Daniel Okachie: An Apostle or Native Doctor?
Three months’ investigation exhumes incontrovertible evidence that Daniel Okachie, the Ogoja born self-acclaimed Apostle was found to be mixing native medicine otherwise called juju with the word of God and he had to run from the local church in Sanubi near Eku to Abraka to begin his own ministry. Hitherto, he now operates at a higher level of spirituality mixed with traditional medicine and tongues are wagging.
By Ovie Edomi
When the Bible says in Mathew chapter fifteen verse twelve that know ye that the Pharisees are offended, it probably knew that a time will come when people will be offended. This time, the offence is not with the master of the christian faith, but with the General overseer of Apostolic Power and Testimony Ministries also known as APTM. The General overseer of APTM, self-acclaimed Apostle Daniel Okachie, a man in his early 30’s is so engrossed in spiritual warfare that he does not realize what is going on around him in the body of Christ.
First, he does not know that both the leadership of Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN and the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria PFN in Delta state do not see his church as a church. Infact, one of the leaders in Delta state told the magazine reporter under anonymity that they cannot welcome the self-acclaimed apostle into their fold. According to him “Those who serve God have nothing to do with the Devil” Besides he said “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirit whether they are of God. Many false prophets have gone into the world deceiving people, he further noted.
Okachie’s blazing passion for the things of God began when he came from Agbarho some years ago to ask a Pastor in Eku, Delta state to help him with accommodation and job. As fate would have it, he was given a place to stay and he soon became a member of God’s anointed church, Eku.
Further investigations by the magazine revealed that Daniel Okachie actually got tutored in the church as a Pastor-in training and was subsequently posted to Sanubi near Eku, Delta state to Pastor a local assembly of believers. It was while he was at Sanubi branch that he was alleged to be using fetish things along with the Bible to conduct deliverance. Information about Okachie’s operations soon got to his General overseer who began investigation into the allegation and when he confirmed that his Pastor had derailed, he sent Okachie packing. Though, another version of the story said that Okachie ran away from his former church because he was not getting enough share from money made from church offerings, tithes and harvest items especially since Okochie felt that 70% of the members came through his efforts and evangelism.
Meanwhile, an insider told the magazine reporter that Okachie’s former boss, the General overseer of God’s anointed had to go Ogoja with a police officer to know Daniel Okachie’s people when he was still with him and his travails were becoming too much for him. The insider noted that it was there that Okachie’s former boss learnt he left home 15 years ago but Okachie’s mother and his other relations pleaded with him to still accept him and do all he can to make him a new creature. The former General overseer did but within six months nothing changed rather Daniel told him that he has acquired more power to see vision and there is nothing he can do anymore with regards to seeing vision and using candles etc, to work for church members. At that point, the General Overseer asked him to leave his ministry before he pollutes the church and brings shame to his name and the body of Christ.
Meanwhile since Okachie established his own church in Abraka in 2018/2019 he continues to shine like a thousand stars. The Ogoja born self-acclaimed Apostle has become a celebrity in Delta state within two years, as he was shown on Facebook, YouTube and so on bathing his followers with Fanta, Coca-Cola, water, coconut water and so on. In one of the videos, hundreds of people were seen queuing with different objects in their hands and when they get to where he is, he pours the substance inside the object on the adherent’s body thus wetting the clothes in the process. He exhibited so much courage and excitement doing this but not without controversy arising from the use of Fanta, Coke, Water and so on to bathe his followers.
Those with inside information told the reporter that since Okachie left his former ministry and moved to Abraka and began his current ministry near Abraka Grammar school, until they recently moved to the permanent site along Abraka/Benin expressway junction, it has been from one controversy to another.
Shortly after he opened the Abraka branch, those with inside knowledge said another branch was opened in Effurun and it was at the opening ceremony that the church was labeled Yahoo Yahoo church. That name has stuck to the church ever since. But as far as Okachie is concerned, there is no big deal about how anybody perceives him and his ministry. This the magazine gathered from one of his former church workers who left the church when he became uncomfortable with the operations of the self-acclaimed Apostle. Even the landlord of where Okachie’s church started from, the magazine gathered, had to issue the church quit notice when he became suspicious of the operations of the General overseer.
