After a five-year-long investigation into the finances of United Kingdom branch of Christ Embassy, founded by popular mega-church pastor, Chris Oyakhilome, the UK Charity Commission has indicted the church’s board of trustees of a wide range of fraudulent practices including illegally paying more than N827 million to entities and organisations it shares close relationships with.
The commission had originally interviewed members of the church’s board of trustees and perused the records and books of the church for a year. Still not convinced that the church has prudently management its finances, it sidelined its board of trustees and appointed Rod Weston of the international audit and accounting firm, Mazar, as interim manager to take over the management of the church in what it described as “temporary and protective measure.
However, despite telling the inquiry team that its “grant making practice consisted of a discussion by the Trustees at a Trustee meeting regarding who should receive grant”, the interim manager found no evidence of compliance with the said grant-making policy. “However, neither set of minutes included any decision or resolution to make payments to a company of which one trustee was sole shareholder,” the report stated.
The inquiry also found that the church allowed Loveworld Limited to use its £1.8 million property for free between 2006 and September 2012. When queried about this, the trustees told the inquiry team that Loveworld Limited occupied a “small part of the premises” on an informal basis. They said Loveworld was subsequently charged £75,000 per year for the use of the property.
“The trustees failed to provide any records to evidence that conflicts of interest had been identified or correctly managed prior to the opening of the Inquiry,” the report stated.The investigation identified nine active bank accounts, which the church’s board of trustees claimed was holding funds belonging to Christ Embassy Nigeria, a separate entity from Christ Embassy UK.
However, the inquiry team “noted that the Land Registry entries in respect of the 3 properties made no reference to the beneficial owner being Christ Embassy Nigeria and documentation supplied by the trustees provided no evidence to support their assertions. None of the Land Registry proprietorship registers differed in any material way from those of the properties originally disclosed to the Commission as belonging to the charity.
Source: News Formal (newsformal.com)
I'm waiting for the outcome of this news,it's first published in seems any time you want attention you just publish anything negative about Pastor Chris&Christ Embassy.The Church is Marching forward,we are unstoppable until Jesus comes
Dear premiumtimesng ,Pastor Chris gave $125,000 last night to 10 young African Leaders who are inventors,educationists,social crusaders, entrepreneurs so as to support their projects,yet such news doesn't draw your attention.Stop your junk journalism in 2020
Last I checked, it was not the church that is the problem of this country. Why is it that youths of this days get distracted easily?
Lol. na today?
Clear reason why Nigerian pastors are always in the front list when it comes to the world richest pastors.....
You guys are excited and Carried away by every wind of attack on the church so sad,how you forget the scriptures judge not.
🤣🤣.. but did you guys really read this report.. because this is typical Christ embassy, you dont need to carry out plenty investigations, visit the churches, our partnership arms are not hidden at all.
No Nigerian Church will survive in the UK if they were to be in the UK.
RealSolaKuti Good. You can't claim to be a charity but devote less than 30% of your income to charitable efforts, repatriate a large percentage of it to Nigeria & indulge in property speculation etc. UK laws are clear, Nigerian churches should comply or close down those branches
Pretending to be surprised 😂
don_fejak
Some news agency will just jump on falsehood and report it, pst Oyedepo case came up some years ago,but when he was exonerated no-one reported it, it's sad how blood thirsty we are here, we deserve the kind of country we have, cos we are as wicked as the people we accuse
Where are the touch not the anointed folks, UK no send una o.
Austynzogs So much to be learn here
Water is wet
Hmmmm detty december!!
It’s because he’s not from the North abi .....
liteventures I'm not even surprised. If the EFCC and ICPC beam their light on Pentecostal churches in Nigeria peren? 🤐
Finally, the veil has been lifted. I am looking forward to when Nigeria's FRCN will look into the books of our churches operated as business ventures with zero accountability to members.
This 2019 has been the year of exposing false pastors and prophets
So the 'massive' fraud is transfer of money from their UK branch to other arms of the ministry and not enough insurance 🙄🙄
Fela's prophecies yet again.... I love to see this
Fraud? What a misleading headline why even bring this up now? A case that finding and conclusions were made far back as 2015. There are many issues to talk about but no, you ppl will rather look 4 one man of God to bring down
The kind of news I like to hear
KICC was investigated by the UK charity commission for one year with £1m from the church account and nothing was found against it.
_dvyn_
Efficacy12 As a business entity or as a church?
See your colleague below but brown envelope journalism won't allow you
Toh. We bn knew.... nr be today!
Blind people callung prosperity fraud.... It was too much that they couldn't call it prosperity, they had to call it fraud. You havent seen any yet, in the budget of some churches, Nigeria will be included as a sector of a church budget
These Jesus pimps posing as pastors in Africa need the gospel to fuel their ostentatious lifestyles. These creeps know nothing about christ
YOU'RE BROKE, YOU WILL SOON GO INTO EXTINCTION LIKE OTHERS
This one we see news u a call am fake, which one we go believe. Church na business. From Orthodox churches to one man controlled Church. But I no go reason am because if I do, I no go serve God again. Make una leave matter.
Kicc on that table
Hypocrites would put their lives and deceitful heads on the ground and tag this as the handy work of the devil and enemies. I pity our people.
The Pastor of Masturbation himself
Old news... Fake news
What a shame. It takes the British & Americans to uncover fraud involving Nigerians
Only the religiously blind will not see that our churches will be cesspool of corruption the way they are set up. Especially, the one-man mega churches where the GO or the founder is both the spiritual and administrative sole dictator.
You're among the junk news outlet, they cleared Christ Embassy and appreciated the ministry for her good work in charity, but as a brown envelope news outlet you're singing a different song.
But having read through the report, I find the Charities act rather overbearing.. Though Christ Embassy had their reasons for registering as a Charity in the first place, and tax evasion is WRONG. If Jesus was in modern day UK, he'd be investigated for feeding 5000 with 5 loaves
Most of these big pastors in Nigeria are fraudsters.
ayemojubar We been knew.
Our Churches dt should be d Moral Compass 4 d Society is fast becoming a Source of Embarrassment to d society, n their activities is not different from dt of Politician's n Yahoo Yahoo's
Fesimaxu They always fail to learn one of Jesus' basic lessons - Never hold your own cash
Is there any church that will survive if forensic audit is carried out
Chinso😮😦
If ICPC_PE or officialEFCC put on torch light for Nija, Na anti-religious and autocratic ringing tone it will turn to. Greater percentage of religious houses in Nigeria is guilty of all these crimes to NigeriaGov .
Na today?
_auxano insert my prophetic Marley
😅😅
What?
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