Vatican asks Ambongo to resolve leadership crisis in Congolese diocese

The Dicastery for Evangelisation suspended training for seminarians in the Diocese of Wamba due to the ‘problematic environment’ caused by the dispute.

The Vatican asked the Archbishop of Kinshasa Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu to visit a Congolese diocese where local clergy and laity have refused to accept a new bishop.

Training for seminarians has been suspended in the Diocese of Wamba, in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s northeast Haute-Uele province, due to the “problematic environment” caused by the dispute.

Fr Emmanuel Ngona Ngotsi MAfr was appointed Bishop of Wamba in January 2024 and ordained a bishop in Kinshasa the following July, but has not been able to take possession of the see after protests by local clergy and laity.

Interventions from the Dicastery for Evangelisation, the apostolic nunciature in Kinshasa and the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO) have all failed to resolve the dispute, and on 7 October Bishop Sosthène Ayikuli Udjuwa of Mahagi-Nioka, the apostolic administrator of diocese, announced the suspension of priestly formation in Wamba.

“The formation of future priests in such a difficult ecclesial environment would be entirely inappropriate,” Bishop Udjuwa said. “Therefore, the dicastery has decided that seminarians who wish to continue their priestly formation may contact other bishops who are willing to receive them after proper discernment.”

Cardinal Ambongo, who as president of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) is one of the most influential figures in the African Church, travelled to Wamba this week at the request of the Vatican.

“I have been sent there to assess what can be done to help the diocese return to normal functioning,” he told reporters in the Archdiocese of Kisangani, where he stopped on Tuesday en route to Wamba.

“The situation in Wamba, I believe, has caused suffering for the entire ecclesiastical province of Kisangani,” Ambongo said. “I simply ask the faithful to pray so that this mission may bear good fruit for the healing of our family of God’s children – here in the province, in Kisangani, and beyond. For indeed, the entire country is affected.”

He added: “It is a mission that the Holy Father holds very dear.”

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