Although the Catholic priest denied meeting the president for any personal gain, he admitted during his sermon on Sunday that the deal in question was a “contract of securing the country”.

He also said the meeting was during Buhari’s first term when he went to “hand over” three white men he never knew but who said “they had the platform to end insecurity in this country under one month”.

The presidency had accused the cleric of seeking Buhari’s removal as president because he was rebuffed after seeking government contracts.

According to Garba Shehu, the presidential spokesman that made the allegation, “Father Mbaka asked for a meeting and to the shock of Presidential Aides, he came accompanied by three contractors. The President graciously allowed them in, and to everyone’s surprise, Father Mbaka asked for contracts as compensation for his support.”

Addressing thousands in his congregation in Emene, Enugu state, Mbaka said the white men in question were in Enugu to request his assistance in reaching the president.

He also attacked Shehu and the presidency for choosing to hide the truth while “you started attacking the person who said the truth.”

He said: “When they talked about giving Father Mbaka contracts, I don’t want to talk about that, I was laughing. It is a laughable, childish accusation. Whoever is saying that is a shame to himself and shame to the people he is representing. The three men he talked about, I am not here to defend anybody’s stupid allegation, but God used that man to tell the world that Buhari’s government is not giving me money.

“Shehu, may God bless you for telling everybody that you are not giving me a contract. And these are the three men that we brought that will handle insecurity for the country; they had the gadgets. The white people had the facilities. That was during the first administration.

“They said they will help them in conquering insecurity. They had the platform to end insecurity in this country under one month; under Abba Kyari. I just handed them over to the government people. They denied them of these.

“I don’t even know these people. They just came to Enugu and said, can I help them reach the government, that the level of insecurity in this country and how Nigeria has been shipping their oil out, refining and bringing them back, that we are losing. That they have all it takes to revive the oil apparatus in the country and get the whole youths employed and the issue of insecurity will die. These are the three people they rejected their offer, since they know how to talk.”

On the one hand, Mbaka said he had nothing to gain from the said meeting, but on the other hand, he attacked the presidency for not having a “reward mechanism”.

He spoke about the people he has helped in life and asked: “All the people they have been giving contracts, are they better than me? Am I begging them, do they know how many people I feed? Fortunately, they reported that they denied me of the contract — which contract?”

“And even the people they are talking about that went there, I didn’t even discuss one percent of ‘if you get this contract’; contract of securing the country? What am I going to gain from it? As if to say when he pushes that, Father Mbaka is no longer a Nigerian,” he said.

“They have shown that they don’t have what they will call, reward mechanism. If Shehu is a human… I don’t even know who the Shehu is. He should be apologising that by now, they have not come down to say nagode Allah for surviving whatever they are passing through. The last person this administration should fight is Father Mbaka talking here because if they speak against me, the anger of heaven will be upon them and how they will end will shock everybody.”

The priest further dismissed reports asking the Catholic church and Pope Francis to discipline him, saying he will be rewarded for speaking against “evil governance.”

“If Rome hears that Father Mbaka is challenging evil governance, Rome will clap for me, so quickly go to Rome,” he said.

“Why I don’t want them even to report this to Rome is because if pope hears the extent of my involvement, they may give me a position I may not like You want to report Messi to FIFA that he plays too much ball? They will make him soccer ambassador.”

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The school was among the affected buildings in the explosion which rocked the community. Over 20 students were said to have been trapped in the dormitory .

Residents said they encountered difficulty trying to get the students out and the priest who had also come to lend a hand died in the process.

“He died trying to save the lives of those students,” one of the residents who gave his name simply as Delight said.

The identity of the priest has not been made known, but residents said he worshipped at a nearby Catholic church.

Delight said the explosion which happened around 8am came with a thunderous sound that shook buildings and structures.

“The next thing we saw was that some parts of Bethlehem school had collapsed, and people started running,” he said.

“We called fire service and at first they couldn’t locate where the incident happened. Then another bystander volunteered his phone to call them, and when they eventually arrive but with a small truck. They soon found out they needed more firepower to put out the fire and they called for backup.”

The small truck, however, had helped clear a path for the volunteers to get to the boarding school where they rescued some students and staff.

According to Delight, about 15 bodies were evacuated, and some volunteers who incurred several injuries have been taken to the hospital.

The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) had said over 50 buildings were destroyed in the explosion.

The agency also said the explosion was not caused by pipeline vandalism.

As of 5pm on Sunday, NEMA and other relevant officials were still in the area checking for casualties.

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The Catholic diocese of Enugu announced this via its official Facebook page, blaming the incident on suspected herdsmen.

