Aflao Police discounts claims

...that church holds members in servitude at Bibiani
Aflao, Jan 25, GNA-Mr Ahmed Issah Yakubu, Aflao District Police Commander on Saturday discounted reports about the local Maranatha Adventist Church, luring some followers from Aflao into a secret camp near Bibiani in the Western Region, where it kept them under inhuman conditions.

He said initial investigations so far after the police evacuated three Elders and 26 followers back to Aflao on Friday established no criminality against the elders.

Mr Yakubu said after the Church broke away from the Seventh Day Adventist Church at Aflao over doctrinal differences, some members from Aflao offered willingly to move with the new faction to Bibiani, but finally settled at Mintikwa, in the Brong Ahafo Region, where the church was established.

He said 14 adults among the followers who were brought back indicated in their statements that they voluntarily followed the elders and were not engaged in any forced labour as alleged. Mr. Yakubu said the 12 children among the evacuees, all bellow 17 year, went there with their parents.

He said further investigations were going on to find out if the rights of members of the Church were violated in anyway by the Church. Mr Yakubu appealed to the public to be truthful in their reports to the police, reminding them they could be prosecuted for deceit of a public officer.

Pastor Francis Denyo, Head of the Church admitted in a chat with the press that the elders took two meals a day while the others took a meal a day on their own volition.

He denied that they lured their followers through false prophesies that the sea was about to destroy Aflao and therefore people must relocate.

One, Master Patrick Hodonu, who claimed to have escaped from the camp, reported to the Police in Aflao that the followers were being maltreated, fed once a day and barred from using anything black. He also alleged that church members were not allowed to use mobile phones.

The reports created anxiety among relatives of the sojourning faithful, who clustered at the Aflao Police station demanding action. The Aflao Police therefore arranged and brought back the members of the Church to assist in investigations.