Daily Sun (May 27 2015) - LIKE many sangomas, Pastor Jeremiah has a steam room to make sick people better.
He invited women into his ndumba with the promise of salvation and good health.
BUT ONCE THEY’RE INSIDE . . . THAT’S WHEN THE TROUBLE STARTS!
People go to the ndumba steam room when they aren’t well. The sangoma makes steam come from fires treated with muthi and other secret medication. The patient squats down with a blanket over her head and breathes deeply, taking in the healing clouds of steam.
But according to a number of women, Jeremiah Rampai (58), a sangoma, prophet and pastor from St Bethel church in Rockville, Soweto takes his treatment one step too far.
He allegedly invites women members of his church to cleanse themselves in his steam room. The women claim the pastor orders them to strip naked before they squat under the steaming blanket and then he sticks his hands under the blanket and plays with their private parts!
The woman told Daily Sun that they didn’t open a case because the pastor threatens to bewitch them if they dare to report him.
“We live in fear,” said one of the women who did not want to be named. “He tells us he will make us go mad if we report him to the police.”
A husband of one of the women said the pastor is disgusting.
“I had to pull my wife out of the church.
“He was disrespecting me and my wife.”
The woman said the pastor was always making sexual advances and the couple had since left the church.
Another former church member said she was forced to leave the church after the pastor started kissing her daughter when he visited her house.
“I left the church last year. I wasn’t happy with things he was doing. My child is young enough to be his daughter,” she said.
Another woman claims the pastor takes her into his ndumba and has sex with her. “I don’t have a say because he dominates me,” she claimed.
She suspects he uses muthi on her and the other women.
“How can he have power over us all?” she asked.
“I fear reporting him to police because he promises to strike us with muthi.”
When Daily Sun visited Pastor Jeremiah at his house he said he didn’t care what people said or what was written about him.
“I know those people and I swear they are going to pay,” he said. He denied sexually harassing women in his church but said: “There are many women who want me.”
But when the People’s Paper asked further questions, he refused to say anything more.
See the Daily Sun’s new website for more on this and other stories....
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