The below text is a leaked email dated 4 June 2024 from Dr Patrick Sookhdeo to Lord Carey and Baroness Cox, patrons of Barnabas Aid. It was copied to all the trustees and many of the staff of Barnabas Aid and linked charities around the world. It had six attachments. 

Dear George and Caroline,

Greetings. I am very grateful to you for sending out your letter to all the trustees of the Barnabas Aid family of charities.  Thank you for your wonderful words of affirmation of Caroline, Rosemary and me. Like you, I am thankful to God for all that has been achieved during the last 35 years, since that conference in Cyprus in 1989 at which the idea of Barnabas Fund was first conceived. By God’s grace our income has grown and what Barnabas has done, especially in the last couple of years when we provided 72 million servings of food to needy Christians (if I remember the figure correctly) is overwhelming.  Ultimately, this is the Lord’s doing, but I must also mention the efforts of our tremendous staff in delivering the strategy/planning which Caroline, Rosemary and I developed.

I am also very pleased that you are both now involved because, when this conflict first emerged in April, I raised with Andrew (Carey) whether our Patrons could get involved as peacemakers to find a Christian solution before things got out of hand. It was one of various initiatives that Caroline (Kerslake) and I made to try to find a Christian solution, without involving lawyers.  I was disappointed when Andrew firmly refused on George’s behalf, saying that he was too ill and should not be disturbed as this could affect his health. I therefore dropped the whole idea of involving the Patrons as peacemakers.  That is why I am particularly thankful that you are both now involved. 

Following up on what Caroline Kerslake wrote to you, perhaps I could help you with some background to understanding the situation?

Recent history of the current conflict

It is clear that there has been a longstanding plot to oust Rev Dr Prasad Phillips, Caroline, Rosemary and me.  We first heard rumours of it in February this year, when a colleague told us that a “white people’s plot” was in preparation, since at least the previous December, which aimed not only to oust us but also to make other staff changes so that all senior leadership positions would be held by white people. 

We discovered the reality of this plot at a Nexcus board meeting on 8 April 2024 when we were told by Michael Hewat (chair of Barnabas Aid New Zealand) of whistleblower allegations against me and (he vaguely hinted) against Rosemary and Caroline too.

Soon after that we were told by another member of staff that, about a year earlier, in early 2023 Noel Frost had asked various staff to make complaints against me to the Charity Commission (CC), which at least four of them agreed to do. (We know the names of four who did so, but there may have been seven altogether if what Noel later told me about the Charity Commission receiving seven complaints in early 2023 was accurate.) The aim was apparently to bring back Hendrik Storm who had resigned as International CEO in January 2023 and been replaced by Noel. This action by Noel Frost was surely the origin of the alarming spate of complaints to the CC which Noel later told me about gravely, assuring me he had managed to pacify the CC so they would not intervene unless another complaint against me was received.

It appears that a second spate of complaints against me (this time internal whistleblower complaints i.e. anonymous) was triggered in early April 2024. (Note – I understand that Noel Frost was the Whistle-Blowing Officer.) From our perspective, it seemed these were a response to events on 3 and 4 April. Noel had erroneously announced to the staff on the evening of 3 April that Caroline, Rosemary and I were leaving immediately from everything. Prasad (at Caroline’s request) corrected this information to the Pewsey staff the next morning, explaining that we were leaving immediately from Barnabas-related things, but not from the other charities in the network and would still be available to advise or assist if required on Barnabas matters. This is what we had told Noel and Prasad on 2 April. (It was our plan to spend six months in this situation and then step back from all the work except OCRPL and boards on 30 September.)

I had been wondering ever since if this could really be the cause of the spate of complaints, but Andrew Carey confirmed it in an email to the Barnabas Aid board dated 29 May, writing of “whistleblowing complaints, which arose when the retirement of the Founders was announced to staff and the company solicitor, Rob Minors, and then a day or two later staff were told that the retirements were not happening. It was this episode that prompted complaints.”  After the information given to us on 8 April, things developed quickly with pressure on us to step down or take leave of absence gradually developing, greater restrictions being put on us, another spate of accusations against us, the exclusion from our emails and from the Pewsey offices that Caroline told you about (enforced by hired security guards outside the gates).

