Sometime during May, an attack website was created to defend “Apostle” Helen Ukpabio following a critical article about her child-witch teachins in the New York Times. The website suggested that the author of the NY Times article was part of a conspiracy which involves Gary Foxcroft, Leo Igwe, Olusegun Fakoya, and myself (this is somewhat flattering to me, as I’ve done far less than the others). Supposedly we are all part of an anti-religious “Darkwins [sic] philosophy”. The blog author uses a pseudonym, although she or he purports to have some background information about how the NY Times interview came to take place. The author has also done a bit of research, digging up that I used to work in Japan, and the site originally carried a number of personal photographs belonging to the journalist (now removed).
The website contains the kind of bluster and abuse that we’ve seen before, but what’s more surprising is that it also contains extremely crude sexual comments about the wife the New York Times journalist – which suggests that the author is prepared to stoop far lower than one might expect from a supposed Christian, and has a particularly disturbed mind. If I were Ukpabio, I’d want to repudiate such embarassing “support” as quickly as possible, since it only brings discredit to her and to the evangelists who have endorsed her.
I checked out Whois to find out the registration details:
Registrant ID: DI_7346064
Registrant Name: Gabriel O. Egba
Registrant Organization: Gaboeski Integrated Services
Egba is also the registrant for Ukpabio’s Liberty Foundation Gospel Ministries, and for a number of other churches in Nigeria (in some cases through a subsiduary called “GabOeski Consults”). The Gaboeski website used to carry a notice that it has “built and Hosted website for many Churches, Businesses, Clubs, Organizations, Companies and individuals”. The company itself, though, does not have any particular religious identity.
Of course, none of this means that Gaboeski supports Ukpabio’s teachings or the content of the attack blog, and so I emailed Egba to ask him if his registration for the attack website was simply a professional assignment or whether he had any other connections with Ukpabio. I also made him aware of the controversy around her teachings about “child witches”. The email bounced back, and so I used a webform on the Gaboeski website. I also contacted him via Facebook. I received no reply, although the attack website went down for a couple of days and, somewhat curiously, Egba has now partially changed his name on his Facebook profile.
UPDATE: As a result of the above, a new post has been added to the attack site, directed specifically at me… and containing unpublished details about the message that I sent to Egba via Facebook. This shows that Egba is fully aware of the site’s contents, and that he decided to pass on my message to the site’s author.
UPDATE 2: A Facebook profile in Ukpabio’s name has the following:
UPDATE 3: A death threat arrives via Facebook, from a certain “Mary John“:
…DEATH AWAITS YOU,I KNOW U DON’T REALLY KNOW WHAT U ARE INTO,YOU ARE IN FOR DOOM AND DIST RUCTION,UNLESS U REPENT TODAY AND APOLOGIZE TO HER… USE YOUR TONGUE AND COUNT YOUR TEETH.THIS IS A PIECE OF ADVICE TO YOU
By strange coincidence, “Mary John” is also a Facebook friend of Egba…
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