Deeper Life pastor calls on families of ill patients brought for deliverance to collect them

LAGOS evangelical cleric Pastor Iyoha Enahoro has called on members of his church to come and collect their ill relatives who are regularly abandoned after they are brought there for deliverance prayers.

Like many of Nigeria's numerous clergymen, Pastor Enahoro offers prayers for ill patients at his Deeper Christian Life Ministry church in the Ikorodu area of Lagos State. However, he has been saddled with full time responsibility for such patients and is particularly worried about the fate of one mentally ill patient John Kakaviya, who has been abandoned. 

According to Pastor Enahoro, who resides in the Bayeku area of Ikorodu, efforts to get the family members of 35-year-old John to take him for medical help have proved abortive. He said he did not want to throw the Delta State indigene unto the streets so that his condition would not worsen. 

Pastor Enahoro said: “I had been seeing the man at the Ketu bus stop and I discovered that he had a mental problem. I sometimes gave him food and money but on July 1, 2015, I left my house at Ikorodu with some clothes which I intended to give him. 

“When I saw him, I decided to also pray for him and after the prayers, I discovered he became calm and I took him to a medical centre where he was given treatment and he later slept. I could not take him directly to a psychiatric hospital because of lack of funds, so I took him home.” 

He added that he later contacted the patient’s family members and they were able to identify him but after paying him a few visits, they abandoned John. Pastor Enahoro, who claimed to have been taking care of mental patients since 1991, said he had no motive of profiting from the assistance he had rendered to 35-year-old John. 

“God used me to pray for him but then, doctors also have a role to play for him to be mentally stable. His family members have been making all kinds of excuses and saying they do not have money with which to take him to a psychiatric hospital. 

I have been wondering if they have abandoned him and want me to continue to look after him and it is becoming unbearable for me. I have my own family and children that I have to take care of and I think the man needs urgent medical attention,” Pastor Enahoro added. 

John’s sister, Rita, however, said that the family did not abandon him but are having financial challenges. She described the victim as a brilliant young man whose dreams were shattered by a strange illness.

Rita added: “John’s mental problem started about 13 years ago shortly after he finished secondary school and was preparing for his entrance examination into the university. We were living together at the time and I just discovered that he would not sleep at night and started misbehaving. 

Later, the problem worsened and he left the house and took to the streets. Our parents are dead and I am married but jobless and my sister, who could have assisted, is a widow who is struggling with her business.” 

Rita pointed out that after getting the news that John had become calm after Pastor Enahoro prayed for him, the family rushed there and saw his health condition had improved. She, however, said the family had not been able to do much because they did not have the funds and called on the government and members of the public for assistance.