UNISA will be shocked - here Bishop Engenas is labelled a heartless man
His Grace Bishop Doctor Engenas Joseph Lekganyane, the spiritual leader and Bishop of the St Engenas Zion Christian Church. Heela Mogalaledi, baa go buabua ka kwano – you have become the subject of national dialogue thanks to your failure to show face or share voice on the recent tragedy that took the lives of the 45 Batswana who set off to South Africa reportedly to fellowship with you. I just thought I should alert you to the discourse here that has summarily dismissed you as a chancer and a fake Man of God. I am scared to share everything they are saying about you Mogalaledi because some of the vocabulary they have used or are continuing to use, is beneath my moral conscience to repeat to you. Mme fela the people are not happy rra. I even risk being attacked myself Mogalaledi by alerting you of this discourse, moreso that the matter is seen as too sensitive given the enormity of the calamity that befell the many families that so believed in your power to restore all things Godly in them. But before I dwell into the depths of the bone of contention from my fellow Batswana, accept my belated word of encomiums on the Honorary Doctorate of Philosophy and eology recently conferred on you by the University of South Africa - some seven months ago to be exact. I congratulate you today to remind all and sundry that despite all the things they are saying about you Mogalaledi, you are not only a true man of God but also of honour. e University of South Africa does not throw honorary doctorates around willy nilly like some universities I know here in Africa and abroad - and for them to do so, they must have seen in you something really worth celebrating. When they did honour you, they said it was to recognise your exceptional contribution to peace, social cohesion and the resilience of African initiated institutions in the 21st Century.
They called you a transformative and compassionate leader who has brought hope, healing and restoration to many people. I remember listening to the citation by Professor Zethu Nkosi on that momentous occasion, which noted that through your spiritual gift and sacrosanct leadership, you have succeeded in diligently transforming the Christian landscape on this continent and beyond. You were further honoured for providing Africans from all corners of the continent with a platform to worship and praise God with pride and freedom. All in all, you were described as a grounded man who is sensitive to challenges and the plight of your people. ey shared that you are a reliable and solution-driven leader whose deeds have earned you respect among your people not only here in Africa, but throughout the world. Elsewhere, those who claim to know you better say you are known to possess healing powers. All this beautiful talk about you I tell you, would be laughed off as a cosmeticized façade by the people of my country. Trust me, the mood here in relation to you is that of disdain for the person they perceive you to be. ey believe you have forsaken your own people in their biggest hour of need. You are seen here as a cold person with no empathy whatsoever, your biggest crime being your failure to be a part of the mourning processes that have been ongoing in the country since that fateful March 28 evening when that bus carrying Batswana pilgrims to your shrine plunged off the Mmamatlakala bridge in Limpopo, South Africa. From Day One they have wondered why your silence has been so loud – so conspicuous they would have sworn the people who died were not even visiting you. Le gore you didn’t even know a thing about them. A newspaper headline here even made things worse when it suggested you were too busy to condole with the families of the deceased. It has been over a month now since that tragedy struck and the people here are wondering if you have been busy all that time, with not a single minute to at least make some form of public statement to react to what happened. It has irked many here that even on the day the Heads of State for both Botswana and South Africa, His Excellencies Mokgweetsi Masisi and Cyril Ramaphosa visited the crash site, you could not be bothered to show up. Even at the national memorial service, people here say they expected that you would either show up or at least convey some form of message to comfort the bereaved. Even some within the government enclave here in Botswana strongly believed your mere presence could have helped ease the pain on the mourning families. When you couldn’t show up, they then assumed you would attend the mass funeral that was state sponsored. Instead, some Moruti read a message purported to be from you. Not even a pledge of support of any form Mogalaledi and this my people feel was a flaunt of arrogance, lenyatso and disregard Your Grace. In their eyes, the University of South Africa was duped into thinking you are a compassionate person who brings healing and restoration to your people even beyond the borders of South Africa. You should get into the social media pages of several Batswana and even some in South Africa to have a feel of their sentiments – they say they have lost respect for you, and that they will be stopping their parents from ever stepping foot at your Moria shrine in future. Morena, gatwe ga o na pelo, and that you only care about your church people when they make monetary contributions towards the growth of your church. Gatwe e bile Bishop Barnabas Lekganyane of the other ZCC would have done far more better than you. ey argue that with him, truckloads of foodstuffs would have reached the bereaved, and that the church would have taken the lead in funeral preparations and all related activities. Gatwe Barnabas would have even come to Botswana more than once in that period and would certainly have been there in person to deliver messages of condolences at either the memorial service or the funeral service or even both. Rra, your name here is being dragged in the mud, with some even suggesting that President Masisi declares you a prohibited immigrant in Botswana. Which made me remember Julius Malema’s words when our former President Ian Khama declared him a prohibited immigrant. He asked what Botswana has that could make him want to come to the country. I believe you would say the same, even with your many followers in Botswana. I hear you have never been this side and that if the recent deaths of your followers could not make you come here, then nothing else can make you come to the country. Some are even casting aspersions on you and wondering if you didn’t have some form of involvement in the tragedy that unfolded – they mention things such as sacrifice, I am not sure what they mean, but that is a permeating conversation on social media this side. ey call you all sorts of names My Leader – they are using words such as heartless, fake, egotistical, and many others to describe you. A number of your followers here in Botswana tried in vain to come to your defence – their reasoning failed to convince the average Motswana who ascribes to the virtues of botho, setho le mautlwelobotlhoko – the values they say you failed to display by your very loud silence throughout the mourning period. Even those who defended your absence by saying the deceased belonged to some faction in the church that is not aligned to yours could not convince many. ey argue that no amount of internal wrangling inside an institution of God can make you so angry that you could not even make some unifying statement, or even some donations to the bereaved families – as well as some form of posttrauma counseling. For those who say you are a very busy man, many have concluded that instead, o lenyatso.
ey wonder how busy you can be compared to your Head of State Cyril Ramaphosa who not only took time to call his counterpart in Botswana to converse about the accident, but also made time to visit the scene of the accident. ey wonder too, if you can be busier than President Masisi who is not a member of your church but made time to comfort the nation on television; traveled to Molepolole to personally convey his condolences to the bereaved; made time to attend the national memorial service, and even crossed the border to visit the accident scene. So, nna tota Mogalaledi, I may have very little information about these spiritual things and the ZCC fights and churches and all, but I feel you have a lot to do to restore the people’s faith and trust in you as a church leader. Batho ba go tlhobogile rra and maybe you need to find time to at least explain your no-show because to many, it does not make sense, no matter what explanations your defenders try to give. With all this, I wouldn’t be surprised if the University of South Africa comes out tomorrow to say they regret ever portraying you as a compassionate man and a global unifier who cares about his people through healing their souls and giving them hope. For in the eyes of many, thou art not so.