General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye, has rejected claims that he carried a placard in protest against former President Goodluck Jonathan, saying the photograph in circulation was taken during a 2020 prayer walk against insecurity.
Adeboye made the clarification on Sunday during RCCG’s November Thanksgiving Service, where he criticised journalists for failing to verify the date and circumstances surrounding the incident before publishing reports about it.
According to him, the report portrayed him as “a very wicked man” for allegedly carrying a placard against Jonathan, even though Jonathan had left office five years before the incident occurred.
“True, I carried a placard. I can’t deny that. It was important. It was a prayer walk. We wanted to pray,” Adeboye said.
He explained that the exercise followed a directive from the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) for churches to organise prayer walks as part of efforts to seek divine intervention over killings, terrorism and insecurity across the country.
“The chairman said all churches should do a prayer walk near their churches. That’s what I did,” he said.
Adeboye stressed that the date of the event made the claim that he was protesting against Jonathan untenable.
“But I carried the placard in 2020. Jonathan ceased to be president in 2015. I carried the placard five years in the second term of Buhari,” he said.
Reports from February 2, 2020, confirm that Adeboye led RCCG members on a prayer walk in Lagos over the security situation in the country.
Contemporary reports described the exercise as a peaceful protest or prayer walk against killings and insecurity.
The procession reportedly began at the RCCG national headquarters in Ebute Meta, Lagos, proceeded towards Atan Cemetery in Yaba and returned to the church.
Adeboye was photographed carrying a placard bearing the inscription, “All Souls Are Precious to God.”
Jonathan, meanwhile, left the presidency in May 2015 and was succeeded by Muhammadu Buhari.
The 2020 prayer walk therefore took place during Buhari’s second term, rather than during Jonathan’s administration.
Adeboye accused the journalist responsible for the report of twisting the circumstances surrounding the photograph and expressed disappointment that the claim was accepted and circulated without adequate verification.
“A journalist twisted it. I said, I did what I did in 2015. And everybody swallowed it,” he said.
Reflecting on his exposure to journalism during his university days in the 1960s, the cleric said journalists were taught to investigate claims before taking them to the press.
“I remember in those days in the Department of Journalism, when you go there and you take a course, they talked about something called investigative journalism,” he said.
Adeboye added that journalists should not assume that an image tells the whole story without establishing its context.
“That things don’t appear as they may seem. Investigate, if you have a story, before you take it to the press,” he said.
Addressing members of the creative industry attending the thanksgiving service, he expressed concern that nobody appeared to have checked the circumstances surrounding the photograph before the allegation gained traction.
“I’m talking to those of you in the creative industry. Nobody checked,” he said.
