The Celestial Church of Christ has spoken about a 21-year-old man, Sylvester Friday, allegedly used for money ritual by one of its Parish pastors, Steven Babatunde Shittu at Bayan Dutse/Narayi in Chikum Local Government Area of Kaduna State.
One of the church’s leaders, Superior Evangelist Sam Atolagbe, who addressed reporters yesterday on the matter in Kaduna on behalf of the church, said the incident that led to Sylvester’s death was an accident and by no means ritual.
The death of Sylvester on March 21, 2018 had sparked violence at Narayi/Bayan Dutse community as youths accused the Celestial Church pastor of killing him for ritual.
The deceased was engaged as a mason by the 78-year-old evangelist to construct a concrete demarcation inside a river beside the church when he fell into the river and died.
The church commiserated with the family of Sylvester and insisted that Evangelist Steven was not responsible for Sylvester’s death.
It said the deceased and a member of the community had worked with the church as mason on construction jobs for some time now.
“On that fateful day, Sylvester was engaged by Shepherd Steven to do a small work by the river bank where the church was trying to control the erosion.
“While working, he slipped into a deeper part of the water while the shepherd who was supervising the work raised an alarm.
“When he realized that the mason was drowning and the neighbours that came around could not help much, he ran to the nearest police outpost to report the situation,” Atolagbe said.
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