Member of cult church speaks out

REVEALING: Chief Jongisizwe Ndzambule and other community representatives show posters found inside the controversial cult church in Umtata yesterday.

GRISLY SEARCH:

A mechanical digger, under police
supervision, is used to search the compound of the Awaiting Christ cult church in Umtata's Mandela Park
yesterday.

Eight bodies were

earlier exhumed from shallow graves at

the site.

By Ncedo Kumbaca

UMTATA -- Ex-members of the controversial cult known as the Awaiting Christ Group, or Ibandla lika Krestu, have been left numb by the closure of their church at Mandela Park here.

While Mandela Park community members called for the building to be demolished yesterday, the Daily Dispatch, flanked by community leader Chief Jongisizwe Ndzambule, visited former cult members.

A short distance from the church compound, 26-year-old Busisiwe Ncetani sat outside a two-roomed mud house with her Bible.

She was reportedly the closest cult member to its leader, Nokulunga Fiphaza, and the last person to see her, but has refused to give information to the police.

She was garbed, in obedience to Fiphaza, in a long skirt to hide her feet and had a cloth on her head.

"By wearing this cloth, I show respect to God," she explained.

She joined the church in 1996 in Port Elizabeth. Already a "born-again" Christian, she was attracted by the cult's principles when she attended with her aunt and brother.

The other two left because of the cult's principles. Her brother wanted to go back to school.

Ncetani moved out to stay with Fiphaza and quit school after passing Grade 11 in 1997.

The cult was then chased away from Port Elizabeth, and found brief asylum in Grahamstown.

Forced to move again, it tried to settle in Twecu, near East London, then Payne Farm in Umtata, then Matatiele and Tsolo.

Ncetani lashed out at those who called the cult the Awaiting Jesus Group. "Our church has no name, it is just a group of born-again Christians," she said.

The group is fuelled spiritually by a strict regimen of four daily prayer sessions and marathon fasts that last 20 or 30 days.

"In these services, people praise God and testify about their backgrounds and where they came from with the Lord," said Ncetani.

She said there were about 30 children with no birth certificates at the compound, who were not attending school. Most of the adult members had no identity documents and chose to quit their jobs and stay in the compound.

Ncetani's mother, Nokhaya Hlotyana, said she had been living without her daughter since 1995, before she went to Port Elizabeth.

"When I asked her to come back, she said she was waiting for Jesus," said Hlotyana.

Ncetani came back to her mother's house in Mandela Park last Friday.

"I feel insecure because of her presence. I have sleepless nights worrying that Mandela Park residents will burn my house down," said Hlotyana.

Residents raid cult buildings

UMTATA -- Local police were shouldered aside as chanting Mandela Park residents broke locks and entered the controversial Ibandla lika Krestu church with a crowbar yesterday.

As anti-crime committee members entered, onlookers shouted vula vula, vula (open up!).

Inside the two residential houses used as church buildings, posters were found -- one depicting four human figures, another showing one figure, a third a "soul" and a fourth, with a black background, showed a bird in the heart of a person.

In the church hall more posters were found.

These said: Jesus Arrives, The Ark Is Leaving for Heaven, Preparations for Rapture, Revelations from God, and many more.

In cult leader Nokulunga Fiphaza's room were chairs, a small table, a sponge mattress and a Bible.

More sponge slabs, blankets, Bibles, hangers and clothes were found in the congregation's sleeping quarters.

Police refused residents' demands to demolish the houses and check the foundations for more bodies. Other residents suggested the houses be burnt.

"We do not want these cult members back here. This has tarnished the area," said community leader Chief Jongisizwe Ndzambule.

A mechanical digger, guided by police, had earlier dug up the ground at the cult headquarters in search of more bodies.

This follows the exhumation of eight bodies at the church compound on Tuesday.

Postmortems were conducted on Wednesday, the results of which will be forwarded to the magistrate's court and the investigating officer.

Fifteen cult members arrested on Sunday for concealing the deaths will appear in the magistrate's court here today.

Three of the detainees -- Pastor Thompson Lingani, 77, Sabelo Simayile, 55, and Herbert Lingani, 50 -- have indicated their intention to apply for bail.

The other 12 were granted R300 bail on Monday.

Cult leader Nokulunga Fiphaza is still missing, along with most of the congregation.

The cult has been chased away from King William's Town, East London, Port Elizabeth, Grahamstown, Matatiele, Tsolo and Paynes Farm in Umtata.

Commenting about the evictions earlier, Fiphaza said: "This is the pain we have to endure as the children of God."

Fiphaza, who denied she was the cult's leader, said they were waiting for the return of Jesus Christ.

According to Chief Ndzambule, the cult came to Mandela Park in 1997 and were initially community ignored the group. "But we discovered their strange beliefs a few years later. They did not allow their members to work, to mingle with other locals -- even their own relatives -- or attend family funerals.

"Children were not allowed to go to school or clinics and were without birth certificates," said Ndzambule.

The police raid last week followed allegations by the mother of a cult member that her daughter had died and been buried by the cult. -- DDR