“With a deep sense of sorrow, the Catholic Diocese of Enugu announces the tragic death of Rev. For. Paul Offu who was shot dead this evening (1st August 2019) by some hoodlums suspected to be the notorious and murderous herdsmen, along Ihe-Agbudu Road in Awgu LGA,” the diocese wrote.

The priest was until his death the parish priest of St. James the Great parish, Ugbawka.

The sad incident comes less than a month after another priest was killed by yet-to-be-identified people in the state.

Ikechukwu Ilo was attacked and seriously injured by kidnappers who opened fire on him after he refused to stop his car.

It also comes months after Clement Ugwu, another priest, was killed by armed men while returning from a meeting in Ezeagu local government area.

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McCarrick, who in July became the first Roman Catholic prelate in almost 100 years to lose the title of cardinal, has now become the highest profile church figure to be dismissed from the priesthood in modern times.

The defrocking was announced ahead of coming week’s meeting at the Vatican between the heads of national Catholic churches to discuss the global sexual abuse crisis.

McCarrick had appealed the decision, however, it was upheld and Pope Francis said no further appeal would be allowed.

The allegations against McCarrick date back to decades ago when he was still rising to the top of the U.S. church hierarchy.

McCarrick, who became a power-broker as Archbishop of Washington, D.C. from 2001 to 2006, is living in seclusion in a remote friary in Kansas.

He has responded publicly to only one of the allegations, saying he has “absolutely no recollection” of an alleged case of sexual abuse of a 16-year-old boy over 50 years ago.

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Philip Wilson, the archbishop of Adelaide, becomes the most senior Catholic in the world to be charged and convicted of the offence.
He was found to have covered up the abuse of altar boys by a paedophile priest colleague in New South Wales.

During his trial he denied being told about the abuse by some of the victims.

In a statement issued by the church on Wednesday, Wilson said he was “obviously disappointed” with the verdict and would consider his legal options.

Last month, Wilson told the Newcastle Local Court he had no knowledge of priest James Fletcher’s actions, which took place when he was an assistant priest in Maitland, 130km (80 miles) north of Sydney.

Fletcher was later convicted of nine child sexual abuse charges in 2004, and died in jail in 2006.

One of his victims, former altar boy Peter Creigh, told the court he had described the abuse to Wilson in detail in 1976, five years after it took place.

Magistrate Robert Stone rejected Wilson’s claims that he had no memory of the conversation, and said he found Mr Creigh to be a reliable witness.

The priest knew “what he was hearing was a credible allegation and the accused wanted to protect the Church and its reputation”, Magistrate Stone said.

Another victim, who cannot be named, told the court he disclosed the abuse in the confessional box when he was 11 years old. He said Wilson told him he was telling lies and to recite 10 Hail Mary prayers as punishment.

Child sexual abuse survivors praised the verdict in emotional scenes outside the court following the decision.

“The decision will hopefully unravel the hypocrisy, the deceit, and the abuse of power and trust that the church has displayed,” Mr Creigh told reporters.

Wilson’s lawyers had tried to get the case thrown out on four occasions, after the 67-year-old was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

He will be sentenced in June and faces a maximum two-year jail term.

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Chris Ezike, the state commissioner of police, confirmed the development Channels TV on Sunday.

Onunkwo was said to have been abducted from his vehicle in Orlu, a town in the state on Friday morning.

Following a manhunt, a body was discovered in the bush in Omuma village in Orlu east local government area, still in Imo, on Saturday.

The commissioner said the corpse had been identified as that of the priest.

He also said investigations were ongoing to unveil Onunkwo’s killers.

There are speculations that he may have been strangled as his body had no gunshot nor stab wounds, according to the police.

They also said his car was discovered intact, with nothing removed from it.

The police said they have not made any arrest in connection with the incident.

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The Church said the essence of his transfer was to make him more useful.

In a reaction through the Secretary-General of the Catholic Secretariat of Nigeria, Reverend Father Ralph Madu, the church said the posting was not meant to be punitive but a “normal church procedure.”

“Mbaka’s transfer is not an exception; the Bishop has the right to post any priest wherever he feels his service would be more useful to the church.

“His posting should have been a privilege, not a punishment – which the Bishop can do because he has the power.

“If he (Mbaka) says it’s a punishment, then it’s open for further investigation. Posting is a regular thing, a priest can be transferred after two, three, four, or more years. It depends on the discretion of the Bishop.

“That ministry (Adoration Ministry) is his private ministry. It does not belong to the church. Overseeing a parish is a full time job. Overseeing a ministry is a bigger task. If the church decides to take him somewhere where he’ll have more time to carry out his ministry, how is it punitive? That should not be the language.”

Madu said Fr. Mbaka had done things that were unacceptable to the church in the past but received no punishments for them.

