Tamale, June 3, GNA - A watchman with the Tamale Office of the Department of National Lotteries (DNL) who won a total of 2.6 million cedis lotto last Saturday, claimed that Jesus Christ gave him the winning numbers in a vision.

Mr Kofi Apiya, a lotto addict, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview in Tamale that he had ceased to be a member of any Christian fellowship because he was no longer winning lotto.

Mr Apiya said after constant persuasion by a staff member of the Tamale Office of the DNL, he accepted the Christian faith and joined the Tamale East branch of the Church of Christ.

He said ever since he started worshiping with the church, he never had any luck of winning lotto to supplement his monthly earnings and decided not to worship with any church again.

He said a month after he had stopped attending the church, he saw Jesus Christ in a vision greeting him, but instead of responding to the greeting, "I said Jesus I want winning lotto numbers".

Mr Apiya said Jesus then asked him in the vision to follow him so he obliged and followed him to the Our Lady of the Annunciation Catholic Cathedral in Tamale.

In the Cathedral, he said, Jesus asked him to pray with him but he replied: "I want the numbers first" and before he could raise his eyes to the ceiling a smoke appeared followed by three numbers but he could only remember two of the numbers - seven and 47.

"When I saw the numbers and was now ready to pray with Jesus, the Man of God disappeared," Mr Apiya told the GNA.

The watchman said after the vision he went straight to the bank and withdrew 200,000 cedis to stake the numbers.

He said he passed by the office on his way from the bank and told his colleague workers about his vision.

He said after listening to him, his colleagues only made mockery of him, saying what he was telling them was a figment of his own imagination.

Mr Apiya said since his colleagues had derided him, he felt discouraged and spent only 10,000 cedis to stake the national lotto and another 2,500 cedis on private lotto, the "Banker to Banker", winning 2,130,000 cedis and 550,000 cedis respectively.

"If I had used all the 200,000 cedis to stake the lotto, I would have won more than 20 million cedis and that would have mitigated my poverty," he added.