Meanwhile Michael Hewat (chairman of Barnabas Aid New Zealand) wrote in an email to Caroline on 10 April that he had “good reason to believe” that the complaints against me would be dropped if we three would truly resign, withdrawing completely – to use his own phrases. Otherwise, he said, my reputation would surely be tarnished. As doughty fighters for justice, both of you will understand why we could not take up an offer like that: if we have been accused we want an opportunity to clear our names, not some kind of plea-bargaining.  

Not only were staff orchestrated to send in waves of whistle-blower complaints, but I have heard that the eye-witness who wanted to tell the investigation how they saw this orchestration being organised was prevented from doing so by being told that there was no free slot on the schedule for them to meet with the investigators.

Simon Reading (Lord Reading) has claimed that I harassed people when I managed to enter the Pewsey site on 9 May and walked up the drive. In reality it was the other way round. I was assaulted by John Murray, as he tried to stop me going up the drive. This is recorded in a video and the police confirmed that it was an assault on me. 

Now there are rumours flying around that HR staff have been delving into the files of colleagues who left long ago, searching for disgruntled ones who might be induced to complain against me. Colin Bloom is currently gathering information on me by dredging up my past and looking for any “dirt” he can find. What is more, he has set staff (we know who) the task of doing the same for my children.  Did the four remaining trustees of Nexcus approve this methodology of pro-actively gathering “dirt” in addition to persuading staff to make complaints about me?  This kind of methodology may be accepted in politics, but surely not in Christian ministry? It is Satanic. We are told Satan is the lord of the flies and of moral pollution.

In the past I have been subjected to false accusations and have suffered much for it. Now I see false accusations again, affecting not just me but anyone associated with me. Surely this is diabolical?  Anonymous whistleblowing mechanisms are being used to make false accusations and to destroy.

After the appointment of Colin Bloom as Interim International CEO, many forceful and intimidatory actions were taken at the Pewsey site, with “the Nexcus board” quoted as the authority. Prasad, Caroline, Rosemary and I had our emails cut off on the evening of the day Colin Bloom was appointed. The security guards appeared the following morning which was also the morning that the Pewsey staff were corralled in the devotions room against their will for half the morning, having to ask permission even to go to the toilet, and then all forced to leave and go home. Some staff were greatly distressed, even traumatised, by this experience. No one but Colin Bloom’s inner circle were allowed back on the premises for the next two weeks. 

Please understand that Caroline, Rosemary and I, although members of the Nexcus board at the time, had no knowledge of any of the decisions, appointments or messages that were being sent out in its name, presumably by the other four members of the board: Michael Hewat, Simon Reading (Barnabas Aid UK chair), Ian Clarkson (Barnabas Aid Australia chair) and John Marsh (Barnabas Aid USA chair).

In particular, we cannot understand how the other members of the Nexcus board could have appointed Colin Bloom. His career to date has been in politics with the Conservative Party in the UK. True, he has been director of the Conservative Christian Fellowship and served as the British government’s Faith Engagement Adviser but this is no preparation for full-time Christian ministry or providing aid to the persecuted Church. He is first and foremost a politician and last year was awarded a CBE for “political and public service”. Sadly, the party he is allied to, the Conservatives, are sometimes known as “the nasty party” reflecting what some perceive as their heartless policies and ruthless methods.

Finally, at a Nexcus board meeting on 9 May, the other Nexcus trustees first voted to change one of the bye-laws and then, using the changed bye-law, voted Caroline, Rosemary and me off the Nexcus board. The trustees were Michael Hewat, Ian Clarkson and John Marsh, who were undoubtedly Nexcus trustees, plus Simon Reading who was continuing to function as a Nexcus trustee even though he was no longer chair of the Barnabas Aid UK board, so should have been replaced on the Nexcus board by the new UK chair, Philip Richards. For simplicity I will describe all four of them as trustees, although only three of them were valid trustees.  Colin Bloom was in attendance at that meeting and reminded the other four trustees about the need to remove us from the board. This removal was evidently in relation to the allegations against us, as they said that if we were completely exonerated we could return to the Nexcus board.

The four trustees who did this had been aware since 15 April that they themselves were also the subject of a complaint – not an anonymous whistleblower complaint but a grievance complaint by Prasad Phillips – for the way in which they had bullied, harassed and undermined him while he was serving as Interim International Director. Nevertheless, they decided, with blatant hypocrisy, that they would all remain on the Nexcus board so that they could continue to run the work.  (Prasad is now engaged in a formal grievance procedure against the four trustees of Nexcus, which could lead to an employment tribunal.) 

