This has been going on since 2010 I think, pastor
Chris Oyakhilome of Christ Embassy made his members to pay N1,000 each as
gate fee to attend the Church's New Year Crossover service which held
at their Ikeja church HQ on Dec. 31st, 2014. Only the members who could pay the 'gate fee' were allowed into the church while those who could not afford it were sent back.
In 2013, the church said the reason they did this was to reduce the
number of people who come for the annual service, because the venue
couldn't handle the thousands that showed up, many or whom were not even
members of the church. So, it was their own way of controlling the
crowd.
So the HQ sitting capacity is about 20k, and let's say half of the crowd
paid N1k each, that would be about N10m for the church from just gate
fee. Some say it's extortion, that no church should ever ask for money
for members to attend, some say they understand why the church would
insist on this. What do you think? Is crowd control a reasonable excuse
to collect gate fee at a church?
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