Mr Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), has urged anti-corruption agencies to prosecute churches converting charity funds to commercial purposes, describing such act as criminal.
He also urged church members to go against the perpetrators of such acts of financial misappropriation.
Mr Falana stated this in an interview on the sidelines of the 2024 Peace Summit of the Justice Development Peace Commission (JDPC) in Lagos on Saturday.
JDPC, a social arm of the Catholic Church, is focused on promotion of a sustainable and integral human development through a holistic empowerment approach.
Speaking at the summit with the theme, “Cultivating a Culture of Peace in Nigeria: A Call to Action,” Mr Falana criticised faith bodies deviating from their core role of service to people to become business ventures under the cover of faith.
“Such funds should be tailored to charity works to help people make good living and meet social challenges.
“Remember those funds are not taxed, therefore, it is a criminal act for faith leaders to subject such funds to commercial venture.
“Members of such faith and the authorities in charge of financial misappropriation should go against such perpetrators and bring them to book,” Mr Falana said.
He decried the situation whereby church leaders raise money to build schools and charge high fees which the children of the poor could not afford.
He said the subsisting culture in which the children of the faithful who contributed to the building of the institutions were unable to pay their tuitions was unacceptable.
According to him, the claims by some proprietors of such schools that Jesus Christ asked them to increase tuitions is a mockery of God and His grace to mankind.
(NAN)
