Prophets of Dettol and vomit raise religious commissioner's ire

09 December 2016 - 19:39 By TMG Digital
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Hot on the heels of the "prophet of Doom" are Prophet Phumzile Topi who is alleged to have made his congregants fall ill after giving them a liquid substance and Prophet Rufus Phala who offered his followers Dettol - shocking the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of Cultural‚ Religious and Linguistic Communities.

Facebook/Tommy Ngobeni
Facebook/Tommy Ngobeni
Image: Facebook/Tommy Ngobeni

Expressing "repugnance about the practices" of both pastors‚ the Chairperson of the Commission‚ Mrs Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva‚ said on Friday she strongly condemns these actions.

She assured the public that ultimately the recommendations contained in the commission's report "will go a long way to address these kinds of issues".

Prophet Topi's congregants collapsed in Mthatha this week while Prophet Phala of AK Spiritual Christian Church in Makgodu in Limpopo was caught on camera giving his church members Dettol to drink.

The CRL Rights Commission‚ which has undertaken a study to investigate the commercialisation of religion and the abuse of the people’s beliefs systems‚ on Friday urged religious leaders "to ensure to give their inputs and responses to the report so that the proposed legislation on the peer review mechanism can be expedited before anything horrible might happen to anyone".

As part of this study‚ the commission had to call a number of Pastors‚ Prophets‚ Priests‚ Religious leaders‚ Jewish‚ Hindu‚ Muslims‚ African Traditional Religion‚ Rastafari‚ and Bahai. Amongst its work to try to gain an understandong of the deep societal thinking that makes some members of our society vulnerable and gullible with respect to views expressed and actions during religious ceremonies.

"The CRL Rights Commission encourages everyone whose rights and beliefs have been violated to report such to the Commission‚" it said in a statement.

"As a Commission‚ we categorically state that no one should be subjected to conditions that are detrimental to their health and wellbeing."

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