carpentry, and I was building wooden doors and all manner of things. I built a wooden wheelbarrow, and every morning when I wake up, I go to fetch water from a far distance until it’s about 6 am, and I will start preparing for school. So, all these shaped my childhood. I was the first to become a graduate in my family and there were many other ways through God’s privilege that I was prepared for this calling. When I got to Lagos, I did not know anybody and I went to a school and appealed to a security man to allow me to be sleeping in the small room with him. In the morning, I will take my shower and go out for evangelism and my street ministrations. It was from there a good man, an Anglican priest, Rev. Chuks Elezie, from Abia State, picked me up and took me to his house. That was how the ministry started about 22 years ago.

Would you say you were a stubborn child growing up, or more pliable?

I was a very stubborn child. I used to fight a lot growing up. You cannot grow up in Benin City and not be stubborn.

So, was the influence of your childhood more from your mother or your father?

I would say I got a little bit of the stubbornness from my father. My mother has a calm personality and my dad used to be stubborn. But as I grew up, I am only stubborn when it comes to confronting the enemy, but in the real sense, I am very humble.

Now, what is your actual age? Are you 55 years or 44 years, because what we have online is different from what you say is your age?

I don’t know how that came about, but we are going to do everything possible to correct that. There is nobody who can lie about his or her age because you have age mates that you grew up with. I was speaking with my childhood friends recently, and they were also worried that people are saying I am 55 years old. I am the sixth child of my mother. If my late elder brother was alive, he would have been 60 years. If he is 60 as the first and I am the sixth, how can I be 55 years? So, my real age is 44 years. Do I look 55 years? My mother is about 80 years old, so if I am 55 years old, how many years was my mother when she gave birth to her first child? But I think how that happened was that there was a time I wanted to travel abroad when I came to Lagos and they felt my age was too small. So, when I was to renew the passport, I didn’t know that while they were filing the form, they added more years to my age. I complained then, but there was nothing I could do. I am sure that was where they got that from. So, I am 44 years. I got married around 21 and 22 years.

Growing up among girls, what was the experience like? Did it make you have respect for women or to loathe women?

I have so much respect for women. For example, I love my mother so much, and I love my sisters, and I can tell you why. Even though we were born without a silver spoon, my mother stood with my father, showed us love and encouragement. I love my mother and my sisters and I respect women. Unfortunately, when I married at that young age, that changed everything. But I love my mother, my sister, and I am married now, so I love my wife as well as my biological daughters and every other one that God has brought around me.

You are a handsome young man, a man of means, and women flock around people like you. How do you manage pressure from women?

It is not a difficult thing to do. There is distraction, and there is focus. You choose focus. Focus is not the absence of distraction, but you choose focus. With the help of God, I have always known how to build deliberate structures around myself. Firstly, there are levels you go with God in prayers. When you become a man of prayers and fasting consistently, and you are determined, certain things don’t become a problem to you. The more you pray and get closer to God and study the word of God, these distractions don’t become problems to you anymore. So, I put structures around myself. For example, it will be difficult for the person to access me. From the church, which is our main consistency, if I am going to have a one-on-one counselling, I don’t do it in my office. We do it in the church openly. So, even if you are a man or woman, if I am counselling you, one of my pastors would be there. Secondly, I go from the church to my house and from my house to the church or when I am going to the airport. So, there are people around me that makes it impossible for people to access me. I don’t just go out because my face is not hidden. As you serve God, the last thing you will want to do is to bring the name of God to disrepute. Covenant and discipline must come in through the help of God.

There is this aphorism that there is a streak of Samson in every man. Do you mean that you don’t have feelings for the opposite sex?

I’m married, so I have feelings for my wife. The Bible made it clear in 1 Corinthians 7 that if you can stay without getting married, stay, but if not, marry, and that if you marry, you stay with your wife. The scripture has already settled it. I am a man, and I am happily married. So, whatever it is, is for me and my wife. Note that it took about 14 years for me to remarry, and for me to have stayed that long, there must be a reason for that. My appearance may be a little bit deceptive. Why did I say so? 1 Corinthians 2:7 says the man of the spirit knows the things of the spirit, but the people of the flesh only understand by the flesh.

