A cleric, Prophet Elikanah Ajibade of Cherubim and Seraphim at Okinni, a town in Egbedore Local Government area of Osun State, has been charged to court on Tuesday and was remanded in prison for physically abusing his son because he attended a church service against his instruction.
According to reports, the boy left home for the New Year eve service on Monday, December 31, 2012, in a church which was not his father’s, though against the will of his father. Prophet Ajibade had earlier told his son who is his late wife’s third son not to go to any other church for the service to usher in a new year.
It was gathered that, in annoyance, the prophet went to the church, interrupted the service and brought David out, lashing him with strokes of cane. Efforts by members of the church, Salvation Army Church, Okinni, to rescue the hapless boy proved abortive as the father reportedly shunned their pleas.
The boy, who told the police that the father started maltreating him since the demise of his biological mother, recounted that the father in company of his stepmother and stepbrother beat him mercilessly: “When we got home, my dad, his wife and her son descended on me. They tied my hands with a rope and started beating me mercilessly… after beating me, my stepmother locked my me and my father inside and took the key away. Then my dad continued to beat me and when he was tired, he ordered that I should be rolling on hot ashes”.
However, telling his own side of the story, Prophet Ajibade said the boy had been running away from home for years. He said, “he used to run away for weeks and would come back himself. On his last deed which got me angry, he ran away for one week”.
