BiAS 7 – The Bible and Politics in Africa
From this perspective, the privileged role of the Bible in the Zim-
babwean society is easy to explain; about 80% of the population in Zim-
babwe claim to be Christians, of which a majority of them are women,
given that women comprise about 52% of the total Zimbabwean popula-
tion. With these statistics, it is no surprise therefore that it is mostly
women who are the worst affected by political and socio-economic dis-
tresses that Zimbabwe faced. This Christian/demographic factor has
seen, those with political ambitions having to target the church for sup-
port. Since women are the majority in almost all Christian denomina-
tions, shrewd politicians have thus interpreted the Bible to be appealing
to women.
Brief history
to Zimbabwe’s post-2000 socio-economic and political crises
As it is not possible to accurately understand the political role of the
Bible as well as socio-economic and political crises of 2000-2010 in Zim-
babwe independent of the colonial history, I will give here a brief back-
ground of colonisation. Zimbabwe became a British colony in 1890,
under Cecil John Rhodes, with the help of Christian missionaries,^2 who
successively through biblical interpretation among other strategies,
continued to serve the social, economic and political interests of the
colonisers. They took almost all of the fertile land from the black people
without compensation and confined them to ‘reserves’ with unproduc-
tive soils,^3 where again they were subjected to many taxes. The first
attempt by the colonized Zimbabweans to liberate themselves from
colonization from 1896 to 1897,^4 ended in a failure until the Second
Chimurenga of the 1960s which ended in independence in 1980.^5
While the first decade of Independence brought many positive changes
to the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans, the main issues: economic redis-
tribution especially land and mineral resources were not satisfactorily
(^2) Michael Lapsley, Neutrality or Co-option: Anglican Church and State from 1964 until the
Independence of Zimbabwe. Gweru: Mambo Press, 1986, 9.
(^3) R. Mugabe, Inside the Third Chimurenga. Harare: Department of Information and
Publicity, 2001.
(^4) Leda Stott, Women and the Armed Struggle for Independence in Zimbabwe (1964-1979).
Edinburgh Univ.: Centre of African Studies, 1989 8.
(^5) David Lan, Guns and Rain: Guerrillas and Spirit Mediums in Zimbabwe. London: James
Curry Ltd, 1985.