Those who bleach their skin are fraudsters - Apostle Suleman

The Senior Pastor of Omega Fire Ministry, Apostle Johnson Suleman, has likened those who bleach the colour of their skin to fraudsters.

Suleman in a recent sermon at the headquarters of his church in Auchi, Edo State said those who bleach the colour of their skin end up smelling and are prone to contracting cancer.

Nigerians, young and old, are so obsessed with changing their skin colour.

Statistics compiled by the World Health Organisation in 2011 showed that 40% of African women bleach their skin. In Nigeria, 77% of women bleach.

The WHO report also revealed that Nigeria leads countries such as Togo with 59 percent bleaching users, South Africa 35 percent, and Senegal 27 percent.

Seeing the boom in skin-lightening business, many Nigerian female celebrities now operate a thriving business selling skin-lightening creams.

The act of changing the colour of skin from black to light skin is not only common among women as many would want to believe, but men are also caught in the act. Bleaching is not gender-based.

Bleachers have also devised advanced means of changing their skin colour in recent times, it is called organic – where several chemicals are mixed together in a bathtub for customers to change their skin colour, it is a faster way of changing skin colour.

Suleman who frowned at the practice told his congregants that those who change their skin colour are fraudsters.

He said:

Can I give you a counsel as a boy and a girl, don’t bleach.

“Bleaching has no end, anything that moves from the original has no end.

He went on to list the disadvantages of bleaching:

“1. When you start bleaching you start smelling because you’re taking off the original layer.

“2. Some parts of your body react, they refuse to cooperate with you because you are a fraudster. So at that period, you start looking like a map.

“3. You are open to cancer.”

The cleric added:

“Funny enough some men also bleach. Your mates are fans of Manchester, Arsenal and Chelsea, you are a fan of cream and you are a man.”