The late Temitope Balogun Joshua, who was one of Nigeria’s most controversial and wealthiest preachers, made several prophecies during his decades-long ministry.
Joshua’s followers believed that he had an uncanny ability to foretell the future with unparalleled accuracy and have pointed out what they consider his prophecies that were fulfilled.
However, the late megachurch pastor’s critics dismissed him as a charlatan who preyed on people’s desperation and gullibility to line his pockets.
Pindula News has revisited some of the prophecies which Joshua’s church, the Synagogue Church of All Nations (SCOAN) claimed he made.
Michael Jackson’s death
Michale Jackson, “the King of Pop” died on the 25th of June 2009 and according to SCOAN international, Joshua had predicted the death on 12 June.
Joshua reportedly called Tee Mac, the immediate past president of the Performing Musicians Association of Nigeria (PMAN) during his birthday celebration on June 12 and informed him to bring Michael Jackson to Nigeria. Said Tee Mac:
On June 12, I went to the Synagogue to wish him a happy birthday and played some flute for the guests, but the Man of God did not come down to the party.
He called me up to his private office. There we discussed the PMAN problem and he told me to bring Marlon Jackson, Michael to Nigeria.
He stated that Michael needs urgent help, medical and deliverance. I replied that Michael has just passed a medical test before the events managers would sign him for the 50 shows, but Prophet T.B. Joshua insisted that Michel must come to Nigeria to the Synagogue for treatment and that this was a very serious situation.
According to SCOAN, on the 14th of June, Joshua told the congregation about the impending death of the pop star. Tee Mac said he was shocked when the news of Michael Jackson’s death was announced and got more shocked when he went to the Synagogue church the next Sunday only to have the video of the prophesy played to him.
Zambia’s historic AFCON win in 2012
Barely a few hours before Zambia won the AFCON match in 2012, Joshua reportedly prophesied the nation’s historic victory.
Video footage posted by SCOAN in Lagos, Nigeria on YouTube showed Joshua talking on Sunday 12th February 2012, several hours before the match between Zambia and Ivory Coast was due to start. He said:
I know you have a game now which you want to watch. Today is the final and you want me to talk about it.
Yes, this blessing is for a country you are not expecting; this victory is for a country you are not expecting.
God wants to make them happy because of the victims of what happened to them in the past. Yes, this is joy; everybody will celebrate.
That will make them forget about the past record of what happened to the same country… This is a day of forgetting, and dancing!
The last time Zambia reached the AFCON final in 1994, was just a year after 18 members of Zambia’s national football team died tragically in a plane crash in Libreville, Gabon.
In the 2012 final, Zambia were considered underdogs when they took on the mighty Ivory Coast then led by Chelaselegend Didier Drogba but triumphed on penalties. Said Joshua:
God showed me the first and second halves. In the second half at 25 minutes, there is a mistake… Even if you have the opportunity to enter the television where they are playing, you would enter and flog the player, ‘Why didn’t you score this thing?’
You will face the goalkeeper and play it out, over the bar. Face to face with the goalkeeper and you now play it outside.
Is that not a big mistake? That is the goal that would have given you the Cup. Now, it is taken to the other side.
In the 70th minute, the 25th minute of the second half, Drogba missed a penalty after he skied his effort over the bar.
The disappearance of the Coronavirus
Speaking before his congregation on Sunday, March 15, 2020, Joshua claimed that the disease will go away by itself, without medicine or a cure. He told his church:
I came out at the beginning of this year saying last year will end in March and the year will continue to be very fearful till this month [March].
This month 27th, it will be over. By the end of this month, whether we like it or not – no matter the medicine they might have produced to cure whatever, it will go the way it came.
If it is not a medicine that brought this to the world, medicine cannot take it out. It will go the way it came.
Hillary Clinton’s victory in U.S. Presidential Elections
In 2016 Joshua predicted that Hillary Clinton would win the US presidential election.
Joshua told his congregation during Sunday service that he “saw” a woman winning. He said:
Ten days ago I saw the new president of America with a narrow win. The new president will be facing several challenges over many issues, including passing bills, attempts to possibly pass a vote of no confidence on the new President. The boat of the new president will be rocked.
By the way, in order not to keep you in suspense, what I frankly saw is a woman.
The video and Facebook post were however deleted from the church’s accounts after Donald Trump defeated Clinton.
Joshua made several other prophecies over the years including the impending death of an African president which his followers said concerned the former president of Malawi Bingu wa Mutharika who died in 2012, aged 78.
SCOAN also released a video claiming that TB Joshua predicted the Malaysia Airlines MH370 which disappeared on 8 March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport to its planned destination, Beijing Capital International Airport. To date, the plane has not been accounted for.
The prophecy received a lot of attention on social media and its accompanying YouTube video amassed over 1 million views.