The
annual Bishop’s conference organized by A .C. C. Z and affiliate churches of
close to 700 with a gross national following of about 7,3million was a portal
of inspiration and a place where new ideas were embraced in the pursuit of
promoting national peace embracing the rights of children and women in cultural
values.
The
conference attracted approximately 1200 Bishops from various churches who
thronged the conference in solidarity with A. C. C. Z.The conference provided
an interdisciplinary platform for different churches from diverse backgrounds
to convene in an attempt to foster and promote national unity and in the same
breath inculcating the championing of women and children’s rights in their
churches.
The
conference was indeed an inspiration and a watershed event with regard to the
plight of women and children .The Bishops summoned the collective ill of
churches and organization to unite in the fight against all forms of child and
women abuse. It was highly resolved that Diabolical forces are eternal, and
they are formidable and they exist today.
The
conference agenda also tirelessly strove to iron out issues that lead to the
abuse of women and children. Bishop Sibanda who is ACCZ Secretary for Legal,
peace, justice and reconciliation.. After introducing himself he highlighted
that his presentation was chilling as it involves those who were abused after
having gone to an allegedly divine place of assembly. He explained the theme
“The churches’ role in promoting national Unity as we embrace women and
children’s rights.
A) On Children
The national social protection system has become
seriously eroded leaving children extremely vulnerable to exploitation,
violence and abuse, and with little access to justice and social welfare
especially in Zion and Apostolic Churches as perpetrators are taking advantage
of the flaws in areas of child protection.
Significant cases
Madzibaba Ishmael Mufani Budiriro case
The
purpose of bringing these victims was not to parade the victims but to
collectively find lasting solutions to stop such abuses and how best the
victims can be helped and integrated in the mainstream society.
The
highly publicized Budiriro incident where members of Zimbabwe Republic Police,
journalists and leaders of ACCZ were physically attacked for no reason other
than efforts to rescue victims of religious misinterpretation.
The
first to give testimony was Simon Machaya who had gone up to grade three at the
age of 12 and was no longer going because that was against the church doctrine.
He was threatened that if ever he went to school he will die. He also showed a
big wound on his left thigh that had gone for days without treatment as this
was against the church dictates.
The
other victim was a 16 year old Susan Machana who was forced to abandon school
in 2012 while she was in form one. Madzibaba Ishmael gave such directives
alleging that the victim would die upon continuing going to school as education
was associated with Satanism. The victim’s father has been convicted of assault
and is currently in custody. He challenged indigenous churches to distance
themselves from such sentiments.
The
victim said that if she was to be given a chance she would go back to school.
She went on to narrate that girls of her age
were given to some church members in marriage.
Key resolution
THE BISHOPS AGREED: Create a policy, legal and budget framework to
ensure the protection of children against violence, exploitation and abuse and
to ensure that all children can access social services in Apostolic and Zion
Churches.
Proposed action
The action aims to:
- Increase the availability of birth registration services;
- Support the scaling up of the Victim Friendly Initiative,
implementing a pre-trial diversion programme for children in conflict with
the law;
- Advocate the rights and views of children and young people in the
constitution;
- Support the prevention and monitoring of gender-based violence;
- Support the revival of the Government’s cash transfer scheme for
the poorest households through the revised National Action Plan for
Orphaned and Vulnerable Children, and develop ways to improve access to
basic social services.
The cross-cutting programmes of communication for
advocacy and development, gender and human rights, social policy, monitoring
and evaluation and disaster reduction will support all the programme areas.
Women, young people and children will be supported
to participate and advocacy will be based on evidence.
B) On Women
About a quarter (26%) of women in Zimbabwe
experienced some form of violence (psychological, emotional, economic, physical
or sexual) perpetrated by an intimate partner in the period 2013-14. Thirteen
percent of men in the country admit to perpetrating some form of violence
against their intimate partners during the same period. Sixty-nine percent of
women experienced while 41% of men admitted to perpetrating intimate partner
violence (IPV) in their lifetime.
Significant
Case
Again
the leaders took a swipe on the practises of Madzibaba Ishamael. It was seen that women from some apostolic
churches are still being treated as mere objects and they are not even aware of
it. Fortunately there was a woman formerly from madzibaba Ishamael who gave the
audience insight of what she went through as a mother of two. The presenter
labeled her “Heroine” she chronicled how she joined the church while it was
under the leadership of Madzibaba Nehemiah. After the demise of this leader
Madzibaba Ishmael took over and eventually changed the doctrine.
The
changes involved urging members not to use cell phones, not to send children to
school and discouraging all members not to seek medical attention.
The
women highlighted that the authority for these rowdy members of Ishmael’s
church to assault people was an encouragement of this leader as he addresses
his followers that there is no any power and voice they must heed except of God, meaning that they are above
everybody and the law. He is allegedly to have said that that the powers of all
uniformed forces in Zimbabwe must be invalidated in favors of his followers.
