New Bishop for Kokstad

Pope Francis has named Fr Thulani Victor Mbuyisa CMM as the new bishop of Kokstad. The diocese had been vacant since the transfer of Bishop Zolile Peter Mpambani as archbishop of Bloemfontein in 2020. The appointment was announced on April 6.

At the age of 49, the new bishop will be the youngest current bishop in Southern Africa.

Bishop-elect Mbuyisa was born on February 13, 1973 in iXobho, KwaZulu-Natal, to Nomathemba Teresa Mbuyisa (née Mkhize) and the late Themba Beatus Siphiwe Mbuyisa, the second of four children. He was educated at Mariathal Primary School and Nokweja High School, both in iXobho, matriculating in 1991.

He entered the novitiate of the Congregation of Mariannhill Missionaries (CMM) in 1993, and made his perpetual profession on February 2, 1997.

He was ordained to the priesthood at Mariannhill monastery by Bishop Paul Themba Mngoma of Mariannhill on March 4, 2000.

He holds bachelor degrees in philosophy and in theology, both from St Joseph’s Theological Institute in  Cedara, KwaZulu-Natal. From 2002-04 he studied towards his licentiate and master’s degrees in canon law at St Paul University and Ottawa University in Canada respectively.

From 2000-01 he was the assistant parish priest at St Michael’s parish in Mariannhill, and from 2001-02 and 2005-07 chaplain to Catholic university students at Mangosuthu Technikon College, Umlazi. During the latter period, he also lectured in canon law at St Joseph’s Theological Institute.

From 2001-02 and again 2004-07 he was also assistant director of CMM novices at Mariannhill Monastery. From 2008-10 he was formator and superior of the CMM’s House of Formation in Nairobi, Kenya. In February 2010 he was appointed his congregation’s regional superior for the East Africa Region. Later that year was elected general councillor at the CMM’s 15th General Chapter in Rome, and in 2012 he was appointed the congregation’s vicar general and procurator general.

In 2016 Bishop-elect Mbuyisa was elected the superior general of the Mariannhill Congregation in Rome. He was the first black priest to be chosen to head the congregation, which was founded in Mariannhill by Abbot Franz Pfanner.”

Bishop-elect Mbuyisa will be the sixth bishop of the diocese of Kokstad, which was established in 1951, having been a vicariate from 1935. His three predecessors have all become archbishops: Archbishop Mpambani (served in Kokstad from 2014-20), Archbishop William Slattery (1993-2010) and Cardinal Wilfrid Napier (1980-92). Before them, the diocese was headed by Bishop John McBride OFM (1949-78) and, as a vicariate, by Bishop Blasius Sigibald Kurz OFM (1935-48).

He will be the second current bishop from the Congregation of Mariannhill Missionaries, alongside Archbishop Siegfried Mandla Jwara of Durban.

The diocese of Kokstad serves 81,000 Catholics in an area that comprises the magisterial districts of Bizana, Flagstaff, Lusikisiki, Port St John on the left bank of the Umzimvubu River, Mount Ayliff, Mount Frere, Tabankulu, Mount Currie and Matatiele south of the Kenegha River.