FROM THE MAGISTRATES COURTS: about violence - bishop
sengimelane namake noma ngabe ungakanani.
Ngikholelwa kutsi uma kukhona tinkinga, likhona libandla lekutilungisa,” he said in vernacular.
The bishop said, loosely translated to: “It is hurting that in my 40 years and 20 in the leadership position, I am facing a congregant in court. Let me make it clear that I respect women more than I respect leaders in this church. I will never in my life stand against a woman irrespective of her status in the church. I believe that there are structures to deal with any matter arising from the church.”
Matters
He shared that the church had a Constitution which provided that structures were put in place to deal with the church matters before they could reach the bishop.
He mentioned that the structures included local committees, senior church members (family) and the bishop’s committee. He stated that as far as he recalled, he had never in any occasion dealt with a matter involving Khumbuzile alone.
The bishop told the court that he did not recall sending any delegation to harass and intimidate any member of the church.
“Let me put it to the attention of this court that as a church, we respect everyone, starting from families, communities, royal kraals, government, courts, organisations and the King. We cannot, therefore, do things as we please. We always align ourselves to the constitution of the church, which was revealed to the founder, Melika Gadlasenya Vilakati.
Safeguard
“I always make it a point that I safeguard the constitution of the church,” he said.He made an example that even in schools, when pupils breached the rules and regulations without the knowledge of the head teacher, the administrator could not therefore be blamed. He said the head teacher had to be aware and do nothing before he/ she could be blamed.
He stated that there were many branches locally and outside the country that made it impossible to monitor how they operated unless he received a report from the committees.
“I can neither deny nor confirm the alleged utterances by the people accused of harassing Khumbuzile but all I can say is that I never sent anyone to kill, harass or intimidate anyone. It is unfortunate that once someone decides to tarnish your reputation, you lose your image. But I don’t know why someone decided to taint my image. I hope God in Heaven knows the truth,” said the bishop.
Inquiry
Acting Principal Magistrate Vilakati dismissed the peace binding inquiry. The judicial officer stated that there was no evidence linking the bishop to the threats which were allegedly made by Mkhonta. The court also considered that Thulani and Mbongiseni, who were accused of assaulting Khumbuzile, were not present before court, yet their names featured mostly.
“The court cannot rely on hearsay evidence since you had confirmed that you did not have evidence of the bishop telling anyone to attack you. You only told this court that you heard Gadlela claiming that the bishop gave them a mandate to attack you and that hearsay evidence cannot assist the court.
“The peace binding inquiry is, therefore, dismissed,” Vilakati said.