News
Pastor accused of multiple sexual abuses
The case came to light after the church run by Daniel Mururu in Meru County in central Kenya was torched by irate locals late last month.
Mururu, of the East African Pentecostal Churches of Kenya, as well as church elders and ushers, are accused of indecent assaults including stripping women naked, shaving their pubic hair and having sexual intercourse with them, according to a police report dated Monday.
More than seven women and girls ranging in age from 17 to 70 are alleged to have been assaulted, including a 17-year-old schoolgirl who became pregnant, the report said.
Police said their initial investigations had established that Mururu was “running a cult” that had radicalized its followers.
The church members were induced to engage “in indecent acts” for fear of consequences such as “sickness and barrenness” if they defied the pastor’s orders, the police report said.
A devout largely Christian nation, Kenya has struggled to regulate unscrupulous churches and cults that dabble in criminality.
In a macabre case that shocked the world, the leader of a Kenyan doomsday starvation cult was arrested in April last year after bodies were found buried in mass graves.
Rescuers spent many months searching a remote scrubland inland from the Indian Ocean town of Malindi and have now unearthed a total of 448 bodies from the shallow graves.
Autopsies revealed that the majority of victims had died of hunger. But others, including children, appeared to have been strangled, beaten or suffocated.
The horrific saga dubbed the “Shakahola forest massacre” led the government to flag the need for tighter control of fringe denominations.
A commission set up by President William Ruto to investigate the deaths and review regulations governing religious bodies presented its report in July, calling for a hybrid model of self-regulation and government oversight. (AFP)
The traditional ruler of Akumarun Okoloke town, in Yagba West Local Government Area of Kogi state, Oba J.D. Ogunyanda, has been abducted by gunmen.
Okoloke, a peaceful town situated along the Egbe-Patigi road in Yagba West Local Government Area of Kogi State, is an active food production community renowned for its rich cultural heritage.
The Monarch, who is a second class traditional ruler was said to have been kidnapped in his Palace, in the early hours of Thursday by the gunmen, who are believed to be Fulani herders.
Sources, who confirmed the development to BusinessDay, disclosed that the ruler was taken away by the gunmen numbering about 30 to an unknown destination.
As of the time of filing this report, his abductors have yet to make contact with the community or demand for ransom.
“The state of things in our land is dire, with fear hindering entry and progress despite its potential. We cry out to God for deliverance, believing that heaven helps those who help themselves.
“The sons and daughters of Okoloke and Yagba West are demanding security, justice and the safe return of our beloved monarch”, Moses Ayodele, a resident of the community, told our correspondent.
It would be recalled that there has been an escalation in the activities of terrorists and bandits in the Western Area of Kogi State in recent times.
Many people in the area have been forced to abandon their farms and houses, and are relocating out of the locality.
Youth wing of apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo Youth Council Worldwide has described as unacceptable the decision by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, to fix a fresh examination for those affected by what it called errors in the recently released results.
JAMB Registrar, Prof Ishaq Oloyede, had on Wednesday admitted that errors led to the low score of candidates in the five South-East states and Lagos State.
The Board then said arrangement had commenced to reschedule the exam for the affected candidates.
But, in a statement made available to journalists on Thursday, the National President of Ohanaeze Ndigbo Youth Council Worldwide, Mazi Okwu Nnabuike said the arrangement was totally unacceptable.
Okwu said it was a disservice for JAMB to subject the candidates to “another round of mental torture, stress and risk” for no fault of theirs.
“We want to state unequivocally that our people will not accept any fresh examination, having already been subjected to mental torture by JAMB.
“The candidates are not in the right frame of mind to undergo another examination, having been subjected to mental torture ever since the fake results were announced.
“Besides, who is going to bear the cost? The same parents who are facing severe financial challenges?
“What of the risk of moving to the examination locations, in a country ravaged by insecurity?” Okwu queried.
He declared that, “having said this, we demand that JAMB should allocate 300 score to all the South-East candidates affected by its own error not that of the candidates. Igbos are very brilliant people and could have made 300 and above.
“It was a deliberate design to punish the people of the South-East, clearly to deny them education opportunities.
“Should JAMB fail to heed to our request, we shall not hesitate to drag them to court, no form of crocodile tears by the Registrar will save the Board.”
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has reported a slight decline in Nigeria’s headline inflation rate, which eased to 23.71 percent in April 2025 from 24.23 percent recorded in March.
The Bureau released the latest figures in its Consumer Price Index (CPI) update on Thursday.
According to the agency, the movement for April 2025 “headline inflation rate showed a decrease of 0.52% compared to the March 2025 Headline inflation rate”.
“On a month-on-month basis, the Headline inflation rate in April 2025 was 1.86%, which was 2.04% lower than the rate recorded in March 2025 (3.90%),” NBS said.
“This means that in April 2025, the rate of increase in the average price level is lower than the rate of increase in the average price level in March 2025.”
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