Wendy Jasson da Costa
AFTER using power without paying for three years, controversial pastor Vusi Dube of the eThekwini Community Church has finally been issued with an electricity bill.
The eThekwini municipality’s deputy head of parks, leisure and cemeteries, Christo Swart, said the revenue department had billed Dube for R13 049.26 on October 28.
“The bill was posted to him at 92 Broad Street, Durban. Electricity has been disconnected and the pastor has no access to municipal power. Currently, he is using a generator,” said Swart.
Dube’s church has been operating from a tent in Albert Park for the past three years, at no cost, despite using municipal amenities.
However, Dube last week said he had no knowledge of the bill, but would check with his office – where someone may have seen the account – and settle it in the new year. He questioned how the municipality had arrived at the sum, given that there was no electricity meter to calculate how much power had been used.
Dube also questioned how the bill, which the municipality had previously said stood at R9 000, had escalated by R4 000, but said he would pay the full amount.
He said this should solve the problem the city had with him.
Last week he said the church had identified a building in Brickhill Road, Durban, to move into. Negotiations were under way with the owner to buy it and convert it into a church and a “centre of hope”.
He said R12 million was needed for the project and although a fund-raising committee had been set up, it would take a lot of sacrifice from the congregation to refurbish the building and turn it into an “Afrocentric glass house”.
“I’m prepared to sacrifice everything, even if it means selling my car and catching a taxi,” said Dube, who recently swopped his Land Rover for a Toyota Fortuner.
However, it has since been estimated that the initial cost of R12m could climb to R40m if all of Dube’s dreams for the facility are to come true.
Dube and the church first made headlines when DA councillor Tex Collins accused them of causing a disturbance to Albert Park residents. The matter went to the municipal public accounts committee for investigation.
In an e-mail to municipal manager Michael Sutcliffe, Collins also accused Dube, an ANC MPL, of enjoying a “disproportionate degree of political patronage”.
Yesterday Dube said he had held several discussions with Sutcliffe, asking him to formalise the church’s stay in the park and to bill them for services used.
However, the municipality had never acted on his request. He said it was therefore “not for them to make me out to be a thief and accuse me of invading land”.
