Police officers in
collaboration with security personnel of the Redeemed Christian Church of God,
RCCG have evacuated destitute comprised of couples with their young children,
middle-aged men and women as well as the elderly.
Over 100 suspected homeless
people have been evacuated from the Redemption Camp on the Lagos-Ibadan
expressway, the New Telegraph reports. According to the report, the evacuation
was carried out by policemen and security personnel of the Redeemed Christian
Church of God (RCCG).
The destitute and families
were said to have been dumped at different locations in Abeokuta, the Ogun
state capital.
The raid by the policemen
and RCCG security personnel were said to have happened at the worship ground in
the early hours of Wednesday, May 22 and victims were apprehended. The
destitute were said to have been forcefully carried into waiting vehicles as
they drove them to Abeokuta under the cover of the night. The sight of the
destitute at Oke-Sokori, Kuto and Iyana Mortuary areas of Abeokuta sparked
tension among residents.
Some of the destitute, who
claimed to have spent between six months and one year at the Redemption Camp,
accused the church authorities of victimisation. The victims explained that the
RCCG security operatives with policemen indiscriminately rounded them up during
vigil service midnight on Tuesday, May 21 and threw them into waiting vehicles
which eventually took them to Abeokuta.
When the head of media,
RCCG, Pastor Olaitan Olubiyi, was contacted on the telephone, he was said to
have absolved the church of any blame. Olubiyi denied the allegation that the
church forcibly ejected the destitute from its premises, explaining that what
the church did was simply to purge the camp of miscreants and others with
criminal tendencies. His words:
“We have a system through
which we screen those who genuinely come for prayers. We also have an approved
way of taking care of the destitute in the church of God. “Whenever anyone
comes for prayer, we do ensure that we properly document their data in our
register to prevent criminal situations. But those ones you see illegally found
their ways into the church. “Some of them were screened for the purpose of
knowing their challenges and those with genuine accommodation problems were
assisted. But you will discover that they change their addresses and still
return to the church.”
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