ZIMBABWE Indigenous Inter-denominational Council of
Churches has said its membership does not share the perverse desires for
conflict, but prefer to work together with the Government to build a bright
future for the nation.
Addressing a Press Conference in Mutare yesterday, ZIICC
spokesperson, Reverend Andrew Wutawunashe said as servants of God, they should
not call on people to revive old grudges. Hissentiments follow a pastoral
letter from the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’Conference which also received
support from the Zimbabwe Council of Churches that resonates with the
opposition’s claims of a crisis in Zimbabwe.
“We take strong exception to and categorically dissociate
ourselves from calls bycertain religious leaders to march against the
Government and to reignite conflicts and wounds of the past to heal us, from
which God answered our prayers by bringing political leaders to the negotiating
table where reconciliation was achieved. “Please do not reverse the good that
God had done.
Our response as God’s servants should not be to call people
to revive old grudges, but rather to urge people to go forward in peace.”ZIICC
also called on Zimbabweans to reject irresponsible calls to protest marches and
boycotts aimed at provoking violence and worsening the nation’s economic
challenges.” Since 2018 elections and even before, Zimbabweans have been held
to ransom and forced to drink from a poisoned chalice of lethal and adversarial
politics whose sole agenda is that the opposition may govern, regardless of the
democratic outcome of electoral and legal processes, both of which they
participated in.
To this end, a relentless propaganda war bent on painting a
picture of the Government as intolerant, corrupt and violating human rights
with no regard to the rule of law, continues to be pursued- a picture that has
relentlessly been played to the gallery of the international community with the
intent of persuading them to maintain the economic sanctions which have brought
untold suffering to the poor people of this nation.
“These tactics, have also, from the outset, involved
extreme provocation of the elected Government to goad it into reactions that
would, if succumbed to, serve to justify the false picture being painted,” said
Rev Wutawunashe.
The indigenous churches also hailed Government’s vigorous
efforts to protect the nation from the Covid-19 pandemic, the reconstruction of
roads, the aggressive empowerment of the agricultural sector, efforts towards a
new political culture of peace and unity in diversity, persistent efforts
towards international re-engagement as well as measures to fight economic
hardships.
“Clear effort has been made, at best to distract attention
from the sterling, diligent and very visible efforts to develop and take the
nation forward which the Government has been pursuing, or at worst, to sabotage
these efforts,” he said.
Rev Wutawunashe said the church is alarmed by the reckless
dearth of sincerity and basic patriotism among some Zimbabweans who are pitting
Zimbabweans against the Government through deliberate disinformation
campaigns.”The people of Zimbabwe deserve better from their political leaders
rather than this ruthless and cynical adversarial politics.
This kind of politics is reminiscent of the proverbial
‘genius’ who sits on a high branch while applying a determined hacksaw on the
portion between himself and the tree trunk,”said Rev Wutawunashe. ZICC’s
patron, Bishop Nehemiah Mutendi said this is not the time to apportion
blame,but to come together as the church, as a people, nation and Zimbabwe to
make the country great again.
“As true shepherds, let us encourage our sheep to be
productive rather than destructive. Right from the beginning, God urged man to
be productive. Good shepherds should therefore urge their sheep to work towards
building our country.”Isn’t it a shame that Zimbabwe with all the abundant and fertile
land that it has, is spending US$40 million a month to import food when in the
1980s it had enough maize to feed itself for three years even if there was
drought and had enough grain to last eight years,” he said and added: “Good
shepherds should advocate for positive and constructive discourse than
judgement.” Herald
0 comments:
Post a Comment