Noel Frost

I assume you have been told about the South African High Court judgement (attached) against Noel in June 2022, which came to light on 9 May this year.  In summary, he was disbarred from practising law in South Africa because of embezzling money from his clients and forging documents, including charity documents. In the “Striking Order” (i.e. order to disbar him) Noel Frost is described as “a grossly dishonest individual, who is a threat to the public”. Noel did not take the opportunity to defend himself before the judges in South Africa, so the Barnabas Aid board asked if he could be given the opportunity to do so by the Crowell investigation. I have not heard anything more on this but no doubt if Noel had been able to clear his name this would have been announced, his leave of absence would have been ended and he would be back at work. I base this supposition on the fact that Lord Reading, speaking to the UK staff on 8 May, at which point he knew about Noel’s disbarment (although I do not know whether he was already aware through his own channels of the specific reasons for it), announced that the accusations against Noel were not very serious and it was hoped he would be back at work soon.   WAS NOEL SEEKING TO APPLY THE SAME APPROACH TO BARNABAS: FORGING DOCUMENTS, PASSING MONEY TO HIS OWN ACCOUNTS? WAS HE DOING IT WITH THE SUPPORT, DIRECT OR INDIRECT, OF THE NEXCUS BOARD AND IN PARTICULAR THOSE WHO CONTINUED SUPPORTING HIM DESPITE KNOWING HE HAD BEEN DISBARRED?

After this we heard from our bank of an incident at Barnabas Fund itself, in the summer of 2022, where Barnabas Fund’s payment for a removal firm’s invoice of nearly £25,000 ended up in a bank account in the name of “Noel Frost”. When the bank discovered this, the money was repaid to Barnabas Fund. The bank recommended Hendrik Storm to report this matter to the police, but as far as we know he did not do so. Some people are urging that the police should be involved, even now, two years on.  More recently, concerns have been expressed regarding an amount of around £12,000 of charity money apparently taken by Noel in 2023-24, but as we are cut off from the staff we cannot ascertain the details from the Finance department.

The Barnabas Aid UK board has alerted the Charity Commission and has insisted to Nexcus that Noel must have nothing more to do with their charity’s (Barnabas Aid’s) work. It remains to be seen what the Nexcus board will do about the situation, as Noel is their employee.  So far, it has been striking how protectively Noel has been treated by Simon Reading, Andrew Carey, the lawyers at Crowell and the remaining members of the Nexcus board. For example, whereas Noel was expected back at work soon after 8 April, Prasad, Caroline, Rosemary and I have been told that all the restrictions on us will remain in place at least until after the Crowell investigation is completed which, Crowell says, will be August at the earliest.  When the Nexcus board was informed of the South African High Court judgement, a few hours before their board meeting on 9 May, they decided to do nothing about it, but to wait for their next meeting before discussing it.

I am deeply concerned at the way in which a group of trustees of Nexcus and Barnabas Aid seems to have coalesced protectively around Noel and wonder what his hold over them can be. I know that some people have suggested that Noel could have promised them financial support, while others think that he may have fed them a narrative in which he is the only staff person capable and competent to lead the work (perhaps drip-fed over a period of months or even years, including criticism of his colleagues). I do not know, and in a sense the reason is irrelevant. The important thing is that the trustees of the charities in this network, whom I am copying here, act responsibly to safeguard their own charity’s assets.  Almost all of them have Noel on their board.  What action is possible will vary from charity to charity according to your own governing documents and the laws of your country.  

Current governance

From its inception, Barnabas Fund/Aid has had a non-Western ethos.  I am greatly perturbed to see that, in the last few weeks, since what one could call the “coup” of 23 April, when the Pewsey site was seized by force, control has passed into the hands of a group which comprises the rump of the Nexcus board (Michael Hewat, John Marsh and Ian Clarkson), Simon Reading (who, as I said, is on the UK board and claims to be still on the Nexcus board) and Colin Bloom who, as Interim International CEO, is claiming jurisdiction over all the charities in the network whether or not they have any formal link with Nexcus. Forgive me George, but I am sorry to say that we must add Andrew to this list.  Andrew is a member of the Barnabas Aid board but seems to be doing his best to delay and hinder its work. At the same time he has stated in various emails that he is giving instructions to the Nexcus board, to Simon Reading and to Colin Bloom, so is he the real leader of the whole work now?  He has recently described me as a criminal and intimidated Caroline with unspecified threats and menacing innuendo to the extent that she emailed him on 15 April to say: “I am beginning to feel uncomfortable (especially as a woman) at the idea of meeting with you one-to-one to hear about the risk to myself if I join the board of BA UK.”

