/BULLETIN OF RELIGIOUS AFFAIRS 03/ MOZAMBIQUE: Holy Row Over Holy Days

By Mercedes Sayagues Reprint | | Print |

Mercedes Sayagues

MAPUTO, May 26 1996 (IPS) - A holy row has erupted in Mozambique over a Bill that makes public holidays of two Muslim festivals, highlighting the country’s political and religious divisions.

President Joaquim Chissano is under intense pressure from the Muslim community and the Catholic and Protestant churches over the draft law which will make Eid-ul-Fitr at the end of the fasting month of Ramadan and the Eid-ul-Adh at the end of the Hadj, the annual pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, public holidays.

Chissano has until the end of May to return the controversial Bill to the National Assembly which passed it in early May for revision, or let it pass automatically by raising no objections.

On Apr. 24 he met with delegates from the Christian Council and the Episcopal Conference of Maputo, who urged him not to approve the law.

Outspoken Cardinal of Maputo, Dom Alexandre Maria dos Santos and Anglican Bishop Dinis Salomao Seguleme want a return to the ‘tolerancia de ponto’ whereby Muslims could stay away from work on holy days.

But Nazir Lunat, a deputy of the ruling Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frelimo) and mullah at Polana mosque in the capital, points out that the ‘tolerancia de ponto’, “in reality, it was not tolerated as a holiday.” Under the system, schools were open, exams taken and business meetings scheduled Muslims ended up having to work on holy days.

However, Catholics and Protestants emphasise the unfairness of the proposed law which they argue will put one religion above others and force all citizens to observe its holy days.

This is a particularly sore point as, soon after independence in 1975, Frelimo turned Christmas into a lay holiday known as Family Day in its now abandoned socialist zeal.

“This is an ill-judged step that undermines peace and harmony among all Mozambicans,” says Anglican Bishop Dinis Salomao Seguleme. “This is a maneuver of politicians because there is no coherence between defending the lay State, as all MPs say they do, and legislating on holidays of a religious nature.”

The parliamentary leader of the opposition Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo) Raul Domingos agrees: “It is an interference of the state on religious matters, and the State is lay, according to article nine. The law privileges some citizens over others, discriminates on religious grounds, damages social harmony and national unity, all of these prohibited in our constitution.”

Dos Santos, who opposed Mozambique joining the Organization of the Islamic Conference in November 1995, slams the Bill as the harbinger of Muslim extremism in the country.

“Islamic fundamentalism has created problems everywhere and we don’t want Mozambique to have those problems,” says the Cardinal. “Little by little, we are seeing its entrance here: from demanding holidays to imposing the sharia or Islamic law, fundamentalism will come.”

Lunat warns that fundamentalism reacts angrily when attacked, as happened in Algeria and Egypt: “The more you fight it (fundamentalism), the more it revolts,” he says. “We are saying (to Catholics) don’t shoot the first shot. If you shoot first, you will bring problems.”

Lunat contends that secular States do observe religious holidays, citing Catholic festivities in Portugal or Muslim festivities in Tunis, India, Iraq, Egypt: “These are lay States but respect the major religions of the country.”

Although the Bill is the brainchild of 59 Muslims or their sympathisers across party lines, ultimately it was supported fully only by Frelimo and opposed by the opposition Democratic Union (UD) and Renamo with some abstentions.

Domingos considers the Bill a ploy by Frelimo, largely popular in the south, to increase its support in the northern provinces, where Renamo performed well in the 1994 elections. He describes it as a “hunt for the Muslim vote.”

Muslims constitute nearly 20 percent of the population of 16 million, according to a 1991 demographic survey by the National Directorate of Statistics. Twenty-four percent of Mozambicans are Catholic, 21 percent Protestant, 32 percent Animist and the remainder a sprinkling of Hindus and other religions.

But as the survey covered only major urban centers because of the civil war which ended in 1994, it is believed that the proportion of Muslims should be revised upwards to include rural people in the northern provinces of Niassa, Cabo Delgado and Nampula, where easily more than half are Muslims.

There is an economic side to the issue as well. At stake may be credit, investment and humanitarian aid from the wealthy Gulf States for a country still listed by the World Bank as the world’s poorest, as it battles to recover from the 17-year war.

These countries could be lured by Mozambique’s economic potential.

This possibility is lent credence by last week’s visit of Kuwait’s minister of tourism, seen with his retinue lounging in flowing white robes and checkered keffiyas in the lush gardens of the Hotel Polana.

A Western diplomat in Maputo notes that foreign funds must be paying for the proliferation of mosques across Mozambique, with 23 in the capital alone.

Lunat is a mullah at the first mosque to be built in an upper class residential area here. Without being asked, he is at pains to explain that no foreign funding is involved.

While the debate rages, a creative alternative to the celebration of holy days has been proposed by independent journalist Carlos Cardoso, editor of the daily faxsheet ‘Mediafax’.

He suggests that Family Day should be floated on a ten-year cycle to coincide with holy days for all the major religious denominations.

“In this way, in the course of a lifetime, Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Hindus and Animists would see Family Day fall on their sacred day,” says Cardoso, believing that Family Day would then become a factor of unity rather than division.