Even though he claimed that deportation would violate his human rights, a Nigerian pastor whose church was closed due to an alleged £1.87 million scam has lost his battle against it.
Following investigations, notably by The Telegraph, that revealed financial mismanagement by his church, an immigration tribunal has decided that Tobi Adegboyega, 44, the cousin of Star Wars actor John Boyega, should be sent back to his home country of Nigeria.
Mr. Adegboyega was the leader of SPAC Nation, a contentious church that was shut down for operating opaquely and failing to accurately account for nearly £1.87 million in outgoings.
He claimed that because he married a British woman, deportation would violate his right to a family life under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). He added that his community work with SPAC was not taken into consideration when the Home Office tried to remove him.
His legal team characterized him as a “charismatic” community leader of a sizable, well-run church who had “intervened in the lives of many hundreds of young people, mostly from the black neighborhoods in London, to guide them away from danger.”
Though no testimony from them was presented to the court, he asserted that politicians like Boris Johnson and high-ranking officers in the Metropolitan Police had “lauded” his efforts.
He said that projects he had planned would fail or shrink in scope if he were not physically present in London.
But according to the panel, the Home Office argued that “everything is not as it seems.”
The ruling states that “the Charity Commission or the High Court have closed down various manifestations of [Mr. Adegboyega’s] church due to concerns regarding its finances and lack of transparency.”
“They’re selling their own blood.”The church is a cult, according to former members, where poor youths are urged to do whatever it takes to raise money, including taking out big loans, committing benefit fraud, and even selling their own blood.
“It is alleged that the church leadership lead lavish lifestyles and there have, it is said, been instances of abuse. The [Home Office’s] case before us was that all of this needs to be taken into account when evaluating whether [Mr Adegboyega] is in fact of real value to the UK.”
In the tribunal, he maintained no one had ever faced criminal charges over his church’s finances, that many of the attacks on him and SPAC Nation were politically motivated and that claims it was a cult were unfounded.
However, the tribunal was told the Charity Commission concluded “there had been serious misconduct and/or mismanagement in the administration of the charity which was sustained over a substantial period of time”.
The tribunal also found Mr Adegboyega’s evidence to be “hyperbolic in many instances” and had “sought to grossly inflate his influence”. “We find it to be implausible that he has the time to undertake all of this work personally,” it said.
The tribunal concluded: “We are not satisfied that the good work that SPAC Nation undertakes generally would collapse or even significantly suffer should the Appellant be required to leave the UK.
