05640
Dec. 1, 2005

Zimbabwe church coalition
says Mugabe’s senate poll a ‘scandal’

by Ecumenical News International

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe — A coalition of Zimbabwean Christian groups has denounced as “irrelevant” and “a scandal in the eyes of God” last weekend’s polls to elect members to a controversial new senate.

     Less than 20 per cent of Zimbabwe’s registered electorate voted on Nov. 26 to elect a new upper house of parliament after President Robert Mugabe’s ruling Zanu-PF party pushed through constitutional changes to create a bicameral legislature. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party was, however, divided on whether to boycott the poll.

     Opponents have described the new senate as a source of patronage for cronies in Mugabe’s ruling clique.

     Ruling party candidates were unopposed for 19 of the senate’s 50 elected seats. Mugabe’s party won 24 of the 31 contested seats while the MDC won seven. Mugabe appoints six other seats, and 10 of the total of 66 are reserved for traditional leaders, picked by the strongly pro-government Council of Chiefs.

     “We share the view of very many Zimbabweans that this is not the time to introduce a senate,” Christians Together for Justice and Peace said in a statement published in the current issue of the privately-owned weekly Zimbabwe Independent newspaper. “Indeed the misuse of the country’s few remaining resources for this elaborate irrelevance is in our view a scandal in the eyes of the sovereign God of justice and mercy.”

     The Christian group comprises representatives of the main denominations in Zimbabwe’s second largest city of Bulawayo, the capital of Matabeleland province.

     “The introduction of the senate will change nothing so far as the suffering millions are concerned. We are appalled by the way it has been imposed upon a reluctant nation without any proper consultation or debate. We understand that it serves the narrow sectional interests of some of the ruling party elite, and no other purpose. Clearly it will not put bread on the table of a destitute family, not one shelter for a homeless couple, nor provide medical relief for one HIV sufferer among millions.”

     Zimbabwe is battling against one of the highest inflation rates in the world, as well as shortages of foreign currency, fuel and foodstuffs such as cooking oil and sugar. In addition it is also among countries worst affected by the AIDS pandemic with at least 3,000 people dying weekly from AIDS-related illness.

     AIDS activists who met in the country last week said the country had run out of life- prolonging antiretroviral drugs. They said the only local company that makes generic antiretrovirals stopped production after failing to raise foreign currency to import ingredients for the drugs.