Wherever you are, please, lift your hands
and pray for the ‘notorious kidnapper,’ “Evans” Chukwudumeme
Onwuamadike, the man whose Igbo native names roughly translate as
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“God-leads-me-in-whatever-I-do” (for Chukwudumeme), “Death-is-no
respecter-of-a-warrior/great man” (Onwuamadike).
He
needs prayer, a lot of it, following his formal arraignment along his
gang members, in court, this week, on multiple charges of murder, armed
robbery, kidnapping, unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition
filed against him by the Force Legal Department and Lagos State
Department of Public Prosecutions (DPP) before the Lagos State High
Court, Ikeja; with subsequent ones coming up at the Federal High Court
and Edo State High Court, Benin.
While the arraignment, on Wednesday,
centred on his abduction of Mr. Donatus Dunu from whom he and his gang
members collected N150 million before he escaped from their custody, 13
other substantive cases, nine in Lagos, and four in Edo, carrying 52
charges in all, are set to be brought against him and his gang, with
time. You can see why he badly needs prayers. So? Could you, kindly
close your eyes and pray for him!
Time to beg victims
While
you are at it, Evans says he is ready, God helping him out of this one,
not only to repent but also to do the necessary penance. He will
apologise to his victims if he meets them in court, he promises in an
exclusive interview with Saturday Sun. “I will,” he swears. “I have been
begging them. When they came to interview me, I knelt down and begged
them. I am still begging them to forgive me.”
So?
In your prayers, ask God to touch his victims to forgive him. Yes, as
he forgave those who called him a billionaire. “I am not a billionaire,”
he responded when you asked whether he is truly a billionaire like news
headlines and reports are trying to present him. “It’s just because of
the kind of money I collected from the victims, that is why they decided
to refer to me as a billionaire.”
Evans a pastor?
And,
please, let somebody shout Hallelujah fourteen times. Asked if given a
chance, he would like to become a pastor, he answers that he is already
one. He regrets his action and tries to emphasise that point over and
over in this interview with him and he promises to be a changed person.
Even before this time, he was not really as bad as people are trying to
paint him. None of his victims was tortured nor killed in the process,
he pointed out.
“The only time that
someone died (during his operations) was during the attempted kidnap of
the chairman of The Young Shall Grow Motors,” he swears. “During that
operation, we were attacked and there was exchange of gunshots.
They
shot at us and my gang members shot back at them. It was in the morning
that I heard that one inspector and the driver who drove the Young
Shall Grow chairman died. It was an unfortunate incident. I have totally
regretted everything about crime. It does not pay. I keep telling
people to learn from my story. Crime does not pay. Everything I acquired
all these years are gone just in a day. I will be an agent of change in
prison.”
Oh boy! “I already have a covenant with God. If
police take me to court, I told God that I will not tell lies against
the police or victims. I promise to tell the court the truth about any
crime that I am guilty of. Please, people of Nigeria should forgive me.”
Ready to pay for his sins
With
14 cases, 52 charges or whatever hanging on his neck, he is ready to
plead guilty to them all if doing so will help get him off the hook, he
assures you.
“Yes, I will,” he says,
looking directly into your eyes. “I want to do so because I don’t want
those lawyers to be deceiving me. I don’t want them to mislead me.”
Asked about the lawyer defending him on the case, he said: “I don’t know
how he came about the matter.”
May God take power
from the devil, you almost found yourself saying like Mama Joe, a
character in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel, Purple Hibiscus, is wont
to say. So he is not going to accept the lawyer’s help if he meets him
in court? He curtly replies no before adding that he is hoping to get a
lighter sentence.
This is to believe that you
are still praying for Evans! Please, what point are you in your prayers
for him? What exactly are you asking God to do for him? “I just believe
in God for a miracle,” he tells you. “I will serve God all my life. I
also promised the police that I will help them to fight crime.”
If I die, I die
In
addition, he is asking forgiveness from his victims. “I will continue
to beg them to forgive me even if they attempt to kill me and If I have
to die, then I die”, he says. You guess he has not seen his wife and
kids since he was arrested, you told him. What message would he want you
to give to them? “I want you to tell them that I am still alive and
healthy. They should simply pray for me that the court will not sentence
me to death.”
…How HE betrayed us – Gang members
As
Nigerians await the trial of billionaire kidnapper, Chukwudumeme
Onwuamadike popularly known as Evans, some of his gang members have
accused him of not keeping to their oath of secrecy.
It
was gathered that Evans assisted the police to nab several members of
his gang including his informants. He also handed over with ease to the
police two serving soldiers who actively participated in most of the
kidnap operations that he organised.
Among
those arrested is Eric Ezeala, another notorious kidnapper and armed
robber who owns several mansions in Abuja, Lagos and Imo State. During
interrogation by the police, he accused Evans of not keeping to their
oath of secrecy if caught.
Also in police
custody are two persons who provided all the information needed to
kidnap some of his victims. Okwuchukwu Nwachukwu was the one who
allegedly gave information of how and where to find the Pharmacist
Donatus Duno and two others who were abducted by Evans.
Recall
that Duno was the victim who escaped from Evans hideout in Igando area
of Lagos, a development which gave the police a clue as to how to track
and end the reign of terror by Evans and his gang.
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