Description: Religious Leaders and the Regime in the Second Republic of Zimbabwe discusses the nexus of religion and politics in Zimbabwe. The book focuses on how religion has played a role in thwarting democracy and has acted as a machine to silence dissenting voices, repression, and poor governance.
Brief description: Bekithemba Dube is full Professor in Curriculum Studies and a Director for the Centre for Diversity in Higher Education at Central University of Technology.
Review Quotes:
"Here is another valuable resource for the church, governments, and the academy today. Every page of the book rhythms under the overriding theme of an intersection of the church, religion, and politics. Originating from an African soil, it will serve as a timely reminder of the need for the church to recapture its moral-high-ground of religious purity. Clearly laced with vivid contextual biblical, theological, and spiritual insights, the book redefines the church's mission today in the most heartbreaking contexts of the continent. It calls for the church to go beyond celebrating its occupancy of a central space in African communities and controlling a major share of the spiritual market but to expound what it means and how the church can move from being regime enablers and resistors to regime transformers, to use the editor's prominent words. The book is far-reaching, thought-provoking, inspirational, and applicable to Africa and beyond." --Alfred Wimana Sebahene, St John's University of Tanzania
"'All Zimbabweans must go to heaven because they have already experienced hell on earth under ZANUPF regime'. The statement comes from a people who are trapped in a dilemma caused by the brutality of the ruling ZANUPF regime. Those who have gone through suffering at the denial and compromise of democracy and violation of human rights by regime elites and their enablers had better tell the stories. Where does the Church stand and the prophetic voice of religious leaders? This is a 'must read book' that avidly captures the complex sad realities of Zimbabweans caused by the regime, that poses as the Second Republic but pursuing the politics of suppression, exploitation, brutality and elimination of critics." --Kudzai Biri, Otto-Friedrich Universitat Bamberg