Barnabas Aid is now run by a group of six white Western men, none of whom has substantive experience of the parts of the world in which live the suffering Christians that Barnabas Aid exists to help. Our work is focused on the non-Western world, where Christians are a persecuted minority. But there is in general a gulf of understanding between those Christians in their situations and Western Christians living in Western societies. That is why I believe it is crucial that senior positions should be filled by individuals who can relate to our project partners and beneficiaries.

Furthermore, Barnabas Aid is now run in a forceful, manipulative and underhand way. Perhaps the thin end of the wedge was Hendrik Storm’s general contempt for boards and trustees (and indeed auditors). Then we had Noel, who – it appears – was wooing some colleagues with expensive luxuries, trying to compromise others the same way, and marginalising/sidelining still others. At the same time he was, I believe, sowing seeds of division and distrust by repeated vague criticisms of colleagues.  Noel put in place the Knowa software which writes the minutes of all the various board meetings around the world, instead of the minutes being written by the people on those boards or in those countries as previously. Now we have Colin Bloom employing security guards to keep the staff, international directors and even the chair of the Barnabas Aid board out of the Pewsey site.

Colin Bloom has apparently used the term “parent company” to describe to staff the relationship between Nexcus and the other charities, including Barnabas Aid in Australia and New Zealand. He says Nexcus are now the supreme authority over everyone and must have control over all monies and policies. This is totally wrong.

Striving to maintain the non-Western ethos

When Hendrik resigned in January 2023, the trigger appeared to be a briefing/discussion paper I wrote for the Nexcus board meeting in December 2022, entitled “Nexcus in 2023 and beyond” which included a section on how to safeguard the non-Western ethos of Barnabas/Nexcus during and after the transition period in which Caroline, Rosemary and I would step down.  (At that point I was planning to step down in 2023 but this had to be postponed when Hendrik left because much of the handover I had been doing with Hendrik for several years had to be repeated again with Noel.)   One proposal that I made in the paper, as a means for safeguarding the non-Western ethos, was to recommend that Prasad Phillips (an Indian) be appointed Deputy International Director and, if the Lord so led, the future International Director when I had gone.  The Nexcus board approved this, but it seems that Hendrik was unwilling to accept that Prasad would be senior to him. Indeed, it may well have been Hendrik’s intention to take on the International Director role as well as International CEO. Combining these two positions with being treasurer or chair of many of the entities in the network, he would in effect have had sole power. Hendrik resigned the next month and then issued a claim against the charity for constructive dismissal and racism, saying that he, an African (South African), had been discriminated against because he was white, and requested (if memory serves) £180,000 in compensation. Noel negotiated this payout down to “only” £100,000. I was not involved in this and as far as I am aware none of the boards were involved in agreeing this massive payout.

After Hendrik left, another white South African, Noel, stepped into Hendrik’s position as International CEO.  When Hendrik resigned he signalled that he did not wish to work out his three months’ notice period, so the handover had to be pretty much instantaneous and was not very thorough. There was no one but Noel who could possibly have taken on the role at such short notice although I had to supervise and mentor him in detail.

But history began repeating itself in many ways, and one of them was that, earlier this year, Noel said to me that he would never let Prasad be International Director.  This was in a discussion about my intention to leave and hand over to Prasad but Noel flatly refused to have Prasad as International Director. I am aware that some colleagues wonder if there was a racist motive behind this.

We had brought over to work with us Archdeacon Hassan John, a senior church leader from Nigeria.  When I urged that Hassan should take on Prasad’s role of Deputy International Director when Prasad became International Director, Noel said this could not be done because Hassan’s visa for working in the UK would not allow it.  This information turned out to be false.

Sadly, the appearance is that Noel was unwilling to Asians or Africans have senior leadership positions and that he wanted sole and supreme control over all money and positions of power. It seems that Hendrik had had the same aims.

