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Church's AIDS programme closed down – Zimbabwe
Sokwanele.com
July 25, 2004

www.sokwanele.com

So great is the paranoia gripping ZANU PF and so determined is the party to seize control of all food relief and humanitarian operations, that even ahead of the proposed legislation affecting NGO’s and the Churches they have started to close down HIV/AIDS service organisations operating in the Gwanda/Filibusi District in south-western Zimbabwe.

The AIDS and orphan care organisation called "Sibambene" run by the Catholic Archdiocese of Bulawayo was one of the first victims of the stringent new policy announced by the District Administrator, a political appointee. In March he ordered the Catholic AIDS Action Committee to stop their operations forthwith. It is understood that the Lutheran Development Services were also ordered to terminate their HIV/AIDS programme in the district, and an organization called Souls’ Comfort was told to stop taking photographs of people living with AIDS. In the case of the Sibambene scheme alone more than 400 orphans and terminally ill patients have been cut off from all assistance by this arbitrary move of doubtful legal authority.

Fr Martin Schupp, a Catholic priest and Chairperson of the Archdiocesan AIDS Board of Bulawayo confirmed that the programme activities in Gwanda had been suspended following the order to stop operations. In a prepared statement on behalf of Sibambene he said that "the programme was supporting 200 plus sick people with home-based care requirements (nursing kits, visits and nutrition requirements) and 200 plus orphans were receiving educational support and other requirements such as food when available". The local priest in Gwanda, Fr Andrew Heier, said that all feeding of these vulnerable people had now stopped. Without any alternative supplies of food or health care, those affected are in a desperate predicament.

The politicians who make such inhumane decisions causing untold suffering in the community, and their underlings who enforce them, usually dress up their decisions in a legal guise. In this instance also the officials concerned claimed that Sibambene and the other Church organisations should have had certificates of registration from the Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare and were required to sign a memorandum of understanding with the local council. It is a fact however that the Catholic Archdiocese of Bulawayo has run this home-based AIDS and orphan care scheme in excess of 10 years without ever being required to seek registration, and hitherto the Church has not received any complaints about its activities from the authorities. Furthermore other such schemes organised by the Catholic Church (and others) are continuing across the country and without interference. So that responsibility for this cruel and inhumane "order" and for the appalling suffering caused thereby, must rest squarely on the shoulders of the District Administrator for Gwanda.

It is understood that so far as the Catholic Church is concerned the matter is being referred to an Episcopal Conference in August with a view to agreeing on a common stand on the issue whether the Church should seek registration. The late Archbishop Chakaipa of Harare was known to be strongly opposed to the Church registering for any of its humanitarian work.

With ZANU PF promising further harsh legislative measures to bring the humanitarian work of the Churches and NGO’s under their exclusive control, perhaps this account of arbitrary power and needless human suffering affords a glimpse of what lies ahead

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