It was therefore not a surprise that Okachie was arrested by the police in Abraka some months ago and fetish things were found in his wardrobe. When confronted about the fetish things, he told the police that he was a spiritual man and denied being a native doctor. When the magazine reporter visited Abraka after an earlier phone conversation with the Apostle followed by a letter requesting an interview, which Okachie refused to respond to, however, the reporter’s investigation revealed that PFN and CAN are not the only ones feeling the heat of APTM’s operations, even security operatives and other believers talk about his operations in the open. However, a policeman who did not know the identity of the reporter said “It is not my duty to pull down a man of God. Let God be the one to expose him”
When the magazine reporter asked those who know him well enough, a man who claimed anonymity stated that the Bible says that on the last days many shall come in my name performing signs and wonders. Okachie also called Fanta/coconut pastor because of his alleged use of Fanta, Coca-Cola, coconut, perfume and so on to bathe his members is believed to have an inner room in the church premises where he sends those who come for deliverance or solution for final miracle. An insider told this reporter that anybody who enters the room is automatically hypnotized for as long as he or she is alive and as a result, such member can neither speak ill of the church nor will he or she be able to leave the ministry unless Christ is determined to save such a person.
On May 15 at precisely 5:03pm, a call with the caller’s number hidden called one of our Editors phone and the caller without any formality said “Am I speaking to the Editor of South South International. Immediately the Editor confirmed he is the one, she burst out. I hope you are not one of those journalists that have being paid to support one party in the episode that is unfolding at APTM? Even when the reporter/Editor assured her that journalists do not support any party in a developing story but would rather remain an impartial judge and report the truth after hearing from both parties, she did not hide her feeling that journalists are filing behind one of the parties. With such posture, the magazine editors were more determined to expose any darkness that appears to be over Delta state particularly Abraka, Kwale and Effurun, where Apostolic Testimony branches are located.
When the magazine reporters went to conduct physical inspection of the church environment after the partial lockdown in Delta state, a mechanic who refused to be named for fear of being attacked showed the reporter a portion of the land where rams and cows were buried alive. Furthermore, the mechanic noted that a friend of his, a member of APTM, Abraka branch took him to the church to see the General Overseer, who told him that he will take him down to his inner room to pray for him and his life story will change but that whatever he sees in the inner room must not be revealed to anybody. He asked him if he can keep secret and the mechanic said yes. He asked him to come on a particular day but the mechanic said he never went back because Jesus in his earthly ministry freely gave and performed miracles without asking those he blessed to keep any secret. He did not also take those he healed to inner room, Jesus he noted healed his victims in the open.Though, Okachie uses Fanta, Coke and coconut water to bathe his members who are desirous of miracles, he continues to receive a lot of battering from other Christians and church leaders.
It would be recalled that it was the activities of miracle pastors and fake deliverances that were aired on National television that made the National Broadcasting Commission to stop the airing of miracle programmes and deliverances on National television stations. The sound warning to broadcast stations not to air church miracles resulted in most churches owning their own broadcast stations where they air their church programmes on cable. Similarly, it was the operations of most Christian leaders with respect to their involvement in Christian pilgrimage exercise that made the federal government to remove its hand from sponsoring pilgrims to the holy land for pilgrimage.
The Nigerian constitution does not adopt any particular region, but as a secular state, those who spoke to the magazine noted that if the churches, mosques and traditional African religions are not regulated, the federal authority will soon have more increased cases of ritual killings, murder and assassination of herbalists, pastors and imams in Nigeria because of the involvement of religious leaders in unholy acts.
At the Apostolic Power and Testimony church, an insider told the magazine reporter that many members of the church are in bondage. When the magazine reporter got to one of the former members of the church, popularly called Jagaban, he wondered how the reporter managed to get his phone number, and noted after much pressure that he did not like what he saw at APTM so he had to leave. Another member of the ministry who is now Pastoring in another ministry called Austin said he left the ministry long ago and does not want to judge anyone rather he says God is the only one that judges. When he was pressed to describe Daniel Okachie, he said he is a spiritual man. Similarly, one Pastor Christian said he left the ministry because he discovered that Okachie rather prays and does deliverance for his members using red candle, water, Fanta, Coca-Cola, coconut water and so on. Confirming this further another pastor who worked with the self-acclaimed Apostle who now owns a church in Warri said it is not as if Okachie does not preach the word but the content of what he preaches and what is in the Preacher’s mind should be the major thing his followers should be concerned about. This, according to him is because it is difficult to know what is in the mind, it is better to depend absolutely on God for divine direction and instruction.
