ZIMBABWE: Anglicans face ongoing harassment from Mugabe's police force
Episcopal News Service. April 14, 2010 [041410-02]
Matthew Davies
Anglicans in Zimbabwe continue to face intimidation from President Robert Mugabe's police force, which is routinely instructed to take whatever measures necessary to prevent them from worshiping freely in their own churches.
The latest incident occurred on Sunday, April 11, at St. Luke's Anglican Church in Rhodesville, which was "sealed off by riot police following violent clashes between a faction belonging to excommunicated Harare Bishop Nolbert Kunonga and the one belonging to the official bishop of the diocese Chad Gandiya," according to a report from the Zimdiaspora news agency.
Kunonga, an avid Mugabe supporter who was officially excommunicated by the Church of the Province of Central Africa in May 2008, still claims ownership of the diocese's Anglican churches despite court rulings ordering his faction to share the buildings with Gandiya and the country's loyal Anglicans.
Gandiya was elected in May 2009 and followed Bishop Sebastian Bakare, who served as the diocese's interim bishop since December 2007 when Kunonga was deposed after illegally separating from the Province of Central Africa and installing himself as archbishop of Zimbabwe.
Kunonga has supported the intimidation of Anglicans in Zimbabwe for opposing his and Mugabe's leadership.
A Zimbabwe Republic Police operational order, dated March 26 and seen by ENS, instructs its officers to "ensure that only one church [service] is conducted and being led by the Kunonga faction" and to be on standby for "reaction purposes."
The Zimdiaspora reported that the police have since decided to shut down St. Luke's Church indefinitely.
"We have discovered that as the police we are being used to fight Kunonga's personal battles. We have closed this church and no one is allowed to enter the church every Sunday until sanity prevails," a police spokesman told the news agency.
Many Anglican parishioners are now attending Sunday services at a nearby Roman Catholic Church "as they were tired of the infighting within the church," the agency reported.
Zimbabwe has experienced an economic and socio-political crisis under the leadership of Mugabe, whose ZANU-PF party continues to hold on to power despite being defeated by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and his opposition Movement for Democratic Change in the March 2008 elections.
Tsvangirai and Mugabe formed a power-sharing government in February 2009 but tensions between the two leaders have since caused the agreement to falter.
The Anglican Communion's primates have previously expressed their "horror" at the situation in Zimbabwe, calling on Mugabe to step down and urging "the implementation of the rule of law and the restoration of democratic processes" in the devastated African nation.