So, because of what I went through in my previous marriage, it took me a long time to remarry. Recall that I spoke out one time after I was done with my first marriage. I had a really terrible experience in that marriage, and because of that, I said I was not going to get married again. What I am saying is not hidden because I said it openly in the church that I would never get married again, and that neither would I have anything to do with any woman because of the wound I came out with from that marriage. But I prayerfully went through it by the help of God and through fathers like Pastor Mathew Ashimolowo and Bishop David Abioye. These fathers really helped me to come out of it and encouraged me to remarry. So, the last thing in my mind before now was talking about a woman.

So, you don’t see yourself as a womaniser?

How can that be? Firstly, there are certain things you cannot do. If you carry fuel in your body, you cannot go to where there is light. It will burn you. You don’t carry water in your mouth and attempt to blow out a fire. Whether you like it or not, there are things that, by being a child of God, as a Christian and by your calling, to him whom much is given, much is expected. You cannot rebuke if you have not been rebuked; you cannot teach if you have not been taught, and you cannot command if you have not been commanded. So, you have to do everything possible because you are answerable to God. As I said to you, going through my experience in my first marriage, the last thing on your mind would be a woman or women. They say if you have been bitten by a snake before, even when you see a millipede, you will run. I am not just a Pastor that just goes to the altar to preach; if you attend my service, you will see the kind of things that God does through me. You cannot operate in that dimension and still be living your life anyhow.

So, why are there all sorts of allegations of molestation and sexual misconduct against you?

Now, another question that is important to be asked is: How come I wasn’t accused of molesting anyone for 14 years, until I decided to remarry? That is what everybody should be asking. So, they allowed me as a molester, to walk freely for 14 years? So, nothing was wrong until I decided to remarry? If I tell you that my ex-wife sent me a message recently asking me why I decided to remarry. Imagine a woman we divorced 14 years ago, with whom we have never spoken, because it was a bitter split, asking me why I decided to remarry. She even got my wife’s phone number and was threatening her that they would kill her.

So, the whole issue started because I decided to remarry. If I was any of those things they allege I am, they would have come out to say so for 14 years. Imagine telling my son that now that I have remarried, his inheritance will be threatened. How do you tell a 17-year-old boy that? This is the dimension and angle people don’t understand. I have the divorce proceedings. There is no way any court will put four children under your custody when you are a molester. She wanted to take custody of the children, but I told the court that she didn’t have what it takes to raise them. How old were these children then – nine, six, four, and two years respectively. No court would give me all those children if I were a molester. Recall that 14 years ago, she granted an interview to a newspaper, and there was no place where she mentioned that I molested the children. After that, I was given the custody of the children, and she was given access, so that she could come and see them, but under strict supervision. One day, she came to my house after we had divorced, and she said she was not going to leave. I had to call my lawyer, Barrister Ubani, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, who reported the matter to a Police Station close to my house. That was how they came and moved her out.

She tore her clothes, went to a newspaper, and granted another interview. There is no way I would be such a person, and the court would grant me the children. How do you think I will feel when a DNA test I conducted, which I decided to keep to myself for years, shows that two among the four children are not your own? That is the wound I have borne for many years that I kept within myself, because I wanted to protect those children. So, I am not happy that I am saying all of these. When all these things started, they went to VeryDarkMan (VDM), the one whose face was blurred, and made her say some scripted and fabricated fallacies against me. When I was with my previous wife, she would tell me, “I will pull you down, I will destroy your ministry.” So she thought she had found a platform to unleash that threat. It was well-scripted, and I am speaking today because I have evidence. If you watch, all these while I decided not to respond, not because I don’t know how to talk, or because we are powerless. But silence says so many things. Later, the one who is supposed to be the first daughter called from Canada via WhatsApp, and I recorded our conversation.

She kept asking if the conversation was being recorded because they knew they had done something bad to me. I asked her, “Chinyere, you grew up here, knew me as your father, have I ever done any of those things you were said to have accused me of doing?” She said “no.” I asked her again: “What is that thing you said I normally do to you before I climb the altar?” She said, “Nothing like that happened.” I asked her about what her sister went to VDM to say, and she said she doesn’t have any knowledge of such a thing, and I asked her to add her sister, Amarachi, to the WhatsApp call and she added her. I then asked Amarachi why she lied against me, and she said we should forget it, that it has passed. I said, “Really, to misrepresent me, damage my reputation, and make me look like who I am not, and you are saying it has passed.” I now knew it was a script and they told them to act. I asked her if I had ever done any of those things they accused me of doing, and she said no.