Finance

When Noel took over as International CEO we were disappointed to find that he communicated even less with the International Directors than Hendrik had.  Between us, Caroline and I asked Noel, explicitly and many times, to keep us better informed, both of things in general and specifically of financial matters including expenditure and the amount of money available in restricted funds for various projects. But nothing seemed to change. At first we assumed Noel’s lack of communication was because he had such a big workload.  With regard to the project balances, he gave us reasons we could not understand about delays in putting the information on the system. He promised it would be ready for us in (I think) January 2024. When that deadline passed, he said it would be April 2024.  As you know April was the month when the plot was unleashed on us, and no financial figures were ever provided. 

The national chairs copied into this email can confirm or deny this, but my impression is that Noel spent a lot of time “courting” them as individuals, although providing very little financial information to their boards. 

Meanwhile he was running up the overheads, for example buying an app in Australia for something like A$100,000, purchasing expensive new financial software that does not seem to be helpful or needed, and committing Barnabas Aid in the UK to sponsoring the Big Church Festival weekend last month, which will have cost us over quarter of a million pounds.

Whoever authorised the appointment of Crowell, an extremely expensive American law firm apparently without particular expertise in UK charity law, to represent Nexcus, whoever decided to ask Crowell to write an aggressive legal letter in response to my suggestion of sorting things out by a spiritual Christian meeting (thus obliging all involved to get legal representation) and whoever authorised the appointment of security guards at the Pewsey site, two guards at a time, 24 hours a day for four weeks (as well as at least one inside the office?), also had little regard for our low-overheads ethos.  Is this what the supporters around the world give their donations for?

In fact, I have been told that the 12% overheads figure we have been telling our supporters is probably not accurate.  Sadly, it could be substantially more because we do not know the accounting procedures that Hendrik and Noel used to calculate this figure. The whole matter is not only opaque but extremely murky. The information we have been giving the supporters about 12% overheads appears dubious and possibly false. 

There is also the question of about £20 million which Nexcus should have, comprising donations forwarded from the UK, US, Australian, New Zealand and other offices, but do they still have it and what are they doing with it?

I am pleased to hear that a full forensic audit of the work will be done by an outside body (to be chosen by Crowell) but will this deal with the new “corporate culture” of spend, spend, spend which seems to have taken root in Barnabas?

Integrity and ethos issues

You will have seen in Colin Bloom’s email to Caroline Kerslake that he says there are no accusations against either her or me.  Yet he must have known about the letter to staff dated 25 April 2024 and headed “Barnabas/Nexcus” statement for staff and signed by “Lord Simon Reading, Rev Ian Clarkson, Rev Michael Hewat, and John Marsh” (which incidentally was cc’ed to one member of the UK board, Andrew Carey). It began: “Serious and numerous allegations have been made against Patrick Sookhdeo, Rosemary Sookhdeo, Caroline Kerslake and Prasad Phillips”. Colin Bloom was present at a Nexcus board meeting on 9 May when Simon Reading told me that there were over 75 allegations against me, which he described as “very serious”.  There is a list of the rough areas of complaints against Caroline, Rosemary and me on page 1 of the in the Crowell Investigation Plan which was sent to Colin Bloom by three Crowell lawyers on 10 May 2024. On 24 May I received an email from Nexcus’s lawyers, Crowell, asking me to reply to fourteen questions as part of an investigation. 

What, then, does Colin Bloom mean by saying there are no accusations against me? If there are none, why have I been banned from access to the Pewsey site and to most of my work emails since 23 April? Is this equivocation or word-games by Colin Bloom?

If so, then it is just one more sad change in the Barnabas culture which used to be open and transparent. In recent weeks a climate of intimidation, bullying, control and secrecy has developed under the leadership of Colin Bloom and the four remaining Nexcus trustees. Nexcus has become like a cult. There is authoritarian rule, zero tolerance of criticism, lack of financial transparency, and unreasonable fears of those outside the group (hence the draconian restrictions put on Caroline, Rosemary, me and Prasad). 

It seems that anyone who raises questions about the activities performed recently in the name of the Nexcus board or by Colin Bloom is speedily targeted with allegations. Note how in Colin Bloom’s email to Caroline he mentions Ian McNaughton, Prasad Phillips, Vinay Samuel and Philip Richards, all members of the Barnabas Aid board who have pushed back against the activities of Colin Bloom and Nexcus.  All of them except Prasad have recently received letters from Crowell asking questions about their financial affairs as part of the investigation, and Prasad was told some weeks ago that there were whistleblower allegations against him so his letter will surely come soon.

