NGOs using churches to sabotage election

While the writer of the article which follows begins with facts and figures that are correct he proceeds to make spurious allegations that because of what we are doing as CAT Zim we intend to sabotage elections. That is far from the truth. I am a patriot in my own right. The fact that we are doing what we are doing shows that we are very patriotic. We love everyone across party divide. No one should claim to be more patriotic than others as if patriotism is only for the few who chose themselves to be so. Levee Kadenge===================================================================================== By Nondumiso Sibanda in The Patriot===. WE have been telling you for a long time dear readers that elections will be held this year no matter what. I am glad that this is happening and the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are finding themselves in a very precarious position. They wanted to stall elections as much as possible to 2015 even, but this time around, their stalling tactics have failed. Now we are hearing of a new buzz word from the NGO sector. They are now calling for ‘credible’ elections and have moved from calling them ‘free and fair’. In this calling for ‘credible’ elections which in their lingo means violent free and rigging free, we are finding the churches being entangled in this Western agenda mess. The Southern Africa Crisis Management Agency (SACMA) and Christian Action Trust Zimbabwe (CAT-Zim) have come together to launch a grassroots anchored peace initiative ahead of Zimbabwe’s watershed elections this year. To lay the groundwork, the organisations are training church pastors and spiritual leaders in electoral processes and monitoring of political violence across the country. They will also be responsible for escalating the incidences with relevant authorities, making follow-ups on incidents reported. A total of 200 church leaders comprising pastors, reverends, apostles and bishops have so far been trained to date. On completion, the programme is expected to reach 5 000 church leaders across Zimbabwe. “We are part of a broader group of organisations affiliated to the Zimbabwe Council of Churches, who have embarked on various strategies to minimise violence and torture as part of our normal pastoral work in Zimbabwe,” said Reverend Kadenge, chairman of CAT-Zimbabwe. “This programme seeks to compliment the efforts already underway by three Zimbabwe main church organisations, The Catholic Bishops Conference, Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwe Council of Churches to address Zimbabwe’s perennial legacy of violence before, during and after elections. “SACMA in partnership with CAT-Zim is training pastors in electoral processes and monitoring of political violence, equipping them with various skills like terrain scanning, event diarising, incident recording as well as peace building. “The initiative aims to finally set up a Zimbabwean own version of Ushahidi, where incidences of violence are fed onto an online database in real time with church leaders as community focal persons in scanning, detecting, verifying and feeding our call centre.” The above snippet of what these two organisations are planning on doing was taken from the Kubatana website. SACMA and CAT-Zim are busy advertising and looking for more churches to work with. We will remember that not too long ago, Jestina Mukoko of ZPP had started the same programme with the mobile phones that were then taken from her. Now we are finding the NGOs using churches to complete this unfinished work. This strategy sounds all too familiar. The West is using the church to have its own agenda of regime change fulfilled. Remember dear readers how the church was the backdrop for colonialism. The church is at the centre and was used to propagate racism. Just imagine how many innocent individuals attend church and the majority of them listen to everything that their pastors say as bible. This is something that the NGOs have realised and because of this influence that churches wield, they are now being used. Why should NGOs want to come in and compliment the efforts of the church? The various denominations have been calling for and praying for peace and that is the role of the church. Now we hear of trainings for pastors, reverends, apostles and bishops and one wonders why these trainings are being carried out? The answer is very simple; the idea is to discredit the elections since everyone in the world can never discredit the men of the cloth. This whole online depiction of violence in Zimbabwe is absurd. Why the police are not part of these trainings if there really is any truth to what these NGOs are saying and doing is something worth asking. The NGOs as I always say, are there to compliment the efforts by the Government. In this case if there is any violence taking place anywhere in Zimbabwe, the police ought to be the first port of call. Where is the church coming in honestly!! Like I said, this is a new strategy to ensure that the elections are discredited. Why is the Government not involved in this exercise? The church once again is finding itself at the centre of controversy. May the men of the cloth please stick to their calling and may the relevant Government authorities be involved in this so-called exercise. I do not support these trainings as I smell the hand of the pink men. The church is being used and must stand up to these colonial powers. Zimbabwe will have free and fair elections and the ball has already started rolling. No NGO can stand in the way of that. Forward ever as a nation and backward never!