A prayerful tongue-speaking evangelist who stole $1,400 from his benefactor, literally threw a tonne of dust into the victim's eyes when he organized an all-night prayer session to help him recover the money.

The crowd-pulling, charismatic and flamboyant miracle working Nigerian evangelist, Pastor Augustine Johnson Monday, has been jailed for two years by an Accra Circuit Court for the theft.

The money belonged to Mr Owusu Marfo, a business executive and an ardent admirer of Pastor Monday. He gave his room at Awoshie to the pastor in June 2001, where he conducted an all-night service and prayer session. Pastor Monday, 36, stayed with his victim for eight days, offering prayers and fasting. However, in the night, he sneaked in an adjoining room when everybody was asleep and stole the money.

When the complainant detected the theft and confronted Pastor Monday, the ‘man of God’ suggested organising an all-night prayer session for him to recover the lost money. Later, Pastor Monday converted the money into cedis and bought an engine and a second-hand Nissan bus, which he parked in a fitting shop at Abeka in Accra.

Pastor Monday continued to look like a very holy and pious person before Mr Owusu Marfo until 19 October 2001, when he succeeded in using similar tricks to steal Mercedes Benz car spare parts worth ?100 million from the store of his father-in-law, one Mr Amoah, at Avenor in Accra. It was after Pastor Monday was arrested for stealing the spare parts, that he admitted stealing the $1,400 from Mr Marfo's house during the eight-day prayer session.

Pastor Monday first appeared before the circuit court on 1 November 2001 charged with stealing. He earlier pleaded not guilty to the charge but changed it later to guilty and was accordingly sentenced on his own plea by Mr K.O. Beechem, the presiding judge, to two years imprisonment in hard labour on 28 February 2002.

After the sentence, Pastor Monday was immediately whisked to the Nsawam Security Prisons to begin his two-year term. The judge ordered the deportation of Pastor Monday to his country after serving his sentence.

It will be recalled that "The Spectator" in its Saturday 27 October 2001 issue carried the story of the arrest of Pastor Monday by the Tesano Police for stealing Mercedes Benz Car Spare Parts worth ?100 million belonging to Mr Amoah. Mr Amoah had sponsored Pastor Monday to do a degree programme at the Central University College where he paid over ?2 million a semester as tuition fee for the Pastor.

Pastor Monday had endeared himself to Mr Amoah in 1998 when he performed the miraculous healing of his daughter through prayers. The daughter truly recovered from her ailment. Mr Amoah took an instant liking for Pastor Monday and gave him free accommodation in his house at Amasaman and later sponsored his education to the Central University College to read a degree in Theology and gave him ?15,000 daily as his transport fare to school.

Pastor Monday often helped Mr Amoah in his spare parts store at Avenor when he was not preaching and took advantage of this opportunity to serve his benefactor to steal the Mercedes Benz car spares parts. Pastor Monday was arrested when he gave the stolen spare parts to Okyere, his close friend, to sell but unknown to him, Okyere sent the parts back to Mr Amoah and quoted ridiculously low prices that made Mr Amoah suspicious.

Mr Amoah alerted the Tesano Police who arrested Okyere. He mentioned Pastor Monday as his source of supply and he too was arrested. Mr Amoah had so much confidence in Pastor Monday that, he said he initially couldn't believe that it was the man of God who stole the spare parts. Pastor Monday was arraigned before the Amasaman Community Tribunal and was remanded in police custody for further investigations into his activities.