“He is supposed to be a missionary. What if the Bishop had closed down the ministry, which is within his power to do? Sometimes, transfers can be for the good of the priest as something can be going wrong which he might not be aware of. The Bishop is free to move any priest at any time, it is his prerogative.”

Criticisms had greeted the Enugu Diocese’s recent decision to transfer Mbaka out of Christ the King Parish , GRA, where he had served for over a decade and had established a popular prayer ministry, the Adoration Prayer Ministry.

Fr Mbaka is to resume immediately at his new post at the Our Lady Parish, Emene. The priest, who is as fiery as he is controversial, had described his re-posting by the church as a “calculated move” to make him suffer.”

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After he slumped, church workers rushed to the altar and took him to a hospital but before doctors could attend to him, he was dead.

The 82-year-old Idika who hailled from Umunze in Orumba South in Anambra, was posted to the parish after he retired from active priesthood.

He volunteered to assist other priests to celebrate mass.

On the day the incident happened, Idika went to the church to conduct mass before he slumped right in front of the congregation.

Eye witnesses account said that, half way into the service, Idika fell down on the altar and became unconscious.

The incident threw the congregation into confusion and the mass ended abruptly.

His corpse was later deposited at the Visitation Hospital mortuary in Umuchu.

Some of the parishioners who spoke to our correspondent said the late Idika lived a good life throughout the period he was active as a priest.

PMNews

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The State Police Public Relations Officer, Wole Ogodo, who disclosed this, said the robbers were operating on the road when the victims ran into them.

He explained that the victims were travelling in Toyota Highlander when the robbers came out of the bush and opened fire on their vehicle.

The Police spokesman added that the robbers shot at the petrol tank of the ill-fated vehicle while the driver was trying to escape with vehicle.

He stated that the vehicle burst into flame, burning the occupants, saying the driver sustained injuries and receiving treatment at an undisclosed hospital.

Ogodo, however, said the men of the command were on the trail of the bandits while investigation was ongoing and assured the travellers of adequate safety on the highways in the state.

The PPRO said, “On getting the information of the incident, our patrol team quickly went to the scene to rescue the surviving driver and deposit the corpses of the deceased in a mortuary.”

It was gathered that the deceased were travelling from Lagos to ‎Ugbe-Akoko in Akoko North-East Local Government Area of Ondo State on the fateful day to meet with members of their family, who reside in the town.

Meanwhile, the Director of Social Communications of the Catholic Diocese of Ondo, Reverend Father Leo Aregbesola, when contacted on telephone, said he had yet to receive the information as of the press time.

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Mbaka, whose New Year Message, “From Goodluck to Badluck,” became a major talking point during the campaigns for the election, said Buhari’s emergence was a divine victory for all Nigerians.

Speaking through his spokesman, Maximus Ugwuoke, Mbaka also noted that Buhari’s victory was a fulfillment of his prophecy in the New Year Message, but urged the President-Elect to seek divine wisdom before appointing people who will work with him.

According to him, President Goodluck Jonathan’s biggest problem was that he surrounded himself with the “wrong people,” advising Buhari to avoid making the same mistake.

“It is with vindictive joy and glory to God that the Adoration Ministry, the nation and indeed the world saw the fulfillment of Fr. Mbaka’s New Year prophesy of change with the miraculous, victorious emergence of General Muhammed Buhari at the March 28th polls as the President-elect of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

“We wish to restate that before President Goodluck became the President of this country, Fr. Mbaka prophesied it in his message titled ‘Okolo.’

“Today again, Buhari’s victory, among other lessons it portends to Nigerians, has once more confirmed to all and sundry that Fr. Mbaka is indeed a true Prophet of God and that his New Year message was indeed from the Oracle of the Holy Spirit as he declared.

“The ministry with magnanimous heart holds no grudges against anyone who attacked it in one way or the other at the rage of the controversies surrounding Fr. Mbaka’s message and view their actions as being orchestrated by their misconstruing of Fr. Mbaka’s prophetic calling.

“The Ministry joins the rest of Nigerians to congratulate Buhari as God’s chosen instrument of change to tackle the myriads of problems facing Nigeria and pray God to endow him with the wisdom to go about this onerous task.

“We see Buhari’s victory as divine victory to all Nigerians irrespective of our religious and ethnic divide.”

While urging Buhari to seek divine wisdom before choosing the people he would work with, he said, “The prayer of Fr. Mbaka is that God will give Buhari wisdom not to surround himself with wrong people – that was the major problem Jonathan’s administration faced.

“Fr. Mbaka has advocated that Nigerians should be patient with Buhari because the holes dug in the country are too much – holes of corruption, holes of unemployment, among others.”

He, however, assured that he will be the first to condemn Buhari if he fails to live up to expectations.

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