ANC and former ecumenical ally break ties
Written by ENI Tuesday, 06 October 2009 02:20
Cape Town (Munyaradzi Makoni), 22 September 2009:
Once, South Africa's apartheid government labelled the South African Council of Churches as "the African National Congress at prayer". That was when the church grouping stood at the forefront of the struggle against white minority rule and racism in the country.
Past SACC general secretaries, much hated by the apartheid regime's National Party, read like a Who's Who of the fight to liberate South Africa. Among them are Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and the Rev. Frank Chikane, whom the security forces once tried to poison by impregnating his clothes.
Chikane went on to become the most senior official in the office of the president in a post-apartheid government. Then there is the Rev. Mvume Dandala, an anti-apartheid stalwart who began his activist life as part of the black consciousness movement. Today, Dandala leads an opposition parliamentary party called the Congress of the People, or Cope, made up largely of those who have left the ANC.
SACC marginalised
South Africa's Mail and Guardian newspaper on 18 September quoted SACC leaders as saying, "The ANC has marginalised the South African Council of Churches in favour of Pastor Ray McCauley's National Interfaith Leaders' Council because it (the SACC) refuses to cosy up to the ANC."
The newspaper reported that the ruling party's Commission on Religious Affairs, led by African National Congress lawmaker Mathole Motshekga, met the SACC at the headquarters of the ANC in 2008. Motshekga is said to have urged the SACC to strengthen its relationship with the ANC in the form of an alliance. "The SACC was also asked to provide the ANC with a database of its members and their contact details," the Mail and Guardian wrote.
SACC under pressure
The SACC groups the country's Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant and Anglican churches, to which the majority of South Africa's traditional Christians belong. The Mail and Guardian report said that the ANC punished the SACC for refusing to endorse the ruling party, and for failing to provide the ANC with its membership database during the April 2008 general election. In that election, the ANC failed to gain the two-thirds majority it needed to change the country's constitution.
ANC religious affairs commissioner Motshekga has not commented on the newspaper report.
Rival body
The National Interfaith Leaders' Council consists of about 25 Christian church leaders, as well as representatives from African Traditional churches and the Muslim community. Pastor Ray McCauley of the Rhema Church leads the council. He has made no secret of his support for South Africa's current president, Jacob Zuma. The formation of the new council on 27 July 2009 is seen as duplicating the role of the SACC.
In fighting to remove apartheid, some say the ANC always counted on the moral support of the SACC. Now, 15 years into democracy, the church grouping is seen to have lost its clout with the ruling party.
The Mail and Guardian report said the ANC had accused the SACC of bias towards former President Thabo Mbeki for attempting to mediate rifts between Mbeki and Zuma. That was before the ANC jettisoned Mbeki in favour of Zuma, and forced him to resign as leader of the party in 2008.
Pastor McCauley stirred controversy when he hosted Zuma at his church during campaigning for the 2009 general election, and denied other parties the same opportunity.
Free to differ
"We prefer to have a relationship of critical engagement not only with the ruling party but also with other parties because our membership cuts across the political spectrum," SACC president, Tinyiko Maluleke told the Mail and Guardian. Maluleke said the SACC wanted to be free to differ with the ANC, and that when they did agree, it should not be as a result of the ANC telling it to do so.
On its formation, the NILC said it would serve as the official point of contact and dialogue between the office of the state president and the broader religious sector of the country. The government has said it is not behind NILC, and is not funding it.
"It is embarrassing and humiliating for religious bodies to fight one another because they want government attention or the ruling party's attention," the SACC said in a statement after the launch of the NILC.