Rev. Isaac Opoku
The Christian and Pentecostal Councils as well as the National Chief Imam have been called upon to regulate the activities of pastors and Muslim clerics who pronounce death on prominent persons in the country through prophecies.
The General Overseer of “In Him Is Life Church International”, Rev. Isaac Opoku, who made the call, noted that failure to regulate those prophecies could create unnecessary fear and panic among the public.
According to him, although some of those prophecies may be true, the pastors and Imams must find better ways of communicating their prophecies rather than putting them out publicly.
Rev. Opoku stated: “In recent times, religious leaders, especially some prophets, have been involved in giving prophecies concerning untimely deaths on public figures and other stakeholders like presidents, vice-presidents, journalists, artists and others which, in my opinion, puts the target people in fear of death and I think such conduct from those men and women of God needs to be regulated”.
Speaking at a press conference at the International Press Centre in Accra, Rev. Opoku noted that religion must be used to inspire progress and development of the nation and not be used as a weapon of confusion and fear mongering.
He said Ghana is gradually moving into a superstitious realm where prophecies seem to be taking centre stage in almost all endeavours especially in the area of politics.
He said if the situation is not checked it may have adverse effects on the progress of the nation.
He blamed some media houses for allowing such prophets and Mallams to use their platforms to propagate their messages without any form of control on the content.
He noted: “Today the only requirement for religious leaders to get media platform is to pay the requisite fee at the radio and TV stations without being scrutinized by the media houses. This has created a situation where some pastors go to the extent of using precious air time to give lotto numbers on radio stations when they are preaching. I think this has become one of the flaws of the media fraternity in the country”.
He therefore called on religious bodies in the country to instill some sanity into the activities of these clerics to avert fear and panic that could lead to heart attacks and subsequent deaths.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak