page_title: Fumanekile Gqiba
section_title: Biography
hierarchical_section_title: Fumanekile Gqiba / Biography
caption_attribution_description: English: Milawi, 1998, with Chiefs of Chaplains of S. Africa and Swaziland U.S. Navy Chaplain, Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff (Command Chaplain, United States European Command), with Chiefs of Chaplains from S. Africa (MajGen Fiume Gqiba) and Swaziland (Sabelo Maseko).
context_page_description: Fumanekile "Fumie" Gqiba is an Anglican priest, a former chaplain general of the South African National Defense Force, and a former South African Ambassador to Israel.
context_section_description: Fumanekile Gqiba was born in Cape Town, South Africa. Gqiba studied theology at the University of Transkei and was ordained as an Anglican priest. He rose to the rank of commander in Umkhonto We Sizwe (MK or "Spear of the Nation") the guerrilla arm of the African National Congress (ANC).
  He later joined the South African National Defense Force (SANDF) as a chaplain, after the military was integrated. In 1998, he was appointed Deputy Chaplain General, and then Chaplain General, responsible for military chaplains of all faiths. During his chaplain service he became an Honorary member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Military Chaplains Association.
  He is also a social scientist, specialising in urban development planning, strategic management, and international relations. In January 2005 he co-founded the Azzurri Construction Company.
  Gqiba has stated that the integration of South Africa's military was a matter not only of race, but also of religion – linked to the "first human right – religious freedom." In addition to his efforts to expand religious pluralism within SANDF, including the recruitment of its first Hindu chaplain, Gqiba helped create the Southern African Military Chaplains Association, an association of military chaplains from a number of nations in the southern part of the African continent. A primary purpose of that organisation, according to Gqiba, is the promotion of religious freedom as a human right throughout all the militaries in the region.
  He worked with Elijah Loza, a trade unionist in Cape Town to recruit and transport young people for Umkhonto weSizwe, to fight the apartheid policies of South Africa.
  Gqiba was a founder-member of the ANC's Department of Religious Affairs in exile, in Lusaka, Zambia.
caption: Gqiba (left) as SANDF Chaplain General, with Sabelo Maseko, Chaplain General of Swaziland, and Chaplain (Rabbi) Arnold E. Resnicoff, Command Chaplain for the U.S. European Command
exif: {}