{"id":7120,"date":"2015-07-28T13:32:45","date_gmt":"2015-07-28T17:32:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/?p=7120"},"modified":"2016-10-06T15:05:41","modified_gmt":"2016-10-06T19:05:41","slug":"justapaz-1996-lifting-mozambique-from-the-rubble-of-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/2015\/07\/justapaz-1996-lifting-mozambique-from-the-rubble-of-war\/","title":{"rendered":"JustaPaz, 1996: Lifting Mozambique from the Rubble of War"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Alfiado<\/a>
Alfiado Zunguza, MA ’99, founding director of JustaPaz, with Peacebuilder<\/cite> editor Bonnie Price Lofton (Photos by Alfredo Mueche)<\/i><\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Two decades before Bishop Dinis Matsolo <\/strong>journeyed from Mozambique to the United States to take three courses at EMU\u2019s 2005 Summer Peacebuilding Institute, he was a peacemaker forged in the cauldron of one of the worst wars Africa has seen.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have a gun, you\u2019ll use it\u2026. If someone provokes you and you have a gun, you\u2019ll say, \u2018I\u2019ll kill you \u2013 I have the power to do this,\u2019\u201d Matsolo told Peacebuilder<\/em>, by way of explaining why his Methodist Church of Southern Africa promotes nonviolence as a way of life in Mozambique.<\/p>\n

This is a country where almost everyone over the age of 40 has fought with a deadly weapon or has family members who did so. And everyone knows people who met violent deaths. During nearly three decades of warfare \u2013 starting with a fight for independence from Portugal, followed by 16 years of civil war \u2013 it is estimated that Mozambicans handled 10 million firearms, or one lethal weapon for every two persons.<\/p>\n

Matsolo gave another example: \u201cIf you see a lion in your path and you don\u2019t have a gun, you won\u2019t walk toward it \u2013 you\u2019ll find another way. If you have a gun, you\u2019ll feel falsely protected by it and will walk into danger.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matsolo\u2019s remarks came during an interview in late 2014 in his office in Mozambique\u2019s capital, Maputo. As district bishop, Matsolo oversees Methodist churches throughout Mozambique serving 16,000 members, almost all traumatized in some way as a result of warfare or its aftermath.<\/p>\n

A brief history<\/h3>\n

Mozambique\u2019s war of independence against Portugal officially ended in 1975, with the triumph of Frelimo, the group that spearheaded resistance to colonial rule.<\/p>\n

But the country was left with many armed fighters and little else. Illiteracy stood at 90%. Infrastructure was non-existent. In 1977, Frelimo formally declared itself to be a Marxist-Leninist party with a mission to replace capitalist practices with a socialist economy. Political and military support came from Soviet-aligned countries.<\/p>\n

An opposition group, Renamo, emerged with backing from white-ruled Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa, and civil war ensued from the late 1970s to 1992. Widespread atrocities occurred amid economic collapse and famine.<\/p>\n

Mozambique\u2019s churches and mosques were under constant attack during this era. Leaders were killed or disappeared. The Catholic Church was regarded as a lackey of the former colonial rulers, and the other religious institutions were viewed through Frelimo\u2019s Marxist lens that religion is \u201cthe opium of the people\u201d and therefore useless.<\/p>\n

But faced with a country in utter collapse \u2013 with a death toll exceeding one million and five million people displaced \u2013 the governmental and party leadership of Frelimo took an extraordinary step: it held a three-day meeting in 1982 with the leaders of the principal religious bodies in the country.<\/p>\n

Then-president Samora Machel (a former leader of the Frelimo freedom fighters) acknowledged that he needed the help of religious leaders to put the country on a better path. And the leaders readily responded. Their institutions, touching 90% of the population in some way, had been the only ones functioning through all the years of fighting, despite being stressed to the breaking point.<\/p>\n

Thereafter church leaders shuttled between Frelimo and Renamo through the late 1980s and into the early 1990s. Their first meeting with Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama took place in 1988 in bush controlled by his guerrilla fighters. With infinite patience, the church leaders sought face-to-face negotiations between the warring parties.<\/p>\n

The church leaders needed, and received, help from leaders in other countries \u2013 some meetings between Frelimo and Renamo representatives were held in Kenya; the final series of peace negotiations were held in Italy over many months. Initially, the meetings yielded little.<\/p>\n

By early 1992, \u201cthe worsening drought in Mozambique was leading to increased attacks by hungry Renamo fighters on civilians and driving many to flee in search of safety and food,\u201d wrote Anglican bishop D\u00ednis Salom\u00e3o Sengulane and Catholic archbishop Dom Jaime Gon\u00e7alves in a 1998 Accord <\/em>article. \u201cThe irony was that the negotiating teams, enjoying the luxuries of Rome, seemed little concerned by the impact of the drought and the plight of ordinary Mozambicans.\u201d[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n

In September 1992, during an impasse in the Rome talks, Archbishop Gon\u00e7alves (one of the four official mediators) wondered, \u201cDid either of the parties sense any urgency or responsibility because mass starvation threatened?\u201d<\/p>\n

Matsolo, Gona\u00e7alves, Sengulane and the other church leaders were careful not to be perceived as taking sides \u2013 they knew it was essential to be viewed as neutral parties focused solely on the well-being of Mozambicans as a whole. In their quest for peace, wrote the Accord <\/em>authors, the Mozambican churches adopted these principles:<\/p>\n