This
leader is addressed as god by his followers.
She
appealed to ACCZ to be afforded an income generating project so that she can
look after the family.
The fourth person to address congregates was a
woman who had been attending the Madzibaba Ishmael’s church together with her
husband and children. All hell broke loose in February 2013 when Madzibaba
Ishmael directed all parents who have school going children to stop henceforth.
This
woman continued to send her children to school without the husband’s knowledge.
Ironically the father is well educated and is a company director. He disposed
televisions, cell phones and other electrical gargets. The husband then took
the child to Mutare so that the child can attend school. This irked Ishmael who
advised the husband to divorce his wife.
The
husband then took the child to an unknown destination so that he cannot attend
school. The woman first approached justice for children and then the civil
court so that she can be granted custody of her child. The order was granted
but the husband could not surrender the child to the wife. Several male
followers of Ishmael could connive with the husband to verbally assault and
threaten this woman.
After
fruitless efforts to locate the child the husband was convicted of contempt of
court but even though could not utter the whereabouts of the child. The mother
tearfully appealed to the congregation to help in locating her child as she is
no longer sure whether he was still alive. Women in the congregation could be
seen with tears flowing.
Key resolution
THE BISHOPS AGREED: Erect programmes that
seek to strengthen institutional
mechanisms and socio cultural practices that promote and protect rights of
women and girls and advance gender equality through advocating for policies
that protect women's rights; supporting implementation of the Domestic Violence
Act (DVA); Gender Based Violence (GBV) prevention and service provision for GBV
survivors; and promoting GBV data collection.
Expected results
1. Supporting a
coordinated multi-sectoral response to survivors of sexual violence:
The objective of this project is to increase access to life saving,
multi-sectoral response services with an emphasis on health, psychosocial and
legal support of adult and child survivors of GBV. Due to the current
challenges the country is facing in provision of basic health, police and legal
services, the focus of the project is to strengthen existing services to enable
them to integrate victim friendly services. Key activities are training of
multi-sectoral teams of nurses, churches under A.C. C. Z and social workers to
enhance their understanding of survivor centered approaches, referral and
coordination mechanisms, refurbishment of relevant assessment and counseling
rooms at Churches and debriefing rooms at police stations in selected districts
and development of standard operating procedures linking law enforcement and
health services.
2. Support implementation of the dialogue based approach as a remedy to
GBV. Child care unit will support implementation of a religious based
platform for dialogue
- Training of Domestic Violence Counselors whose role
includes advising, counseling and mediating the solution of any problems
in personal relationships that are likely to lead or have led to domestic
violence, providing counseling to complainants and respondents, and carry out
at the order of the court investigations into the financial status of a
complainant or respondent.
- Continue community mobilization and awareness raising on GBV and the Domestic
Violence Act through mass media campaigns. This will also include mobilizing
men, traditional and religious leaders for social transformation on gender.
3. Strengthening GBV monitoring and evaluation. Child
care unit will support the development of a national M&E framework to
enable data collection in a standardize manner. Key steps include training of
partners at provincial and district level on the M & E framework and data
collection tools, piloting the tools in two districts and the results will
be used to create a database which will be rolled out in all districts.
4. Advocating for gender equality and women's empowerment. In
partnership with Gender Theme Group members and civil society, Child care unit
will continue advocacy efforts towards gender equality and women's
empowerment.
ü
Participation of everyone regardless of sex in the fight against GBV.
ü
Creation of enabling environment that champions child, women and
community development.
ü
A violent free community that embraces development
ü
Amplified voice of women in the
development process
ü
A religious foundation as a source of reference in pertinent issues of
development
ü
An end to child marriage
ü
Eradication of forced marriage
ü
Eradicating early child pregnancies
On health
Children in the apostolic churches and Zion churches are somewhat
excluded in child health programmes because of many factors .Paramount amongst
these is the issue of contradiction of church doctrines and contemporary health
problems. Parents in these churches are not aware of the importance of child
health especially in the rural set ups. Children are the foundation of society
hence their health needs are supposed to be addressed and prioritised , but
this is not the case in most religious groups in rural setups. Child
immunization and nutrition is a major issue which needs action in the form of
parent training
Not only children are having challenges accessing health
facilities by even the grown ups too
mainly women. This is in regard to HIV/AIDS. ACCZ has a peer educator program,
which the Bishops are supporting and continue to support.
Key Resolutions
THE BISHOPS AGREED: Have a parent health
training initiatives. Start by going on immunization awareness campaign. Have health ambassadors in the churches.
Train women on water and sanitation.
Expected results
v Increased awareness of child health
needs
v An enabling environment that champions
child development
v A decrease in infant mortality rates
v Eradication of harmful religious
practises
v Erosion of child malnutrition cases
v Participation of religious groups ,
the community and by extension the nation in the campaign for a healthy and
safe environment
