I’ve no police, military, or serial callers to defend me – Otabil

...All I have is God

One of Ghana’s revered religious teachers, Pastor Mensa Otabil has given indications he may not bring legal action against persons he says are using his sermons for dubious political purposes.

Speaking at a press conference Monday on what he called the sampling, splicing and editing of “a pastor’s words to mean something other than what was intended…and place them within a partisan context,” Dr. Otabil said he had taken the matter to the highest adjudicator, God.

“Today I come as a simple pastor; I do not have machinery state behind me; I do not have a police force or military detachment to defend me; I do not have serial callers or a media machinery to spin my story; all I have is the God whom I’ve served over the years,” he stated.

Pastor Otabil said, “when political operatives highjack a pastor’s words, manipulate them to build partisan jingles and play them on party information vans across the country, that is mischief; when political operatives with sinister motives deliberately position a pastor to become a target for ridicule, animosity and hostile attack, that is evil.”

The perpetrators of the voice doctoring, splicing and manipulation, he believes, are largely operatives of the governing National Democratic Congress.

Whilst asking President John Mahama speak publicly against the act, the General Overseer of the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), called “all people of faith – Christians and Muslims, pastors and imams – to demand righteousness, justice and fairness in our national discourse.”