Leading Mugabe Critic Forced to Resign As Archbishop but Vows to Keep up Campaign, AFP, September 11, 2007

Leading Mugabe Critic Forced to Resign As Archbishop but Vows to Keep up Campaign

AFP
September 11, 2007

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iWFZv2NT5bXkWcAXE-AI__z2TiLQ

HARARE — A leading critic of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has resigned as archbishop of Bulawayo after accusations of adultery appeared in state media but vowed to continue his campaign for democracy.

Pius Ncube resigned from his post as archbishop of Zimbabwe's second city, the Vatican announced.

Bulawayo priest Father Frederick Chiromba confirmed the resignation to state television.

Zimbabwe's Catholic Bishop Pius Ncube gives a speech in Bulawayo, April 2007. Ncube, a leading critic of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has resigned as archbishop of Bulawayo after accusations of adultery appeared in state media but vowed to continue his campaign for democracy.

Ncube, 60, has been archbishop since 1998 and was one of the most outspoken critics of the Zimbabwean president.

But in July, the state-run Daily Herald accused him an affair with a married woman and state media published pictures they claimed showed the archbishop in bed with a married woman.

Ncube has been a constant thorn in the side of the Mugabe regime in recent years, calling for the people of Zimbabwe to rise up against his rule and declaring his readiness to "go in front of blazing guns".

The octogenarian president, in power since independence from Britain in 1980, has warned church leaders who had become increasingly critical of him that they were treading a "dangerous path."

Mugabe has since rebuked the cleric for "snatching other people's women" and breaking his vow of celibacy.

Supporters of the former archbishop, the Archbishop Pius Ncube Solidarity Coalition, said they were "deeply distressed" by the cleric's resignation but said he had vowed to maintain his campaign for democracy in the country.

"While we are deeply distressed about the resignation of Archbishop Ncube, we take comfort in the fact that he is going to continue his campaign for democracy, justice and freedom," the group said in a statement.

"He is an important voice that must always be heard."