Rev Ndoni
… pastors write to Justice
minister over ‘corrupt’ judgements
…13 pastors barred from
church
Moses
Ziyambi
The factional battles
ravaging the Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) church has taken yet another nasty
turn, this time with a group of pastors aligned to the Rev Cosam Chiyangwa’s
camp petitioning the Minister of Justice Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Ziyambi
Ziyambi over what they consider to be non-objective handling of their cases at
the Masvingo Magistrates’ Court.
The pastors claim that
some officials at the court are AFM members who are now caught in a conflict of
interest which has seen them taking sides in the legal suits.
The church has 39 ordained
pastors in the province, the majority of whom identify with Chiyangwa, who
leads a rebellion against attempts by Rev Aspher Madziire and Rev Amon Madawu’s
fervent attempts to introduce constitutional reforms that would drastically
reduce the power of pastors and give elders more leeway in church business.
At national level, the
case of the two factions’ claim to legitimacy is before the high court but
locally, a myriad of lesser cases have been before the magistrates’ court.
TellZim News saw a letter,
dated January 10, 2019 and addressed to Ziyambi, and copied to Minister of
State for Masvingo Provincial Affairs Ezra Chadzamira and Masvingo Provincial
Magistrate Langton Ndokera in which the pastors, under the banners of the AFM
Masvingo Provincial Pastors Forum, express serious misgivings about the
neutrality of the magistrates’ court.
The aggrieved pastors,
who include Masvingo overseer Rev Donard Ndoni, Rev Elias Jinjika of Judea
assembly (Runyararo West) and Rev Gilbert Charumbira of Greater Grace assembly (Rujeko),
are being represented by lawyers from Saratoga and Makausi Law Chambers.
They claim that the court
issued a number of dubious judgements that give undue favour to the reform
faction.
When contacted for
comment, Ndokera only acknowledged having received the letter but refused to
comment, saying only authorities in Harare could do so.
“We are doing our jobs to
the best of our abilities and in the best interest of justice. You can get a
comment from our superiors in Harare,” said Ndokera.
Between November and
December 2018, the Masvingo AFM reform faction served 33 pastors of the anti-faction
with dismissal letters, but the purported dismissals were ignored as the issue
of legitimacy was still pending in the high court.
The reform faction also approached
the Masvingo Magistrates’ Court and obtained ex parte interdicts against over a
dozen pastors, barring them from carrying out their duties and using church
property.
On November 08, the reform
faction had obtained another ex parte interdict barring the anti-reform faction
from going ahead with a three-day provincial conference organised at the
church’s provincial centre in Mucheke. The conference, however, went ahead
reportedly because the interdict contained gross errors.
“The pastors were of the
view that we are all equal before the Law but the events that followed the
handling of the cases have proved otherwise. The pastors feel that the Masvingo
Magistrate Court has not taken a neutral position in resolving the said dispute
due to the following:
“The first case on the
interdict (Case Number INT 76 18) barring the Anti-Reform from holding their
conference was heard on 20 November 2018 and the judgement was to be delivered
on 10 December 2018 but unfortunately it was not ready on the said date.
Repeated efforts were done by our lawyers to get the judgement from the Clerk
of Court as promised but that was to no avail.
“Despite our lawyers not
receiving the judgement, the lawyers from the Reform side, arguing a case on
the Second Case of interdicts heard on 08 January 2019, cited that judgement to
the surprise of everyone who was waiting for it. This proved that the Reform
side had received the judgement while the Anti-Reform side was still pursuing
that Judgement. The Reform lawyers had enough time to study and use it as their
base of argument on the interdicts trial while the other had not received the
judgment.
“After the court session,
the Anti-Reform lawyers went to request for the judgement. On receiving the
judgement, there are fundamental errors (sic) that show it was not done
diligently,” part of the document reads.
The errors, according to
the document, were that the place at which the hearing took place is different,
the number of cited respondents were inaccurate and that the judgement gave the
reform faction control of assets despite acknowledging the existence of the
legitimacy dispute.
“The judgement did not
have reasons why the interdict was granted and this has resulted in the
Anti-Reform pastors not being able to launch an appeal and are still waiting
for the reasons,” the document reads.
On the (second) case of
interdicts which was due on December 21, 2018, the reform faction is said to
have simply sent their lawyers to ask for a postponement which they were
granted.
“Anti-Reform lawyers
requested for a written judgement so that after studying the reasons, provided,
see if it was necessary to launch an appeal with the High Court. He was
promised that he would receive it but to no avail. The lawyers proceeded to write
a letter to the Magistrate Court requesting for the judgement but to no avail
until the 08th of January 2019 when the case was heard. In this case
the Masvingo Magistrate Court has robbed (the) Pastors the right to appeal to
the High Court since they did not have a written judgement with reasons why the
case could be heard on that day. Until now the judgement is still not
available…The pastors are of the view that…the judgment itself was not
substantive and there were no enough reasons to support it. Also, it was meant
to delay the process until the 8th of January 2019,” the document
further reads.
The pastors also accuse
an unnamed magistrate of dubiously recusing himself from a case he was supposed
to finalise as a way of sabotaging the anti-reform faction.
“Another worrying factor
is that some officials at the Masvingo Magistrate Court are members of AFM
church in Zimbabwe and in the said dispute are believed to be aligned to the
Reform side. This puts them as interested parties….One of the Magistrate (sic),
the lawyer of the Reform side and the most active members of the Reform side
are from the same AFM assembly in Masvingo.
“Given the above
arguments, we are of the opinion that the Masvingo Magistrate Court is siding
with one party through corrupt tendencies or other reasons best known to them,”
the document reads.
