Controversial pastor Vusi Dube, says he knows nothing about his church being evicted from its Albert Park location.
|||The eThekwini municipality has instituted legal proceedings to evict controversial pastor Vusi Dube’s eThekwini Community Church from its Albert Park location.
The application was filed in December last year, but Dube said on Thursday that he had no knowledge of the matter.
Dube’s church has been operating from a tent in Albert Park for the past three years, and at no cost despite using municipal amenities. The municipality said in December that the revenue department had billed Dube for R13 049.26 on October 28.
Dube, however, questioned how the bill, which the council had previously said stood at R9 000, had escalated by R4 000, but said he would pay the full amount.
Municipal legal adviser Vuyokazi Ngwenya told the municipal public accounts committee on Thursday that the church had filed opposing papers in response to the city’s application to evict the church.
Asked about the matter, Dube said “it was the biggest joke of the day” because the church had not filed any papers against the municipality.
“The municipality needs to explain who from the church received the court papers. We are in negotiations with the (ANC) political leadership under James Nxumalo,” he said.
Dube said they were hoping to discuss the matter with new municipal manager Sibusiso Sithole. He said the church was moving to new premises in Sylvester Ntuli (Brickhill) Road.
The church’s attorney, Mandla Mngomezulu, echoed Dube’s sentiments. “We cannot oppose something we have not been served with,” he said.
The flamboyant pastor made headlines when DA councillor Tex Collins accused Dube of causing a disturbance to Albert Park residents.
The matter was then referred to the municipal public accounts committee for investigation. In an e-mail to former municipal manager Michael Sutcliffe, Collins also said that Dube, an ANC MPL, enjoyed a “disproportionate degree of political patronage”. - The Mercury