Storm-torching Kenyan Blogger Abraham Mutai has struck again at the controversial founder of Ministry of Repentance and Holiness Church Dr Prophet David Owuor, saying the man of God with the iconic long dreadlocked beard is a threat to national security.
Mutai, who has previously questioned Prophet Owuor’s following and why he had state-like protection at his gatherings that are attended by thousands took to Twitter on Tuesday to register his growing alarm of the man of the cloth, tagging along Fred Matiangi, the Cabinet Secretary, Ministry of Interior & Coordination of National Government Kenya.
“Conman Dr Prophet Owuor is a threat to national security. On 19th May during his Uhuru Park meeting, he had over 1000 police officers and Army officers in civilian clothes, several commandos and police in Uniform. @FredMatiangi, this is a SERIOUS THREAT to NATIONAL security,” he posted.
The post has attracted different reactions from Twitter users, among them Prophet Owuor’s apologists who felt the blogger was being a relentless alarmist and others who felt Mutai was raising a major concern.
The tweet registers yet another time the blogger had clashed with the man who claims to be the mightiest Prophet of God and popularly known for his swanky suits, stylish cars and large entourages.
Last year Mutai checked in at Ngong Police Station and recorded a statement seeking protection after he received threats from one of Prophet Owuor’s followers.
One follower allegedly went to the length of inboxing him to let him know that he’s in danger for not believing in Prophet Owuor.
The blogger declared that if anything was to happen to him then Prophet Owuor should be directly held responsible.
Pursuant to the laws of the Republic of Kenya, I have recorded a statement with @NPSOfficial_KE Ngong, OB number below. This is with regard to the threats to my life from the brainwashed Dr Prophet Owuor Cult followers. Should anything happen to me Owuor is directly responsible pic.twitter.com/j2A96Y4qPp
— Lord Abraham Mutai (@ItsMutai) July 10, 2018
A chemical engineer who transformed into becoming Kenya’s powerful cleric, Prophet David Owuor was once easy to dismiss as a hungry man out to scrimp and scrape a living in the gospel’s name when he started his Ministry of Repentance and Holiness Church in the early 2000s in the streets of Nakuru Town.
At the time, Prophet Owuor ministered while sometimes wearing oversized suits with no fashion flair, with a handful of half-interested bystanders giving him an audience, noted the Daily Nation.
His message was also precise: “Repent, for the Lord is coming”.
“When you do what the Kenyan church is doing, to run to prosperity, to big cars and homes and money, then you drift away from the true gospel of repentance and holiness,” the prophet once said.
“If the church is preaching any other gospel far from repentance and holiness, if that gospel is about prosperity, that means they are preaching the gospel of the devil, which is bent on lying to the people.”
The ‘prophet’ emphatically said the ministry did not require money. He condemned excesses by the church in Kenya and even called on religious leaders “to release the church to the will of the Holy Spirit”.
Prophet Owuor was gaining national traction, even anointing politicians on his podium like the former Bomet Member of Parliament Nick Salat, but it wasn’t until May 2009 when he seized the nation’s attention as he paraded a barefoot then-Prime Minister Raila Odinga in a rare public declaration of faith and repentance.
By February 2013, when the fate of the general election was clouded by the ghosts of the 2007 post-poll chaos, Prophet Owuor was the go-to person, bringing together all presidential candidates for a national fasting and prayer rally at Uhuru Park.
Bordering on two decades now, the man is now practically unrecognisable and some have pointed at his transformation as quite baffling.
He now enjoys the very trappings of power that have traditionally been a preserve of personages in the top echelons of government, writer James Kahongeh observed.
Although he is rarely spotted in public, he shops for clothes at select boutiques in Nairobi, mostly along Kimathi Street and reports are that whenever he visits his favourite designer shop at Nanak House, the busy street literally grinds to a standstill, as his caravan of magnificent vehicles blocks the street.
His lynx-eyed security detail of both civilian bodyguards and policemen armed to the teeth seals the entrance of the shop and hover around as Dr Owuor shops, engaging with the attendants while being assisted by his retinue of hands.
Essentially, this kind of fame is wont to attract attention, admiration and criticism in equal measure and ‘Prophet’ Owour’s activities have not earned him any less of these.
While his lifestyle oozes excessive grandeur and flashes for a man of God instead of humility, the humility he once so fervently preached, is a subject of great controversy.
A merely conventional man who disregards the interweb, Dr Owuor does not have an online presence even with this big following. Reports are that he warns his followers that whoever claims to be the prophet on these platforms is “a fraud and a conman”.
Now a popular phenomenon and a movement as well, he’s met with President Uhuru Kenyatta and been flown in state choppers, an indication of his proximity to power.
In one video that surfaced online, Prophet Owuor is seen being escorted by an Officer in Charge of Police District (OCPD) named only as Okiring, a Chief Inspector Mwangi and an officer of the Divisional Criminal Investigation Officer (DCIO).
These men are heard in a video addressing the ‘prophet’ as “my lord”.
Such standing ovations have, however, triggered tremors within the government and the public with the likes of Abraham Mutai calling him out.
Inspector-General of Police Joseph Boinnet expressed displeasure with senior police officers in Nakuru for authorising “misuse of State vehicles”.
The vehicles were detained with investigations into whether they were issued procedurally carried out.
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