SOMETIME last year, I got a call that our workplace had been besieged by members of Emmanuel Makandiwa’s United Family International Church (Ufic), who were apoplectic after our sister paper had made a mistake in a caption of the church leader’s wife and I was called to defuse the situation.
Candour: NQABA MATSHAZI
To this day, I am convinced that was an innocuous error and nobody would make such a mistake intentionally, let alone in a newspaper, but they would have none of it.
The passionate group was fuming and offered all manner of suggestions on how we could right the wrong, even suggesting that their church members could help take the offending newspaper off the streets, a suggestion I obviously rejected outright.
I was not responsible for the error although I had to deal with it and I was able to see the lighter side of the episode, but some of my colleagues were at some point worried for my safety.
In the end, we reached an amicable solution and when I meet some of the people that confronted me on that day, we share cordial greetings.
What was interesting about that group was their passion about what they perceived to be a wrong, which they wanted corrected immediately and I wondered if such strong emotions could not be replicated in the political and economic arena, where we can immediately demand our leaders to be responsive and fix the country where it is broken.
I am not the most religious person, but I worry that religion has become some sort of escapism, where we accept our situation and believe that one day our toiling will be rewarded.
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A fundamental teaching of religion is turning the other cheek and forgiveness, with the promise of a better life in heaven.
What people believe in is their personal choice, but can we not demand a better life on earth and also pray for the best one in heaven?
What has happened now is that prophets and pastors have taken over the role of elected leaders and we put more faith in them instead of confronting elected people, whom we should be holding accountable because they are responsible for the situation we are in.
Politicians have abdicated their roles and the vacuum is being filled by religious leaders, who do not have the same level of accountability as elected officials.
As someone working in the media industry, I am often asked why newspapers are too quick to publish stories on prophecies no matter how fanciful.
There is a ready market for such stories and people would rather hold on to the word of a prophet rather than a politician’s promise.
But, this is where I have a problem, politicians are elected on the basis of their promises and need to be put to task if they fail to deliver.
It does not matter which party one belongs to, politicians need to be questioned on electoral promises they made and, as citizens, we have a right to go to their constituency offices, call them and write letters questioning why they have not delivered on their promises.
The same zeal and passion we display at church gatherings is the same we should be displaying when engaging politicians and not allow them to get away with anything.
Heaven is an enticing prospect and the promise of suffering on earth in the hope that tomorrow would be better is luring, but do we really have to suffer?
It just should not be acceptable that a company in the industrial areas closes and in its place a church moves in and these are things we should be challenging our leaders about.
Churches can and should be allowed to continue to sprout, but not at the expense of industry and factories.
Because we are so desperate for salvation from religion, we are now opening ourselves to abuse by charlatans and fake prophets all in the name of God.
Every day we read stories of women being abused and people being conned by charlatans and this betrays the level of desperation in the country, where we have given up on our own agency and we think we have put everything in God’s hands.
Such escapism leaves us vulnerable and weak to tricksters and opportunists, who are quick to spot an opportunity to make a quick buck.
A video by School of Life claims that the poorest countries in the world are the most religious and it is easy to see why, it is because citizens stop demanding answers from their leaders and give up all hope and are content with waiting for divine intervention.
Philosopher, Karl Marx famously equated religion to being the opiate of the poor, or more practically, he meant that religion had the effect of reducing people’s immediate suffering and provided them with pleasant illusions, but it also reduced their energy and their willingness to confront the oppressive, heartless and soulless reality they had been forced into and this could be where we find ourselves as Zimbabweans.
What is needed now is for Zimbabweans to be zealous about how they are governed and to confront any perceived injustice and demand that it be corrected immediately.
There should be no room for indifference and waiting for salvation from a deity, but instead we should ask questions and demand immediate answers on how we are governed.
If we were to do this, then there is no way our leaders can continue running roughshod over our rights, neglecting service delivery and above all failing to make good on their promises.
I alluded to my confrontation with Ufic members because their passion over something they believed in was palpable and they did not wait for the following day for it to be corrected, they demanded immediate answers.
That is how I think our approach to politics should be and passion should not be confined to the spiritual realm.
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