Founder of Word Assembly Ministries, Rev Isaac Omolehin, says threats of a bandit attack have forced him, his family and more than 100 residents of his camp in Kwara State into hiding.
Rev Isaac Omolehin said the security scare began when police officers stormed his church camp at Idofian, Ifelodun Local Government Area, around midnight between May 30 and 31 and ordered everyone to evacuate immediately.
According to the cleric, the police warned that bandits were on their way to attack the facility.
“The police came to my camp in the middle of the night and asked everybody to run because kidnappers were coming to attack me. The whole camp was deserted, and it has remained deserted,” he said.
The cleric said he was not at the camp when the evacuation took place but later learnt that the suspected bandits eventually arrived.
“They came, the bandits, but they didn’t meet anybody,” he added.
Omolehin said the development has left him constantly moving from one location to another with his wife and children.
“I have a house I can’t enter. I have a car I can’t ride. I have to hide myself from the public. If I sleep here today, I’ll sleep somewhere else tomorrow. I’m homeless with my wife and children,” he said.
The abandoned facility, according to him, is more than a church camp. It houses an orphanage, primary and secondary schools, a hospital, an old people’s home and a rehabilitation centre for women rescued from the streets and their children.
“Bandits chased us out of that place. The school cannot open, the hospital is not functioning, and the patients and nurses all ran for their lives,” Omolehin said.
He said more than 100 people who lived at the facility have since been scattered across different locations, with authorities yet to give the green light for their return.
The cleric said he wrote the police seeking confirmation that the area was safe, particularly because schools had resumed and more than 100 children under his care needed to return.
“We asked if it was safe for us to return because schools had resumed and we have over a hundred children that need to go to school. There has been no response,” he said.
Omolehin added that reports had also been sent to the Department of State Services and the Kwara State Ministry of Social Welfare, which supervises orphanages and rehabilitation centres.
But, according to him, no official response has been received.
The cleric also linked the Kwara incident to an attack on his village in Kogi State days later, saying several people were killed there.
“Three days after the attack on my camp here in Kwara, my village in Kogi State was also attacked, and my people were killed. When they missed me here in Kwara, they went to my village and attacked my people,” he alleged.
While the buildings at the camp remain standing, Omolehin said the prolonged abandonment has opened the facility to thieves who allegedly began carting away property after the evacuation.
He, however, distinguished the alleged looters from the bandits who prompted the evacuation.
“The kidnappers did not destroy our buildings; the structures in the camp are still intact. However, a few days after we evacuated, thieves began breaking into the camp and carting away our belongings,” he said.
“Those were different criminals. The kidnappers did not come to steal refrigerators, fans or mattresses. They came for human beings.”
Omolehin, who is known for his outspoken views on divisions within the Nigerian Church, said the security threat was coming amid other challenges surrounding his ministry.
He disclosed that he was recently stopped from preaching in Baptist churches.
“Baptists banned me from preaching in Baptist churches just about a month ago,” he said.
Despite the situation, the cleric said he remained committed to his ministry, recalling that he had faced various forms of opposition over his preaching.
He appealed to the Federal Government and the Kwara State Government to strengthen security around the camp and make it possible for the displaced residents to return.
According to him, some of the orphaned children in the facility were actually referred there by government authorities.
“I want to appeal to the government to improve security so that I can return to the camp with my family and all the people I look after,” he said.
“Some of the children in the orphanage were brought to us by the government. Even if they say they don’t care about the rest of us, what about the children they entrusted to us?”
Don’t Miss Out! Join our WhatsApp Channel for instant news updates. Click here to join
