Tanzania: Churches and Religious Organizations to be closed

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News)--The Tanzanian Minister of Home Affairs threatened that churches and other religious organizations that publicly oppose the country's new constitution will be unregistered beginning on April 20.

According to Barnabas Aid, Minister Mathias Chika said that though leaders of religious institutions had the right to participate as individuals, it was illegal for them to use their positions to influence the votes of their flocks.

Tanzanian Christians have already opposed a bill that will introduce Kadhi(Islamic) courts across the country's mainland.

Already existing in the Muslim-majority Zanzibar archipelago, the bill to introduce Kadhi courts into mainland Tanzania were intended to only deal with familial matters -- e.g., marriage, divorce and inheritance issues -- within the nation's Muslim population.

But with the approaching referendum as well as a general election scheduled for October, relations between Muslims and Christians are already tense.