Archbishop of Southern Africa responds to panel of inquiry report on John Smyth

[Anglican Communion News Service] In a statement about safeguarding in the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), the archbishop of Southern Africa, the Most Rev. Thabo Makgoba, has called the church to “redouble our efforts to eradicate all forms of abuse in the church and to campaign more vigorously for its abolition in wider society.”

His Feb. 4 statement was made in response to the report of a Panel of Inquiry that investigated the contact of the British serial abuser John Smyth with the ACSA between 2001 and 2018. The Farlam-Ramphele Panel of Inquiry report on Smyth abuse was published on Feb. 3.

The archbishop’s statement outlined proposals for action that relate to safeguarding in the Anglican Church of South Africa and to Anglican schools.

Makgoba appointed the Inquiry Panel on Nov. 22, 2024, following the Church of England’s  Makin Review of 2024, which reported on Smyth perpetrating abuse of young men in the United Kingdom and Zimbabwe. As Smyth had also spent time in South Africa, the inquiry panel was set up to explore what the Diocese of Cape Town had done to respond to warnings about his conduct and the potential risk he posed.

In his statement the archbishop said, “I asked the panelists a very specific question: to examine our failure to respond adequately to a letter of warning received from the Church of England in 2013, and to make recommendations on our safeguarding process.”

The inquiry panel said although no cases of abuse in South Africa had been reported to it, “the risk of a repetition of abuse by Smyth in his time in South Africa (2001-2018) was at all times clearly high.” The report refers to several areas for improvement in ACSA’s safeguarding processes.

ACSA also published a seven-page summary of the report on its website.

In responding to the report, Makgoba emphasized the need to effectively progress safe church processes and campaign about issues of abuse and gender-based violence in society as a whole.

His statement also refers to research by the Human Sciences Research Council that reveals that one in every three South African women report experiencing physical or sexual violence during their lifetime.

Makgoba’s full statement is available here.

The Church of England offered a response to the report from the ACSA Panel of Inquiry; that is available here.