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By Citizen Reporter

Journalist


WATCH: Pastor Xola Skosana burns SA flag in protest

The pastor who once said Jesus was HIV positive has taken part in a form of protest at the memorial of Ras Zuma.


A video clip apparently from the Sunday service of Pastor Xola Skosana at the memorial service of Mthunzi “Ras” Zuma shows the pastor burning the South African flag.

The video is being shared with the description that Skosana is rejecting “South Africa as a neocolonial state”.

Standing on a stage with a Pan-Africanist Congress of Azania logo behind him, prior to burning the flag, the pastor – believed to be Skosana– says the constitution has failed South Africa. As the flag burns he says, “We reject the constitution and call for Azania to rise!”

The burning flag is carried through the venue to the sound of singing, cheering and whistling from the congregation.

Zuma was killed after leading a land occupation in Khayelitsha.

https://youtu.be/aN6YHkr5g7U

GroundUp reports that a group of Khayelitsha backyarders orchestrated a large land occupation in Cape Town two weeks ago and have “vowed to continue their fight for land”. Mthunzi “Ras” Zuma was killed last Sunday night and no arrests were made, the NGO says.

A group comprising mostly “backyarders” in Town Two reportedly began their occupation on 15 May, GroundUp reports, “demarcating hundreds of sites on vacant pieces of land in the area”.

“One of the pieces of open land is next to the Khayelitsha Magistrates’ Court. The other two sites were in Makhaya and Kuyasa.”

A community leader, Zola Booi, told GroundUp last weekend that the shooting occurred “after they had barricaded the road next to the vacant land”.

“A car came and two people got out and asked what was going on. Ras explained to them. The driver then got out and asked whether he was Rasta. He was then shot in the head,” Booi was quoted as saying.

The City told GroundUp it owns all the occupied sites in Khayelitsha, “with the exception of two plots owned by the Western Cape government”.

The memorial service for Zuma was held on Sunday afternoon at the Kilombo Village in Khayelitsha, where the flag burning ceremony presumably took place.

Skosana, the founder of the Way of Life Church is no stranger to controversy having been accused of “instigating” the Fees Must Fall movement in the Western Cape. He also once gave a sermon claiming “Jesus Christ was HIV positive”.

He has previously been slammed for his divisive views on race and religion.

In 2015, Skosana was reportedly suspended without pay from his job as chaplain at the SA Air Force. He was also reportedly banned from the University of the Western Cape.

 

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