He told the magazine reporter he left the church as soon as he began to see the misunderstanding between Okachie and his wife. When he was asked if he was comfortable with the use of candles, coconut water and so on to perform miracles and deliverance, he noted that to every man God called he gave instruction. In the same way, when he wants to conduct healing and deliverance and he calls upon God, the same God can instruct you on what to do to heal someone. Consequent upon the mysterious way God works, I do not want to judge anybody including Okachie.
An insider told the magazine reporter that members of the church became scoundrels who had to swallow their tongues in order to save their mouths. Many members who spoke to the magazine reporter including those who have left the ministry as a result of one thing or the other collaborated the other in their narrations to the reporter.
One of those who spoke to the magazine as an impeccable source close to Okachie said that there is a woman who supplies pigeons, candles, chameleon and other spiritual materials to the self-acclaimed Apostle who the Ogoja born spiritualists now regard as his spiritual mother. The source added that the woman popularly called Mama Tekevwe added fuel to the quarrel between Okachie and his wife on one hand and between Okachie and his Father in-law on the other hand. When the magazine called Mama Tekevwe on May 21st, she denied being the spiritual mother to Okachie and asked the reporter not to call her line again.
Again, findings by the magazine’s reporter came handy. First, a source close to Okachie’s estranged wife said until Rachael Okachie got married to her husband, two suitors were visiting the family to ask her hand in marriage and in a bid for the young bride to get the best and God’s choice for her, she was taken by a friend to Okachie’s church. In a bid to offer prophesy, Okachie asked her to wash her face with water he poured inside a basin and after she did that, the spiritualist turned Apostle told her to look into the basin and whosoever she saw would be her husband.
Curiously, when she looked inside the basin of water, she saw Daniel Okachie’s image. The young damsel(Rachael) got home and told her father that she had seen the man she wants to marry. Father and step mother were dumbfounded but all efforts to make their daughter see reason fell on deaf ears. Within three weeks, the marriage was consummated even against the advice of Rachael’s father.
Insider said Daniel Okachie took quarrel with his father in-law for going against the marriage and his spiritual mother, Mama Tekevwe kept fueling the quarrel until the recent altercation which resulted from the wife’s discovery that the same room which Okachie ordered her never to enter is where he takes ladies to, to perform abominable things. One of Okachie’s victims is a 14-year-old girl and a relation of Okachie’s former protocol officer. The lady in question got impregnated and when the pregnancy became an open thing, he approached the family with the help of the former protocol officer, the matter was resolved, after he allegedly paid money to the girl’s family. Not long, another girl, 15 years old got pregnant for him again.
For a man whose wife is a lecturer, insider said the wife could not bear the humiliation any longer. Soon one thing led to the other and the centre could no longer hold. When the magazine reporter called the estranged wife, she took a deep breath and politely told the reporter she does not want to talk to the press yet because many journalists have been paid to spread embellished lies and propaganda. Even when the magazine reporter assured her that the magazine founded in 2007 had written several peerless editorials and investigative stories that the federal and state governments have looked into at different times, she still refused to talk.
Though, she noted that there is need to expose darkness and free people from hypnotism, she said it will only take journalists who have not soiled their hands with evil money shared to them from the pit of darkness to report the truth of the controversy between she and her husband.
When the magazine called the self-acclaimed apostle after the letter that was sent to him to clarify things about his operation, the spiritualist from Ikom in Yalla local government area of Cross River state refused to pick his call.
Meanwhile, boys were paid peanuts to keep posting things to the world which were not true. Before long the internet was filled with materials that was meant to counter the truth.
Though the police which arrested Okachie earlier and released him on the grounds that he committed no crime have re-opened their investigation and possibly face fresh charges as a result of the petition against Okachie, which police sources say threw up new facts.
In the meantime, Okachie goes about in a tinted car to some of his clients, and visiting lawyers and top police officials to help him quench the matter. He told someone that he has paid a former Minister of the federal republic who is also a lawyer to help him sweep the matter under the carpet. Even then top security sources in Abuja who has placed him under watch says his days are numbered.