HARARE: Family of a prominent preacher and senior Pastor, Bishop Berry Dambaza, who fell four floors to his death at a car park in Harare CBD on Monday, suffered a double blow after the deceased’s mother died hours later on the same day.
Dambaza was a senior pastor at the Pentecostal Assemblies of Zimbabwe (PAOZ) Upper Room Ministries. PAOZ is one of the biggest churches in the country with over 200 branches.
The church on Tuesday moved to deny social media rumours that Dambaza took his life after walking in on his wife, Sithembeni, with another man in a Harare office.
“Those rumours are entirely and wholly untrue. They are malicious and extremely regrettable,” PAOZ spokesman Reverend Craig Ndoro said.
“Yesterday, when this tragic incident happened involving the bishop, his wife was actually at home nursing the bishop’s mother, and we have just received terrible news that she has also died.”
Monica Dambaza, the bishop’s 90-year-old mother, suffered a “very serious stroke” recently.
“She was not young and wasn’t doing very well after the stroke,” he said.
Sithembeni Dambaza was so traumatised by the loss of her husband and mother-in-law in such a short space of time that she has been admitted to a hospital.
Ndoro added: “In short, Bishop Dambaza’s wife of over 30 years was not cheating on him, and no, he did not find her in a compromising position in the office. We’re not sure who has been generating these rumours, and spreading them. They are very hurtful not just to the family but the church as well.
“Bishop Dambaza touched many lives in Zimbabwe and internationally, perhaps that’s why we have rumours flying quicker than facts. But those that know him, his wife and children know that no such issues are true, and that gives us a bit of comfort.”
Harare Police were called to the Rezende Parkade in central Harare after 2PM on Monday over reports of a dead body in the car park exit.
Witnesses told police the man, later identified as the bishop, had fallen from the fourth floor of the car park.
Infidelity rumours spread yesterday after a policeman who attended the scene allegedly “confirmed a troubled marriage” after checking the late Bishop’s phone and suicide note left behind.
