Tags
CHC, chc confessions, City Harvest Church, cult, cults, Kong Hee, straits times, trial, word of faith cult, word of faith cults
Rodyk & Davidson explain the CHC situation
CHC confessions recently provided it’s readers with the following information:
“In the Corporate Governance Workshops organized by SIAS on 13 Nov 2013, the speakers from Rodyk & Davidson presented the case of CHC.”
Source: CHC Confessions, CHC Confessions, https://www.facebook.com/CHCConfessions/posts/798553436830702, 16/05/2014. (Accessed 24/05/2014.)
They provided the link,
Rodyk & Davidson – CHC Presentation
CHC Confessions highlighted the following information within the article:
Findings from the COC’s Inquiry (Taken from Inquiry into the City Harvest Church, MCCY):
• Despite representations made to public and members, funds were used to fund the crossover Project; executive members were not told of the actual purpose of these funds
• Used to fund the Crossover Project under the guise of donations to its affiliated church in KL, and these were then transmitted by CHCKL to support the Crossover Project in the United States
• Donations and tithes to the charity were transferred into a private fund known as a “Multi Purpose Account” (MPA), and monies in the MPA were used to fund the Project
• Selected donors were asked to transfer their donations from the “Arise and Build” campaign to the MPA
• Apart from a few members the existence of the MPA was not made known to the charity’s members
• Attempt to conceal the existence of the MPA by closing the joint bank account and dealing only in cash transactions
• Disclosure of related party transactions
o Kong Hee’s company sold over S$3m worth of merchandise to the charity, and this was not disclosed
o Eventually Kong Hee ‘re-funded’ royalties to the charity arising from the sale of his merchandise, however these were later reimbursed to him from monies in the MPA and the CHCKL
• Board governance and control issues
o Appointment of Investment Manager was not properly tabled and discussed by the charity’s board
o When he suffered financial difficulties, donations were “re-funded” to him in two tranches, Board approval for one being received 9 months after the re-funds were made
Questions that arise
• Duties of intermediaries where there are complex structures to disguise the true substance of the transactions and monies
• Do intermediaries have adequate facts and information to give professional advice?
• Do donors insist that funds be used for specific purposes?
• Can donors change their minds? How can this be done?
o Under the Charities (IPC) Regulations, if donors specify a purpose for their donations, this must be followed
A CHC family break up
This other news is also from CHC Confessions. Just as we have reported how C3 causes serious damages to family break ups, CHC appears to be no different. Once again – the below events are marks of a cult.
I’m not Christian but my husband attends CHC.
We’ve had problems in our marriage for years and I’m finally filing for divorce. When I brought the matter up, my husband became angry and started threatening to make things difficult for me. One of his threats was that he would never give me a single cent of financial support (I only work part-time so I can take care of our child, so I don’t earn much in comparison to him).
My husband gives a five-figure sum to every Arise and Build or whatever CHC calls their fund-raising campaigns. But he won’t give any support to the mother of his child. He says he has no money.
I don’t understand. What kind of hold does this church have on its members, that they won’t try to save their marriages and they won’t support their spouses?
Source: CHC Confessions, CHC Confessions, https://www.facebook.com/CHCConfessions/posts/798554253497287, 16/05/2014. (Accessed 24/05/2014.)
Here is another interesting story,
If you look through the various Facebook pages that proclaim support for Kong Hee and gang, you will find a lot of amens for posts that supposingly declare God’s support. You will find verses that proclaim ‘who can’t be against us when God is with us’ etc. However, you can never find a post that proclaims ‘God’s justice will be served’. NOTHING, I repeat NOTHING along that line.
It seems like members are scared to proclaim God’s justice. It seems like they would very much prefer their leaders to be found innocent then for God’s justice to prevail whatever the outcome may be. And this, I find extremely disturbing.
I am now an ex-member. Let me share 1 experience in my CG. Sitted in a circle, we were asked to pray for the leaders. As the prayers go around, there were the usual enthusiastic amens to each prayer. When it came to my turn, I simply said that let God’s justice come whatever it may be, and that if the leaders are innocent, let God’s justice prevail. If they are guilty, let God’s justice prevail.
As you might have guessed it by now. NOBODY in the group amen my prayer. My CG leader even quickly took over the prayer during that brief period of silence and continued her enthusiastic support prayer. I’ve since left CHC for other reasons and how glad I did.
To me, it is very clear that what those hard core CHC members want is not God’s justice. They have an outcome in mind, that their leaders walk free. And they are just selectively quoting God’s words to support their cause. Classic case of hearing only the good thing.
Source: CHC Confessions, CHC Confessions, https://www.facebook.com/CHCConfessions/posts/801177769901602, 20/05/2014. (Accessed 24/05/2014.)
