Headmasters, teachers, nursing staff and priests were evicted this week from Daramombe Mission near Chivhu, as the breakaway Bishop Nolbert Kunonga continued to seize properties belonging to the Anglican Church of the Province of Central Africa (CPCA).
Bishop Dr. Chad Gandiya, head of the CPCA’s Harare diocese, was also victimized Thursday night, when ‘robbers’ entered his home in Harare and took about $800, two laptops and mobile phones. No-one was physically hurt.
The evictions are being illegally enforced by the police, who have supported the renegade Bishop Kunonga since the split in the Anglican Church in 2007. Kunonga, a close ally of Robert Mugabe, is using a recent partisan court judgment that gave custody of Anglican properties to a board of trustees headed by him.
Bishop Dr. Chad Gandiya argues that the court judgment limits evictions to Harare only and does not apply to other provinces. He accuses Kunonga of instructing the police to harass parishioners.
Reverend Paul Gwese confirmed this week’s eviction of clergy and staff at Daramombe, one of Zimbabwe’s oldest mission schools. Those evicted include the headmaster of Daramombe Primary School, Denford Javangwe, Priest Muyengwa Murombedzi and all senior nursing staff at Daramombe Mission Clinic.
Gwese said the evictions and the robbery at Bishop Gandiya’s home are all linked to Bishop Kunonga’s persecution of the CPCA. Kunonga formed his own Anglican Church Province of Zimbabwe (ACPZ), after he was excommunicated in 2007, when serious differences emerged over the issue of homosexual clergy.
Meanwhile, Reverend Julius Zimbudzana from Highlands, was released without charge on Thursday evening after spending a day in police custody. He had been arrested Wednesday morning, accused of stealing church property worth over a million dollars.
Reverend Gwese dismissed the arrest as part of the harassment of their clergy by the police and Bishop Kunonga. “We will not be discouraged and we will not be deterred by harassment and persecution. All this will come to an end,” Reverend Gwese explained.