By Celani Sikhakhane
- Inkosi Cosmos Sawela Kubheka of Manzana told the Nkonyane family that the church land does not belong to them and the bishop must be exhumed from the premises.
- The Pietermaritzburg High Court ruled on Thursday that Bishop Thamsanqa Nkonyane’s body can be exhumed, after his legal wife Dolly Nkonyane obtained a court order to stop the original funeral.
Bishop Thamsanqa Nkonyane was buried in secret inside his own church premises in Osizweni, outside Newcastle — and his legal wife and siblings did not know it had happened until after it was done.
The burial was carried out on a Friday. The following day, at the public funeral service, mourners were shown a coffin. When police and the family opened it, they found bricks. The bishop’s body had already been placed in the ground inside the Christian Catholic Apostolic Holy Spirit Church in Zion (eNyonini Mission) without the knowledge of his legal family.
His wife, Dolly Nkonyane, has been married to him in community of property since 1988. She was never divorced from him. She had already obtained an interdict from the Pietermaritzburg High Court stopping the original funeral after she and the bishop’s siblings were shut out of all arrangements. Those arrangements, according to court papers, were made by church trustees and Priscilla Sizeni Mazibuko, the woman Nkonyane had been living with in eThekwini at the time of his death.
Now the family has a second court order. The Pietermaritzburg High Court ruled on Thursday that the body can be exhumed. Church and family representative Thokozani Zulu confirmed they are proceeding with the exhumation.
But there is another problem. The land where the bishop was buried does not belong to the church or the Nkonyane family. It falls under the tribal authority of Inkosi Cosmos Sawela Kubheka of Manzana, who covers the Manzana and Osizweni areas west of Newcastle.
Inkosi Sawela said he had been told about the bishop’s death and burial plans — and he made the church’s position clear from the start.
“When the church and a Nkonyane family representative came to me to inform me about his passing and the burial plans, I made it clear to them that there are three burial sites in the village of which they can choose from. The church premises were never mentioned because it is not a graveyard. It is a residential place for the living communities,” he said.
“I was shocked to hear that they have secretly buried him inside the church premises. They need to exhume him because this is not a burial site and that land does not belong to the Nkonyane family. It is under my tribal authority,” Inkosi Sawela said.
A fraud investigation is already under way. KwaZulu-Natal police spokesperson Colonel Robert Netshiunda confirmed the case was opened by the Nkonyane family against Mazibuko and Icebolethu Funeral Group, the company that handled the body before the secret burial took place.
Icebolethu said it handed over the bishop’s remains to family members through its normal processes and that what happened after that was not within its jurisdiction.
Pictured above: The church premises in Osizweni, outside Newcastle, where Bishop Thamsanqa Nkonyane of the Christian Catholic Apostolic Holy Spirit Church in Zion (eNyonini Mission) was secretly buried and is now to be exhumed.
Image source: Icebolethu TikTok
