Mugabe clashes with new Zimbabwe archbishop over human rights

Catholic New Times, Sept 26, 2004

HARARE -- The new Roman Catholic archbishop of Harare, Robert Ndlovu, and Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe have clashed over the protection of human rights in the southern African country.

"The role of a bishop and of the Church in general is to stand up for human dignity, and from human dignity flow human rights," Ndlovu told a congregation of 6000 people attending his inauguration on Aug. 21.

The archbishop's sermon came after the Zimbabwean government announced plans to ban all foreign human rights groups and place restrictions on foreign-funded charities. Ndlovu said free expression, association and assembly were rights the church supported.

After the archbishop finished speaking, Mugabe took the microphone for an unscheduled speech in which he criticised unnamed religious leaders for having "joined hands with erstwhile colonial masters to peddle lies about the state of affairs and demonise Zimbabwe."

Zimbabwe has been marked by political violence and economic turmoil in recent years.

Ndlovu, formerly bishop of Hwange, belongs to Zimbabwe's minority Ndebele community, which in the 1980s faced massacres at the hands of North Korean-trained soldiers, ostensibly fighting guerrilla dissidents. Thousands of people were killed during the campaign by government forces, according to a report produced in 1997 by a church-sponsored rights group, the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP), and the Legal Resources-Foundation.

Earlier this month, the Zimbabwean government warned the Catholic Church about the activities of the CCJP, accusing the group of "soliciting the help of a foreign power to fight the government." The warning came after the CCJP wrote to a Catholic human rights group in Australia, the Brisbane archdiocesan Justice and Peace Commission, about the social and political problems afflicting Zimbabwe. The Brisbane group then called on the Australian authorities to maintain sanctions against Zimbabwe, imposed after several observer teams said Zimbabwe's 2002 presidential election was tarnished by violence and intimidation.

CCJP director Alouis Chaumba said there was nothing sinister about his commission's communication with the Australian group. He said the letter reflected the prevailing situation in Zimbabwe. "The government is intolerant of other views and that is destroying our country," Chaumba said. "It is starting with the country as a whole and trickling down to families and as an arm of the church, we bear the brunt of the government's excesses on its people."