wfn.org | Commission members give to Africa University scholarship fund

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG>]

Sept. 28, 1999	News media contact: Joretta Purdue*(202)546-8722*Washington
10-21-30-71B{494}

NOTE:  This story may be used as a sidebar to UMNS story #493.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (UMNS) - Members of the United Methodist racial monitoring
agency were so moved by the words of an African bishop that they gave more
than $3,500 from their own pockets to allow a student to attend Africa
University for one year.

Bishop Nkulu Ntanda Ntambo of the denomination's North Katanga Area, which
includes part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire) and
Tanzania, reported on racism in that area of Africa to the United Methodist
Commission on Religion and Race at the commission's recent meeting.

There, he explained, discrimination between 450 ethnic groups has led to
open warfare.

The people, even church members, continue to practice extreme sexism that is
rooted in the culture, according to the bishop. "A wife is not only married
but also purchased," he explained. Traditionally, wives are much younger
than their husbands, perform arduous labor to provide for the family, and
are beaten by their spouses to keep them working and submissive. Only males
can inherit family property.

Children, especially girls, are victims of the same social injustice, Ntambo
said. The father gets the richest food, and boy children eat with their
father. Girls are generally denied education, and children are often
neglected and exposed to diseases, Ntambo added.

"The church is actively engaged in raising the consciousness of the people:
preaching the biblical teaching of forgiveness, love of thy neighbor and
reconciliation," he said. The church sponsors many activities and invests in
the dignity of women, he added. 

Especially important is Africa University, which was established by the
United Methodist Church and opened in 1992. There "men and women are equal,"
he commented. Currently 44 percent of the student body is female, although
the norm for African schools is only 8 to 9 percent.

Although some leaders and the churches strive to bring people together,
ethnocentrism tends to prevail, Ntambo reported. Especially strong is the
antipathy between the Congolese related to the Tutsi or Hutu people of
adjacent Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda, he observed.

"The war in the Congo . . . is a war of extermination, not a war of
liberation," Ntambo asserted. Thousands of civilians have died without the
world noticing. Women and children have often been the victims of horrible
atrocities, he protested.

He likened the situation in the Congo to Germany in the 1930s, saying the
war should be stopped by whoever has the will to do it because the Africans
do not have the means.

Not only is the war being ignored outside central Africa, Ntambo said, but
Africans are treated differently than others when they try to travel in
Europe or the United States, he noted

Ntambo appealed to the commission and the church to care for the refugees
and to urge the U.S. government and United Nations to push for peace among
the parties to the war. An existing cease fire agreement is not being
honored, he said.

The urge to "do something" led one of the commission members to propose a
scholarship for a student from the Congo. In less than 24 hours, checks and
pledges for $3,850 were collected from the 41-member commission.

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