Nearly two decades after one of Ghana’s public gospel industry divorces, Rev Ahenkan Bonsu, the ex-husband of renowned gospel musician Esther Smith, has broken his silence in a tell-all interview, revealing the moment he knew his marriage was over.
Speaking in an interview on Radio XYZ, Bonsu recalled that Esther had travelled for a show and he tried reaching her, only to be told she had gone to the United States.
He heard nothing more until a surprise phone call from a friend.
“A friend of mine based in the United States called me and told me that he had seen her come to perform at a Church of Pentecost branch in New York and that an announcement was given that she would hold a naming ceremony at the church.
“I was shocked because I never knew she was pregnant and had given birth,” he said.
His friend recorded the naming ceremony and sent the footage to his email. Bonsu downloaded it, burned it onto a CD, and took it straight to their bishop.
“That was what made me officially leave the marriage,” he said.
According to Bonsu, what made it more painful was the child’s name.
“I had wanted to name the child Bright Ahenkan Bonsu and had spoken about it to her. So it’s like the name had stuck in her head, she named the child Bright Smith Bonsu,” he said.
When the bishop confronted Esther with the allegations, Bonsu says she initially denied everything. It was only when the bishop played the CD that she relented.
“All she could say was she was sorry,” he said.
In the same interview, Bonsu also accused Esther of abandoning their eldest child after the divorce, saying she took the two younger children, left the oldest, named Mighty, with him, and never returned to check on the child. He added that he has never set eyes on his two other children since the separation.
Esther Smith and Rev Ahenkan Bonsu were married in the mid-2000s, but the union collapsed after roughly four years, culminating in a widely publicised divorce between 2008 and 2010.
Esther Smith, for her part, has told a different story over the years. In previous interviews, she revealed that she was a victim of domestic abuse throughout the marriage, saying her situation could have ended in death.
She also claimed that stories about her giving her child to another man were lies and that her ex-husband’s false narratives left her unable to defend herself for years.