The Anglican Church of Southern Africa is urging members of the South African Parliament to “vote with their consciences” on the Protection of Information Bill being considered by legislators.
The Anglican Church of Southern Africa is urging members of the South African Parliament to “vote with their consciences” on the Protection of Information Bill being considered by legislators.
The church’s ruling Provincial Synod adopted a resolution declaring its opposition to the Bill after a number of speakers warned the church against what they saw as its failure to speak out sufficiently on public issues.
The priest who proposed the resolution, Rev Drake Tshenkeng of the Diocese of Kimberley and Kuruman, said in an interview after the synod debate that he hoped members of Parliament would vote conscienciously “instead of along party lines”.
Speaking during debate, Bishop Oswald Swartz of Kimberley and Kuruman said that “one of the marks of the church is to challenge unjust structures of society.” Warning of “the great danger we are in if we keep silent,” he asked: “Is this inability to speak because we are uncomfortable [with], or even afraid of, our comrades who shared the trenches with us in the struggle against apartheid – also because many of the people now in authority are also Anglicans?”
Tshenkeng, who was detained, banned and forced into exile after the killing of Steve Biko in 1977 told the synod the church had been in the “forefront of public advocacy” during the apartheid era. After liberation in 1994, he said, “there was joy, there was happiness, there was rejoicing… It was a new era and of course the church also changed gears. We were still enjoying a honeymoon… “But… our honeymoon seems not to get to an end. It is a honeymoon that seems to be going on and on. The church is being slowly embedded within the status quo.”