I now wanted to know why she went to that extent, and she said she was fighting for her sibling. So, Amarachi said Precious told her that she entered my room when she was 15 years old and that I touched her and she started shaking, and I left her alone thereafter. I now said if that is in my character, I would have done that to every one of you. Secondly, a molester or a rapist would not say because your body is shaking, he will not go ahead to molest you and if it is in my character, I would have done the same to all of them, and many more people would have come out to say I did the same to them. Later, the same VDM sent me a message on 25th December last year demanding that I should pay the fees for the remaining school years.

According to him, for Precious and the one in Canada, the total amount for school fees, accommodation and other allowance was $57,500. Then for Amarachi – school fees – N6.4 million and accommodation – N3.6 million. When we calculated everything and converted it to naira, it was about N80 million. So, how can you be asking a man who is a molester to pay your school fees? They just wanted to extort money from me if I had played along. One of my daughters sent me a message earlier that if I did not give them the money, she would go to social media. I have the message on my phone. It was then I now asked her to go and meet her mother to ask her who her real father is. Note this, when I discovered through the DNA test that she wasn’t my biological child, I withdrew myself, because there was so much pain in me, and I stopped paying the school fees further.

There were also allegations that you raped your present wife, and after that, you were forced to marry her?

That is to show you the level of desperation. The idea was to do everything to paint me black. My wife and I had a covenant discipline and we agreed that we would wait until after our marriage. For somebody to say I raped her and her parents now compelled me to marry her, it shows the level of desperation.

So, all these talks about young preachers covering for each other when there are allegations of misconduct is not real?

I have never covered for anybody, and for me, I don’t know anything like that. If you are a thief, you cover for a thief, and you cannot cover what you don’t know. I have never such an experience. You know when something happens, people would come out to say different things and all of that.

Who is your spiritual mentor, and what are your biggest strengths and weaknesses?

God is our strength, and there is no weakness in God; if there is no weakness in God, there is no atom of weakness in us. That is the reason why we are moving forward. The Bible says if you faint in the days of adversaries, it means your strength is little. But we are empowered and strengthened by God. As we go to him, we draw strength from him every day. God is powerful and it is the help of God and his mercy that has kept us and held us, and what the enemy meant for evil, God has turned it for our good. I can tell you that this season is my best season. Every season is important. There are seasons God wants you to learn, and there are seasons God wants you to know those around you. Some seasons come to announce you. Talking about mentorship, you heard me mention Pastor Mathew Ashimolowo, Bishop David Abioye and there are others that I admire, but these two stand out for me. They are my mentors and fathers and they have shaped my life. These fathers have stood for me to make sure I do the right thing and that I must continue to do the right thing. I can’t fail God and I can’t fail them. When I look at their faces, I tell myself that I can’t do anything that will bring reproach to them.

What do you consider your highest point in life in terms of happiness?

My highest point in life is when I fulfil what God has assigned me to do, and every time people are converted to Jesus Christ I am happy. Every time God uses me to reach his people, to deliver those in bondage and when I see a sinner turn to righteousness. Those are the things that make me happy.

What of your low points in life?

I don’t think there are low points in my life.

Do you have any regrets in life?

Not at all.

Can you speak to us about the empowerment schemes that are being undertaken by your ministry?

We have the Chris Okafor Humanity Foundation. That Foundation takes care of people in different ways. We have over 600 people, both in Lagos, in my village and other places on scholarship at various in secondary schools and universities. We also have foundation that takes care of widows and the less privilege. We cater for the less privileged, we empower people and atimes we train people for different skills. We have trained and empowered thousands of people since we started this and in the same vein we have sponsored many people abroad. We got visas for some, bought their tickets and all of that. There are countless of people we have sheltered and given accommodation. We give thanks to God for giving us the privilege and the wherewithal to be able to touch lives and we are going to do more by the grace of God. If you come to this area where we have our church, we did the interlocking of the road leading to our church for the community, we bought a new transformer for the community and provided a borehole to access water. We also have a school where we send members who cannot afford school fees to take care of their school fees. On the last Sunday of every month, we share rice and other foodstuffs to hundreds of the less privileged. God has used us to change lives here in Nigeria and all over the world. (THISDAY)