/ 9 December 2008

Where Zim’s shifting flock comes to rest

Andiswa Daniso (21) sleeps on the floor with about 1 500 other Zimbabweans in the Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg.

On her days off from working as a waitress, Daniso, a painfully thin woman from Mashingo, begrudgingly spends her time in the church.

‘This is not home; it’s just a stepping stone. I am grateful to be here, but this is not home.”

Four years ago the church found itself offering shelter to more and more Zimbabweans who had fled their homeland because of a continuing economic meltdown.

Today the church has a school, a crèche and thousands of people dependent on the rent-free accommodation it offers.

Like Daniso, other immigrants are forced to sacrifice privacy in order to sleep here.

‘Conditions here are forced, it’s like boarding school,” says Daniso, whose father and brother made the trip with her.

‘You lead a public life.” But, according to Daniso, Bishop Paul Verryn is doing his best to provide for the needs of the thousands of refugees.

‘Bishop Paul looks after all the people here.”

Verryn is the public face of the Central Methodist Church. His job includes ministering, policing, comforting and advising the refugees.

His time is also in great demand among his temporary flock.

As Daniso and her father, Paul, wait outside Verryn’s office on the third floor, she explains that women and children sleep in different places in the cavernous church, and that 15 security guards have been hired to ensure that law and order is maintained.

If there are any cases of misconduct — such as theft, bullying or drunken behaviour — the bishop will be the one to go to.

Paul Daniso, a chatty man of 54, adds that fights and theft occur daily.

The bishop is a busy man. The waiting room fills with people, some holding crying babies.

Verryn pokes his head through a window connected to his office. His blue eyes — magnified by his large spectacles — scan the room as he fires off questions to the petitioners.

Some are told to go to the church clinic, others, that he’s still working on their requests.

Paul Daniso wants to know if a letter he requested from the bishop, which will enable him to find employment, is ready. Another child starts screaming.

‘I know everybody’s story,” says Verryn from behind his desk in his untidy office. Almost every surface is piled with books, documents and stacks of paper.

One of the piles topples over as I sit down, and I make a grab for it.

He’s leaving for Mozambique later that day and explains his apprehension about leaving the church at this time when the cholera epidemic, emanating from Zimbabwe, begins to spread throughout Southern Africa.

He says he’s done everything in his power to prevent the disease spreading through the church.

Extra cleaners have been hired, there are extra toilets and basins of antiseptic liquid have been set out so that the refugees can wash their hands.

‘We have eight teams of cleaners working around the clock to ensure that the bathrooms are clean, and education regarding the disease is being offered in the building and the city,” he says.

Verryn says the cholera epidemic, acute food shortages and minimal healthcare is forcing even more Zimbabweans over the border.

‘Last night alone I had 63 new Zimbabweans joining us,” he says.

Verryn explains that the church offers ‘a space for these people to be respected, to be healed”.

The immigrants include unaccompanied children, torture victims from President Robert Mugabe’s regime and those desperate to feed their families.

‘A difference can be made’
But, with thousands of desperate people living in close quarters, he says there is a dark side to the shelter.

‘Bullying, abandoned babies and prostitution, it happens.”

But he remains unmoved in his belief that a difference can be made.

‘The number-one rule,” he says, ‘is that you have to be involved in education.”

The church school has 215 pupils, some South African, but most are Zimbabwean. Verryn preaches a sermon every day and groups of refugees are formed to keep order.

He emphasises the ‘practical aspects of religion”, by adopting a 10 commandments-type code for the church’s residents: no drinking, smoking or physical violence of any kind.

But Daniso feels that despite the efforts made by Verryn, ‘there is no formula for how you live here, each day just comes and passes”.

‘It’s not like a small Zimbabwe here. I want to go places, I want to meet people. [But] I’m stuck, I’m going nowhere. I’m turning 22, what have I done?”