Lastly, the Straits Times Reports,
City Harvest Church trial resumes briefly for defence application
SINGAPORE – The City Harvest Church trial resumed briefly on Wednesday as one of the defence lawyers asked the court to refer two questions of law to the High Court.
But the Presiding Judge of the State Court, See Kee Oon, rejected the application.
The two questions were related to one of the accused, deputy senior pastor Tan Ye Peng. One question was whether, under the law, Tan could be considered to have had control of the church’s funds because he was a church board member, when the board had been collectively given control of the funds.
The second question was whether Tan’s status as a board member meant he had control of the funds in the way of his “business as an agent”. The charges against him can stand only if the answers to both questions are yes.
Source: By Feng Zengkun, http://www.straitstimes.com/news/singapore/courts-crime/story/city-harvest-church-trial-resumes-briefly-defence-application-2014, Published on May 21, 2014 3:09 PM. (Accessed 24/05/2014.)
C3 Church Watch 
Quite an “evanscandal” happening here….. http://herescope.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/evanscandal.html
My husband gives a five-figure sum to every Arise and Build or whatever CHC calls their fund-raising campaigns
I can completely emphasise with this. We had very little money when my family was breaking up, thanks to C3 “business guidance”. however my father had pledged to give a certain amount to C3 and their building fund in good times. He even borrowed money to pay when he didn’t have money. When he didn’t have enough money to give in a particular week, he effectively accrued the “debt” he owed the church. So when he got some extra money for whatever reason it went straight to the church to pay off the shortfall of the amount he had pledged when he did have a good income. The family didn’t see a dime.
Through all that it still appals me to this day that the C3 leadership supported him with that madness, and actively encouraged it.
Once he was squeezed completely dry and began asking them for help, that was it though, they dropped him and didn’t want to give him the time of day. I’m not sure if he ever got over that, but is was never discussed anymore.
The bible clearly tells us that if we don’t provide for our families, we are worst than a heathen. Of course the tithes believing church won’t tell you that. Why are so many easily brain washed by these false teachings.
If it looks like a cult, and duds people like a cult – then maybe it IS a cult?
In the Rodyk & Davidson Presentation CHC case study its noted that Kong Hee sold
Sing$ 3million worth of merchandise to the charity, I wonder what price it was sold to the charity for?? this transaction it seems was not disclosed to church members. He apparently repaid the royalties back but then got reimbursed those royalties later from the so called “multi purpose account”-(MPA) with board approval 9 months after he was refunded the royalties!!
Kong Hee bleeding money out to himself from the charity !!! again no Transparency or Governance , Kong Hee is a disgrace !! and he says he maintains his integrity !! what a joke, this guy actually believes he has done nothing wrong !!?? All I can say is that eventually corruption and lies always get found out, His day in court is near.
Transferring Church member’s donations from a Church Charity / Building fund to a multi purpose account (MPA) or some other account which can be tapped into with no disclosure for their own lifestyle spending seems to be a common practice happening these days in some of these modern day churches look at what happened with Steve Munsey in the USA ,Kong Hee /CHC and from memory the scandal at C3 Balmain-Sydney. Could this be happening within the whole C3 Church movement ??
We may never know because the Pringle’s C3 Church movement has NO Transparency or Accountability, its members have no idea what their money is being spent on , except come June each year to raise more funds, church members get fed scraps of information on some projects C3 is involved in, no detailed financial data analysis is given on a project by project basis and no detailed cash flow statements are ever given to show the Charity’s financial position and no External Audit Reports are given either. Basically church members are asked to “Trust the Leaders” but really what is happening is the flock is being fleeced of their money.
Kong Hee is, in my view, already hooked beyond escape. If he does escape after the trial has ended, there will be heads rolling at the COC and CAD, which will certainly lead to lots of trouble for the government.
The question is now this – why were the other 5 co-accused willing to participate in committing the offences. Were they compelled to carry out Kong Hee’s wishes because he was the boss, or were they just blind to their joint mischief. But they were warned about the wrong they were doing and had resorted to concealment and lying. It could also be that they were subjected to some forms of inducement by Kong Hee.
If the inducements had been financial benefits then the prosecutors should seek to establish what they were – and this may open up another can of worms. On the other hand, if the five had simply and foolishly obeyed Kong Kee, then Kong Hee ought to own up saying that he was the prime mover. This might result in less harsh penalty for the five.
“On the other hand, if the five had simply and foolishly obeyed Kong Kee, then Kong Hee ought to own up saying that he was the prime mover. This might result in less harsh penalty for the five”
I agree. I’m sure the five thought what they were doing was right. In terms of evangelism and supporting their leadership (as strange as that may seem to outsiders).
The most unfortunate result would be if the accounting people are convicted because they “should have known better” based on the expertise whereas Kong was ignorant of correct accounting/legal procedures.
There’s lessons in this for church workers.