Staff are now nervous that other colleagues are spying on them, they are afraid that the IT department is monitoring what they are doing on their computers, and they fear for the security of their jobs. Two OCRPL colleagues in Cyprus were told by Colin Bloom that their services were no longer required, although this now seems to have been rescinded. Our Pakistan coordinator, Wilson Siraj, originally from Pakistan but who has worked at the Pewsey office for 16 years, was suddenly told he would be replaced for six months by David Dean. Wilson was called to meet with Colin Bloom, and assumed that Colin wanted a briefing about the projects in Pakistan. When he arrived he found to his surprise three people already in the room, one of them taking minutes, and a fourth person present by video call. There was discussion about financial payments and the Charity Commission and then Wilson was told that David Dean was to be project manager for Pakistan for six months.  Wilson offered to facilitate David’s imminent trip to Pakistan by linking him to the project contacts but said that he could not work under him. The next day David Dean flew to Pakistan and instructed the Barnabas staff there never again to contact Wilson, who was their line manager. Wilson went off sick for with the stress of this situation for two weeks, was then signed off again by his doctor for another two weeks, and has resigned for the sake of his health. Wilson is not mentioned in the Crowell Investigation Plan, so what has he done wrong? He has a blameless and honourable record.  Someone has planted a rumour that Wilson gave me money, but this is completely untrue. My guess is that Wilson’s main “fault” is being a known friend of mine.

When I wanted to find a Christian solution to the situation, I not only suggested this at a Nexcus board meeting but also contacted Ian Clarkson, chair of the Barnabas Aid Australia board. His words indicated that he too would like a spiritual, Christian solution and yet the Nexcus board brought in the law firm Crowell (who wrote their first formal letter to me on 26 April) and have continued to work through their lawyers ever since.  (Although in one of Crowell’s letters, there seems to be a suggestion of a spiritual Christian meeting, their plan is that it is not to be held until after I have been suspended and investigated by lawyers for about three months. So this hardly seems like a Biblical way forward.) Despite Ian’s words, he, John, Michael and Simon have deliberately rejected a Biblical, Christian approach and taken a legal and secular approach. These are the men who now lead and control Nexcus.  Crowell and Colin Bloom have taken to saying that they want a constructive cooperative approach but their actions tell a different story.

George and Caroline, I believe that Colin Bloom sent your letter separately to each trustee around the world individually, so that no one knew exactly who else had received it. This method divided the recipients from each other and hindered free communication. We need to ask the Lord to shine His light on this situation and reveal what is hidden.

From the very foundations of Barnabas Fund, as a ministry seeking to serve the suffering Church, the work has been based on four principles: truth, righteousness, justice and mercy. Where are these qualities now? Sadly, truth has become falsehood, lies and dissimulation. Justice has become intimidation, bullying and oppression. Righteousness has become a corruption which I would not have thought possible. Mercy has been replaced with deliberate hurting and hounding.

Caroline is concerned about an email appeal that was sent out on 12 April raising funds for a non-existent project in Zimbabwe. It was based on information from an organisation we have never supported and whose work does not appear to fit our remit, using photos from another organisation which does not do the kind of project described in the appeal. Surely this is fraudulent. She raised her concerns a few days later and, I have been told, this triggered another allegation against her.

Caroline has been pressing for two or three years, first Hendrik and then Noel, to enable her to sort out the project fund balances as she used to do once a year.  This means moving unspent surpluses from projects that are over-funded to suitable similar projects (same country or same type of project) that are under-funded, in line with the commitment that appears on all our donation forms. Without this being done we cannot properly honour the intentions of our donors regarding the use of their gifts. Our donors’ money, so sacrificially given, is sitting there without any accurate information on how much is available for each project.

I have been told that decisions on project requests are no longer being made and project grants are no longer being sent. 

Our donors support us because they have confidence that we will handle their donations properly. I feel they have been betrayed. What can be done?

I know that some national trustees are considering withholding the funds that they normally forward to Nexcus, and even writing to their supporters to ask them to halt their donations until all these matters have been cleared up. They feel that they cannot in conscience encourage people to continue donating to Barnabas Aid in the current circumstances. They wonder at what point they should do this – what will donors think if they later discover the trustees were aware of the situation and did not warn the donors?

