By Staff reporter
In a bid to set up a branch in Japan, the Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) Church in Zimbabwe posted crafty politician-cum-pastor, Blessing Muroyiwa to seek asylum in the Asian country, a source has revealed.
The church devised the deceitful strategy after realising that it was very difficult to get a missionary visa in Japan.
The source said Muroyiwa was hand-picked on the basis that he had better prospects of getting the asylum, since he once contested for a parliamentary seat under the MDC-Alliance in Mazowe Central Constituency in 2018.
“Ordinarily getting an evangelical missionary visa in Japan isn’t easy, hence as a church in Zimbabwe they devised a strategy for him to come to Japan as an asylum seeker as they deemed that it would be much easier,” said the source.
Muroyiwa, who comes from the Chiweshe area, is also the Secretary for Religious Affairs in the MDC-Alliance National Youth Assembly. It is this political status that he sought to leverage on to allege political persecution by ZANU PF in his application for asylum.
“Muroyiwa first travelled to Japan as a visitor in 2019, and went back in January 2020 to apply for the asylum visa,” said the source.
He added: “On his asylum seeking papers which are still with the Japanese Justice Ministry, he alleged that his life in Zimbabwe was not safe because of threat of political violence against his person posed by supporters of the ruling party.”
Apparently, MDC- Alliance leader, Nelson Chamisa is a pastor with the AFM. There have been some political synergies between the AFM and the MDC-Alliance with some pastors from that church spearheading the formation of the MDC-Alliance National Chaplaincy Department (NCD). The NCD is headed by AFM pastor, Happymore Gotora, who is also the MDC-Alliance Mount Pleasant District Assembly Chair. Other AFM pastors are in the executive committees of the NCD and Provincial structures.
Muroyiwa’s case is one of the two isolated cases of Zimbabwean nationals who have applied for asylum or refugee status in Japan. The other case relates to one Ntombizodwa Ndiweni, a former school teacher in Magusini area in Matebeleland. She went to Japan early this year in the hope of getting residence permit as a refugee.
Most opposition activists got asylum in Europe and US after claiming political persecution by ZANU PF. Even some Zimbabweans, who had no particular political commitments in Zimbabwe, cited alleged political persecution to get refugee status. This contributed to the muddying of the country’s reputation and was subsequently used as a justification of the continued sanctions.
However, some countries such as the UK later discovered that they were being sold a bill of goods. In 2018, the British government made indications that it was going to repatriate 2 500 Zimbabweans living in that country. The decision was nonetheless suspended after fresh false claims of human rights abuse in Zimbabwe emerged.
