Zimbabwe church leader in fresh appeal over asylum seekers

A Zimbabwean churchman appealed to the British government today not to forcibly send back hundreds of people who have fled from the Mugabe regime.

The Reverend Raymond Motsi, pastor of Bulawayo Baptist Church and chairman of the Zimbabwe National Pastors Conference, is in Belfast to highlight the human rights abuses of President Robert Mugabe.

He drew particular attention to the British government’s decision to forcibly evict more than a million people from slum homes in Harare and Bulawayo and force them into rural areas.

During a visit to Belfast to meet local politicians he appealed to the British government not to send back to Zimbabwe those who had fled to the UK.

“Our cry to you is to keep the Zimbabwean people you have here now, there is no way you can take these people and dump them on to the streets of Harare and Bulawayo,” he said.

“This would be immoral, these people have nowhere to go. Unemployment in Zimbabwe is 80% and these peoples’ homes have been destroyed. If you send them back you are just going to make the situation worse.”

The clergyman said the situation his people were suffering at the hands of Mugabe was “unbearable”.

He said: “The removal of the poor, innocent, weak, voiceless and vulnerable members of society by riot police in the middle of the night was uncalled for and unnecessary.

“It is inhuman, brutal and in total disregard of human rights and human dignity.”

He said church leaders had asked the Mugabe government why it had forced people from their homes and confiscated the goods of those running cottage industries.

“We were told by the government it was a clean-up operation and they were trying to weed out of society criminal elements.

“But we believe the only crime these people committed was the crime of being poor.

“We believe there are now about a million people homeless who have been taken and dumped in rural areas. These people have been reduced to abject poverty through this exercise, their livelihoods have been taken from them.”

Pastor Motsi praised Tony Blair for his efforts to help those suffering and urged the international community to stand beside him.

“Tony Blair as a person has done much to stand against the Zimbabwe government,” he said. “I think he has done it almost single-handedly and has been maligned but he has been steadfast.”

The pastor said people’s lives were bad under Mugabe but he feared for the future when he finally leaves power.

“We believe he is going to stand down in two or three years. What he is doing now is what we are afraid of, trying to change the constitution and put his cronies in charge to see his position is secure when he stands down.”

The SDLP’s Patricia Lewsley, a founder member of the Zimbabwe Solidarity Campaign, organised Pastor Motsi’s visit to Belfast.

Ms Lewsley said: “We would call on the British government to send someone from the United Nations to Zimbabwe to ensure that when food aid arrives in the country it goes where it is supposed to go.

“Our information suggests Mugabe banks the aid and uses it in the run-up to an election.”