Nigeria: Another former COZA member accuses Pastor Fatoyinbo of rape

A former member of Commonwealth of Zion Assembly (COZA) has alleged that the church founder and senior pastor, Biodun Fatoyibo, also raped her.

The lady, who spoke in anonymity, in another interview released by Y!Naija said the incident happened in 2017 at the Fatoyibo’s house, said she was a staff in the church.

She said Pastor Fatoyinbo who used to be her “spiritual leader” requested she goes to his apartment on a Thursday morning in September 2017 to take instructions for an errand.

“I was there sitting on the couch with him and he started addressing something that has to do with the church,” she said.

“Everything moved quickly from there and then he started trying to pull me into a hug and started kissing me, which I found shocking. I had known him as a spiritual leader and I was about to witness opposite of everything that I thought he stood for.

“I was too shocked. It was a couch. I don’t know whether I should hold on to something. I remember telling him continuously ‘you can’t do that, you can’t do that.’

“He just kept going. Took off my button and my trouser. And then he had his other hand holding me back to the couch. And another hand right inside my pants.

“I remember he kept saying, relax. Just relax. He didn’t flinch,” she said.

Her allegation comes few days after Busola Dakolo, who is married to a popular musician Timi Dakolo, led to protests outside the pastor’s churches on Sunday.

Mrs Dakolo claims the pastor came to her family home early one morning when her mother was away and raped her in the living room, as her sister slept upstairs. Afterwards, she said Fatoyinbo went to get a bottle of Krest, a fizzy lemon drink, from his car and forced her to drink it, saying: “You should be happy that a man of God did this to you.” She was 16.

He allegedly raped her again a week later on his car bonnet, after insisting on driving her home. Afterwards, Dakolo claimed he said: “You’ll be fine. This thing is not a new thing. Men of God do this.”

Fatoyinbo denied the allegations “in every measure”, saying, “I have never in my life raped anybody even as an unbeliever and I am absolutely innocent of this.”

Fatoyinbo two days after the allegations issued a statement saying he was taking “a leave of absence from the pulpit” to “submit to the concerns of (his) spiritual mentors”, and that he did not understand all that was happening.

The claims have prompted a number of allegations on social media from women abused or raped by people in authority in religious circles, which some have called Nigeria’s #MeToo moment.

About four persons have accused Fatoyibo of sexual assault.