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| Abiodun Fatoyinbo and Busola Dakolo |
Commonwealth of Zion Assembly (COZA) founder Pastor Biodun Fatoyinbo was on Tuesday grilled for several hours by detectives at the Force Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (FCIID) in Abuja, over alleged rape of Busola Dakolo.
Mrs. Dakolo in June accused the pastor in a bare-it-all interview of allegedly raping her when she was a teenager inside her familyโs sitting room in Ilorin, Kwara State, when he visited one early morning.
She gave horrid details of the encounter and explained how the pastor went on to exploit her vulnerability from that day.
Mrs. Dakolo further revealed that two members of the church- Wole Soetan and Folarin Ogunsola- now pastors in charge of Port Harcourt and Lagos branches, had joined Fatoyinbo to beg her family after her siblings discovered what happened to her and took the war to the pastor.
Although Fatoyinbo denied the allegation, claiming it was a calculated attempt to malign him, Dakoloโs case resulted in many other victims of the pastorโs alleged sexual assault speaking out on the social media.
Efforts by the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) to intervene in the matter was said to have been frustrated following the refusal of the pastor to honour their invitation.
The police have located Mrs. Dakoloโs siblings, including the sister she alleged was upstairs the day Fatoyinbo allegedly raped her at her familyโs home.
Also, Pastor Ogunsola was said to have been interviewed and a statement was being obtained from him as at 7pm yesterday, while Soetan was being expected.
The pastor, whose team was said to have been sent out of the department around 11am when he arrived, was interrogated by a team tasked to handle the case by Inspector-General of Police (IG) Mohammed Adamu through the DIG Investigation.
As at 7:30pm it was not certain if Fatoyinbo would be granted administrative bail or detained, the team was awaiting the arrival of the DIG, who was in a meeting.
โPresently, he is still with us. We cannot conclude yet if he will be detained or not, but from what I have observed, he is likely to be granted bail. We are waiting for the DIG to come. He has been in a meeting,โโ said a source.
Another source disclosed that detectives chose to invite Fatoyinbo after locating and speaking to other parties mentioned by Mrs. Dakolo in her statement.
Confirming the development, Police spokesman Frank Mba, a Deputy Commissioner (DCP), said it was too early to say if Fatoyinbo would be detained, adding that only the investigators can arrive at that decision based on their findings.
He said: โYes, he is currently at FCIID undergoing interrogation. We have been conducting discreet investigation. We are making efforts to reach one or two other pastors she alleged intervened then.
โIt was a deliberate investigative strategy to bring Fatoyinbo much later after we must have gotten other things. Some Nigerians were thinking we did not want to talk to him, but that is not so.
โHe is with us now and I cannot say if he will be detained or not. Investigators will have to determine that. They may choose to detain him or grant him bail while investigation continues.
โWe have the statement of Busola Dakolo already. She earlier made a statement to the police. Nigerians are assured that we will diligently investigate and conclude this case.โ
