“The so-called ‘Operation Restore Order’ that the Zimbabwean authorities have inflicted on thousands of vulnerable and poor people is cruel and unnecessary”, said Bishop Crispian Hollis of Portsmouth, chairman of the International Affairs Department of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, expressing the full solidarity of the English episcopate with the bishops of the African country in their opposition to the campaign of mass evictions that Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe has ordered to be carried out in the capital Harare and in other cities. “The Zimbabwean bishops – continued Hollis have made clear their grave concern at the government’s policy and the widespread suffering it has caused. Indeed, they have described the operation as a ‘gross injustice to the poor'”. “Now, almost four weeks after the event declares a Pastoral Letter issued by the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference, following a press release dated 2 June countless numbers of men, women with babies, children of school age, the old and the sick, continue to sleep in the open air at winter temperatures near to freezing. These people urgently need shelter, food, clothing, medicines, etc. Any claim to justify this operation in view of a desired orderly end becomes totally groundless in view of the cruel and inhumane means that have been used”. Hence the appeal of the African bishops: “We call upon all those (Christians in particular) who hold special responsibilities in society, be it in government, the business community or other spheres of influence, to exercise their duties according to the social teaching of the Church”.
