The Glamour and Class of Siju Iluyomade

•Why wife of Pastor Idowu Iluyomade of RCCG’s City of David Parish is not ‘just a cleric’s wife’

Many a rich, privileged woman totter into vogue but it takes a profound, perceptive lady to mirror the breadth and depth of burgeoning trends to the world. Siju Iluyomade, wife of the Senior Pastor of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Idowu Olusola Iluyomade, is a rich, privileged woman. She is profound and perceptive too thus she dictates and sets the pace in her social circuit.

Siju symbolizes the incontestable affirmation of charm and élan as acceptable traits in a virtuous woman. Being a Christian, according to Siju, should not sentence anyone to the dungeons of bleakness and aesthetic barrenness. Siju glamourizes her trendiness and love for high fashion as much as her love for God. She lives her life like a queen, always dressed in Gucci, Zagliani, Hermes and Marc Jacobs products. For her, Christianity has evolved beyond conservative dress. Among other pastors’ wives in Nigeria, she reigns as the queen of style and fashion.

Although she is a pastor’s wife, she remains the essence of glamour, elegance and unrestrained aura. City of David, arguably one of the richest RCCG parishes in Nigeria, is filled with elegant women who appear in church in elegant and immaculate dresses. But they mostly pale into insignificance compared to the flamboyance of their pastor’s wife. Her pretty face looks more like a work of art. She drives the best of cars and wears the most expensive of accessories. Heads turn each Sunday when she steps into church in appreciation of her beauty, while some ladies are simply green with envy. Her jewelry twinkle with carats of diamonds and gem stones and cause the hearts of many to overflow with longing.

MAN OF FORTUNE…ON THE TRAIL OF NASIRU DANU •WHY HE’S HAVING IT SO GOOD
Angels fly because they take themselves lightly. They do not think too much of themselves, so does the polo buff, Nasiru Danu. Nasiru wears his badge of temperance and humility in the shape of a subtly hued bowtie thus affirming that he isn’t what many of his disparagers make him out to be.

Contrary to misconceptions about his character, Nasiru, according to sources close to him, is actually a modest, compassionate, accommodating and understanding man. His only shortcoming if at all it could be considered ‘shortcoming,’ is his lack of tolerance for sycophancy, bribery or any form of corruption. It is often said that too much money destroys character, corrupts virtue, dishevels morals and feeds the vanities of its random possessors. Thus too many possessors of the legal tender have been found to lose their humanity and souls to its enthralling caprices and vile. But Nasiru is remarkably different. Nasiru who is very close to the corridors of power and influence, is immune to the wiles and ravages of money.

Unlike too many of his peer that have fallen to money’s devious charms, he is invulnerable to the terrifying charms of the legal tender. Despite his wealth and stature, Danu is hardly goaded to believe himself capable of feats otherwise unachievable if he were of modest means. The top business magnate and politician who lives a life of modesty does not subscribe to the usual vanities that eventually consumes his fellow deep pockets in the circuits of the filthy rich.

His generosity exceeds the bounds and understanding of human reason, according to sources close to him. Beneficiaries of Danu’s generosity enthuse about his large heart and capacity for compassion even as you read. Even though his company recently won crude oil contracts from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), he shies from living out loud.

$153M FRAUD: DIEZANI’S MEN GO INTO HIDING •OIL MAGNATES AND ASSOCIATES OF EX-PETROLEUM MINISTER RUN TO ESCAPE EFCC PROSECUTION
When brackish waters recede, the catfish burrows deep into mud earth but that hardly prevents the fisherman from yanking it out of its filthy haven. Like the catfish, bosses of oil firms linked to the $153m seized from former petroleum minister, Diezani Allison Madueke, have gone under to evade arrest; they have scurried deep into unlikely havens to evade arrest and prosecution by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

This prompts investigators to believe that they may have opted to forfeit the cash. But the source of the cash sparked a row last week following claims by a suspect that the $153million was sourced by the former minister from five oil firms and not the accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). The suspect said the $153million was another tranche of funds mobilised under the table by Mrs Alison-Madueke from oil companies for the re-election of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan. The board of NNPC is likely to meet in Abuja to get “a full briefing” on the cash scandal.