I myself am in the same dilemma, as I know that some supporters donate to Barnabas because of their confidence in me personally, or in Caroline, Rosemary and me as a group.  Some of our most generous donors and some church leaders have urged me to go public on the basis that our supporters have a right to know what is going on, in particular because of concerns that their donations might not be used for the purposes for which they have given them. 

Meanwhile, the question is: should all fundraising and publicity cease until it is possible to guarantee that donations will once again be used for the purpose for which they were given?  Will our staff around the world be comfortable to continue with their normal fund-raising activities or will they feel that they are raising money under false pretences? 

A dangerous position

As the international director, I, along with Rosemary, Caroline and Prasad, feel it is our duty to say that Barnabas is in an exceedingly grave position. There may well be fraudulent and criminal behaviour. Certainly there has been deceit and deception. Monies seem to have gone missing. The organisation is in a very dangerous position in terms of its ability to fulfil our financial and legal responsibilities to the relevant authorities, to the trustees and to our donors.

In addition we face risk from actions such as that of Lord Reading, who could bring the organisation into disrepute, for example by his selling access to President Putin (see attached), and who endangered Barnabas colleagues in Malaysia with an anti-Malaysia article (attached) that he put his name to recently, with his Barnabas connection cited at the end for credibility.  The article was apparently written by a Jewish research body with links to the US, UK, the Israeli government and the Israeli security services, who paid him in return for being able to put his name at the end as the author.  Further back in the past he allegedly became involved with Saddam Hussein and engaged in illegal trafficking of Iraqi oil when it was sanctioned. This is said to have brought him into contact with the PLO and Yasser Arafat. At another time he was allegedly involved with a former drugs-dealer in a DFID-funded pomegranate project in Afghanistan, working with tribal leaders who had close links to the Taliban.

I am currently powerless to do anything but the trustees around the world, to whom this letter is copied, have power, according to their own governing documents and national laws. I urge trustees to take whatever steps they can to save the work of Barnabas Aid and associated ministries.

• You may want to remove Noel from your board, if your legal framework allows it.
• If your chair is one of those who, as part of the Nexcus board, has led the Barnabas network of charities into their current miseries and degradation, you might want to appoint another chair, who would then take their place on the Nexcus board.
• My understanding is that Colin Bloom is on a three-months contract with Nexcus, which ends on 21 July.  You might want to press the remaining members of the Nexcus board to replace him with a Christian leader who has ministry experience and knowledge of the suffering Church. Another idea would be to bring in a reliable, well-organised Christian organisation to take on the whole of Barnabas Aid’s work as Barnabas may be too much damaged by the last two months to be able to function again on its own.  

A personal note

Rosemary and I have been looking to hand over the work for at least the last 18 years, and this has become especially urgent in the last two or three years. Caroline has expressed her intention of leaving at the same time as us.  Rosemary and I have served the Lord through Barnabas Fund and its predecessor Servants Fellowship International for almost half a century.  There were several years when Rosemary had a salary from SFI and about nine months when I had a salary from Barnabas Fund, but mainly we have been “living by faith”, relying on donations from various benefactors.  Some of these we did not even keep, for example, donating to the ministry a house in east London which we were given. 

Rosemary is now 81 and I am 77.  We both have terminal illnesses and the stress of this situation is exacerbating our symptoms. “Living by faith” is a concept that few Christians nowadays have even heard of, and they look on our financial arrangements  with suspicion. Rosemary is distraught and weeping. According to Noel, when Hendrik accepted his settlement of £100,000 last year, it was on condition that I resigned immediately, otherwise Hendrik would “bring me down”.

In order to protect Rosemary, our children and myself, I am in discussion with lawyers about taking legal action against Colin Bloom, Michael Hewat, Simon Reading, John Marsh, Ian Clarkson, Andrew Carey and any staff members who have enthusiastically cooperated with Colin Bloom’s cult-like regime at Nexcus/Barnabas. I will be suing them as individuals (so they will have to fund their own legal costs) for defamation and the recently revived UK offence of “malicious hurt”. 

I am copying this email not only to the trustees but also to as many staff around the world as I could find email addresses for.  Please do forward it to any other colleagues who have not received it.  I welcome any feedback or comments from any who have received it, either just to me or to the wider group. 

With our Lord’s blessings,

Patrick

Dr Patrick Sookhdeo

Founder and International Director, Barnabas Aid