CHAPTER 2: NON-VIOLENCE, THE HISTORY OF VIOLENCE AND THE ROLE OF THE CHURCH IN ZIMBABWE
2.4 The role of the church in Zimbabwe since 1980
2.4.1 The role of the church in the first decade of independence (1980-1989)
It is important to bring to light the composition of the church in Zimbabwe. Muchena, (2004) identifies three key recognizable groups of churches in Zimbabwe that are politically active.
These are the Zimbabwe Council of Churches (ZCC), comprising more than 20 Protestant Churches and about 11 associate members; the Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe (EFZ), consisting of about 60 member denominations of the evangelical persuasion; and the Roman Catholic Church led by the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference (ZCBC) the secular arm of the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP) – has historically championed the cause of justice and peace since its formation during the liberation struggle in 1972. An inter- denominational committee of churches called the Heads of Denominations in Zimbabwe forms a further dimension by providing a platform for church leadership in Zimbabwe. There are also activist church organizations such as the Zimbabwe National Pastors’ Conference (ZNPC), the Ecumenical Supports Services (ESS), the Student Christian Movement of Zimbabwe (SCMZ) and the National Movement of Catholic Students (NMCS). These draw their members from their various churches, and, along with CCJP, work at the civic level and take an activist approach to economic, social and political issues. They also work directly with the broader civil society movement to promote peace, tolerance, human rights and governance. A more radical group called the Christian Alliance emerged in 2007 to promote non-violent direct action. There are also several indigenous African apostolic churches who are however not politically active.
The church’s deep involvement with the liberation fighters meant that churches gave full- hearted support to the majority regime at independence. On 17 April 1980, on the eve of independence, the ZCBC issued a statement in which the bishops congratulated “all the citizens of the country and its new constitutionally elected government”, and pledged “whole hearted cooperation and support in the difficult but rewarding task of nation building that lay ahead”
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(ZCBC, 1980:1). At the independence celebrations, the Catholic archbishop of Harare was invited to start proceedings with a prayer, a tradition that became custom at all national events where a church representative (from different denominations) opens proceedings with a devotion. Church-state relations started on a very collaborative level at independence, to the extent of the church being rewarded with a ceremonial leadership role of President in the person of Reverend Canaan Banana, ostensibly to acknowledge the role the church had played during the liberation struggle (Phiri, 2001; Chitando, 2002; Gundani, 2007; Ranger, 2008;
Chimhanda, 2009). As Phiri argues, with the franchise question resolved, individual liberties restored and civil society liberated, the churches had no immediate cause for a confrontation with the state. The result, he continues, was a distinct shift in church-state relations from the confrontational model during the liberation struggle to the more or less collaborative and complementary models. The churches recognized the state’s legitimacy and were willing to cooperate with the state in its efforts to rebuild the war-ravaged country.
Be that as it may, Ranger (2008) acknowledges that despite their complicity with the first generation of nationalist leaders, the church leaders still retained enough moral authority to act as arbiters and judges. The ‘relatively human and moderate autocracy’ of the early post- independence regimes had given way to excesses that it needed no theological sophistication to denounce. In response to Gukurahundi violence, Catholic bishops issued a pastoral letter at Easter in 1983 entitled ‘Reconciliation Is Still Possible.’ The bishops charged that violent reaction against dissident activity had brought about “the maiming and death of hundreds and hundreds of innocent people who [were] neither dissidents nor collaborators” (Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference, 1983). They commissioned and subsequently published a report entitled in 1997 – Breaking the silence: building true peace that was jointly compiled by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe (CCJPZ) and the Legal Resources Foundation (LRF), which remains the only published report that gives an in-depth reflection of what transpired during Gukurahundi.
The other main area where the church and state clashed was when the churches challenged the state’s moves to liquidate political opposition and declare a one-party-state political
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system. Besides direct political contestations, another area of conflict between churches and the state in the first decade of independence was corruption in government. Media reports revealing mass corruption by senior government officials led to anti-corruption demonstrations by university students. The state response was heavy-handed to both media personnel and the students, and the University of Zimbabwe was forced to close in October 1988 amid the chaos (Chitando, 2002).
Overall, while in some countries it may have taken longer from the period of church-state collaboration to the period of a conflictual relationship, Zimbabwe went through this full cycle in the first decade of independence (Phiri: 2001). If one is to follow Ranger’s periodisation, Zimbabwe also went full cycle in one decade – from the first revolution through to the third revolution (Ranger, 2008).
2.4 .2 The role of the church in the second decade of independence (1990-1999)
The role of the church in the second decade of Zimbabwe was shaped by the radical economic policy shift by government which resulted in unprecedented socio-economic decline that forced the church to confront the country’s governance architecture. The introduction of ESAP in 1991 caused the black majority to question the dividends of political liberation. As it dawned on the masses that political independence had not been translated into the economic miracle that many had anticipated, discordant voices among workers, students and peasants became more pronounced (Chitando, 2002). Churches assumed the coordinating role for these otherwise disorganized groups by not only providing space and platforms for debate and getting civil society organized, but in some cases providing the leadership. Notable during this period was the Roman Catholic Church’s Justice and Peace Commission and the protestant churches under the banner of Zimbabwe Council of Churches (ZCC) that became focal centres for civil disobedience, much to the chagrin of the state.
Throughout the 1990s, pastoral statements by churches predominantly grappled with social and economic ills brought about by the new economic order which, in their opinion, could not
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be divorced from issues of governance. Most churches, in partnership with other civil society groupings, went on to mount a spirited campaign to change the constitution which they claimed gave too much power to the head of state. This culminated in the formation of the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) in 1997 which not only became a platform to criticise and challenge the government on matters of policy and governance, but also offered democratic alternatives and pushed for a new constitution that would guarantee people’s freedoms. The leadership of NCA reflected the central involvement of the churches. While the labour movement provided the head in Morgan Tsvangirai, the vice presidency was occupied by CCJP, while the chairperson was from ZCC. To the government, this meant that the church was taking a direct confrontational approach. In pursuance of the theme of governance, and in seeking a democratic alternative, in September 1999 the NCA platform played mid-wife to the birth of a new labour backed political party, the Movement for Democratic Change. These events redefined the church-state relations as is reflected below in the analysis of the third decade of independence.