On Friday, the “biggest statue of Jesus in Africa” was unveiled. The nine-metre tall statue of Jesus Christ carved from white marble, is thought to be the biggest of its kind in Africa.

Standing barefoot with arms outstretched, the “Jesus de Greatest” statue weighs in at 40 tonnes.

More than 100 priests and hundreds of Catholic worshipers attended the nine-metre (30-foot) statue’s official unveiling in the village of Abajah in southeastern Nigeria.

The nine-metre tall statue of Jesus Christ carved from white marble, thought to be the biggest of its kind in Africa, is unveiled in Abajah, southeastern Nigeria on Friday


The Statue was commissioned by Obinna Onuoha, a local businessman who hired a Chinese company to carve it and placed it in the grounds of a 2000-capacity church that he built in 2012.

In his homily at a Mass before unveiling the statue, presiding bishop Augustine Tochukwu Okwuoma said it would be a

The 43-year-old boss of an oil and gas distribution company timed the statue’s unveiling to coincide with his parents’ 50th wedding anniversary.

“We think religions can exist side by side,” Onuoha said.

“We hope that people can live in harmony.”



He said the idea of building a giant statue of Jesus came to him in a dream nearly 20 years ago.

And when his 68-year-old mother fell seriously ill a few years ago, she made him promise that he would build a church if she survived.