The Kingsway International Christian Centre (KICC), headed by Nigerian prophet Matthew Ashimolowo, has been duped out of funds close to $5m after they invested it in a Ponzi scheme.
Much like ordinary people who get taken in by greed and decide to invest in schemes promising them an unrealistic return on their investment, the entire church got taken in, as the trustees over its funds also decided to invest in a scheme promising them an unrealistic return on their money.
The fraudulent scheme was run by former English football player Richard Rufus, who was a former member and trustee of the church. A report by the Charity Commission for England and Wales looked into the scheme and found KICC invested $6.1 million (£5 million) in four installments between June 2009 and June 2010. The church, along with other defrauded investors, were promised returns as high as up to 55% on their investment – instead they suffered a net loss of $4.8 million (£3.9 million).

Upon payment of the first installment, the church entered into an agreement guaranteeing profits of 5% per month, with the exception of August and December when they were guaranteed profits of about 2.5 percent.
“The inquiry established that in practice, however, the investments resulted in a net loss of £3.9 million to the charity,” the report stated.
The church’s trustees, who were supposed to take care of its financial investments, were found to have been lax to “follow all the principles expected of trustees to ensure they comply with their trustee duties under charity law when making those decisions,”
Rufus, 41, played for Charlton Athletic his entire career, and was voted by fans as the club’s best ever defender. He was last year found guilty of defrauding over a 100 people out of $10.7m in his innovative Ponzi scheme.

READ ALSO: Refused A UK Visa? CLICK HERE FOR HELP

---

CLICK HERE to subscribe to our daily up-to-date news!!