SUPPLIED
Rev Vusi Dube
Gugu Mbonambi
gugu.mbonambi@inl.co.za
THE eThekwini municipality has served an eviction notice on Durban’s flamboyant pastor Vusi Dube, whose church has been operating out of tents at Durban’s Albert Park since 2008, and says it could prosecute him for illegal occupation of municipal land.
Dube, however, denied receiving a court order for his church to move.
In August, the city cut off the electricity supply to Dube’s eThekwini Community Church.
The move came after the matter went to the municipal public accounts committee for investigation by DA caucus leader and member of the executive committee Tex Collins, who said no “definitive action” had been taken since he had raised the issue of the church with municipal manager Michael Sutcliffe in February this year.
In e-mail correspondence with Sutcliffe, Collins said Dube enjoyed a “disproportionate degree of political patronage”.
Previously, the parks, leisure and cemeteries department said the process of removing the church had begun because it was situated in a designated park which is not reflected in the city’s town planning scheme as a place of worship. Dube had been advised in 2010 that occupation of the land was illegal.
Yesterday, the municipality’s chief legal adviser, Alisande Bradshaw, told the public accounts committee that Dube had 21 days to indicate if he would oppose the “notice of removal”.
Because courts would go into recess from December 15, Dube had until the second week of January to decide whether he would file opposing papers.
DA councillor André Mitchell asked if Dube would be charged criminally for illegal occupation of the land.
Bradshaw responded that he could be prosecuted given that he was contravening a number of by-laws and that would be looked at while the council waited for Dube’s response to the eviction notice.
The head of the parks, recreation and cemeteries department, Thembinkosi Ngcobo, said he had met Dube twice to discuss the issue of removing his church, and that the department had also met 25 other churches occupying municipal land.
“The municipality’s public accounts committee was insisting that we take action, and after getting direction from the politicians, we discussed the matter with the city’s legal department. A decision was then taken to proceed with the court order,” he said.
However, Dube denied meeting municipal officials, saying he should not be asked to comment on the matter because he had not received a court order.
“I have received absolutely nothing. In December, we will be at church worshipping and we do not intend to go anywhere else. We maintain our stance that we did not invade municipal land,” he said.
