written by Peter Wilson
Thursday October 18, 2012
This sad story of Muslims behaving badly comes from the Tanzanian Citizen newspaper: two 14-year-old friends, one Muslim, one Christian, were walking home from school in a Dar es-Salaam suburb. The Muslim boy told the Christian that anyone who desecrates the Koran will be turned into a snake. The Christian didn't believe him and, to put it to the test, he urinated on his friend's Koran. Adolescent hijinks -- kids being kids, you might think. Dumb, but what can you do? They're 14-year-old boys.
The Muslim boy's father, however, didn't find the story amusing. He was outraged, and the Christian boy was detained at the local police station.
Five days later, after being stirred up in Friday prayers, a crowd of Muslim "youth" gathers in front of the police station, demanding that the boy be turned over to them "so that he would be punished accordingly" -- the appropriate punishment being decapitation. The police refuse to release the boy, so the Muslims respond by rioting, burning five Christian churches, lighting tires in the road, and breaking store windows. A hundred and twenty-two are arrested.
This interfaith dialogue of burning churches has become endemic to Tanzania, although it has been confined mostly to the island of Zanzibar. There, as of May 31, 2012, twenty-five churches and convents had been torched. Other churches were burned on June 17, July 27, and July 30. According to a report on one incident, "[t]he assailants were shouting, 'Away with the church - we do not want infidels to spoil our community, especially our children.'" Muslim activists also block construction of Christian churches with court injunctions and other sleazy tactics. It's ethnic cleansing, pure and simple, and it's effective: Zanzibar is more than 99% Muslim.
The Isles government that controls Zanzibar has taken no action to arrest or punish those responsible, appearing to condone the activities. Mainland Tanzania, in contrast, is 30% Christian and 35% Muslim, with 35% holding "indigenous beliefs." Condemnation of the recent events in Dar es-Salaam has come from senior Muslim and Christian clerics alike. Unfortunately, the pattern in too many countries where Christians and Muslims live together is that the Christian population is exterminated -- by going underground, converting, or emigrating -- after decades of bullying, violence, and murder from the religion of peace.
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The Citizen
written by Frank Aman and Bernard Lugongo, The Citizen Reporters
Saturday, 13 October 2012 23:11
Dar es Salaam: At least 122 people have been arrested in connection with Friday’s violent clashes in Dar es Salaam’s Mbagala suburbs between anti-riots police and Muslim youth protesting an alleged act by a 14-year-old boy of desecrating the Quran.
The riots erupted on Friday when the youth stormed a local police station and demanded that the said boy be handed over to them so that he would be punished accordingly.
Dar es Salaam Special Zone Police commander Suleiman Kova said yesterday that 32 of those arrested allegedly vandalised and torched church buildings while the 86 were arrested for demonstrating.
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Compass Direct news
written by Staff
August 1, 2012
Tanzania Assemblies of God (TAG) Pastor Yohana Ari Mfundo said he has witnessed a series of attacks on Christians on Pemba island.
The pastor had bought a half-acre of land for a church building some three kilometers (nearly two miles) from Chake-Chake town, but when area Muslims learned of it they arranged for a road to be built through it, he said. The smaller size made it fit only for residential use. The road passing through the land today makes it impossible to erect a church building, he said.
He added that Muslims have openly vowed in their meetings not to make friendship with “infidels.”
Another church building on top of a hill about 20 meters from the site where Pastor Mfundo wanted to build is also facing government obstruction. A court case challenges the existence of the Redeemed Gospel Church, said Pastor Yohana Shigalile, on the basis that the site was intended to be a burial site. Compass found only three graves there.
The church had reached an agreement of 20 million Tanzania shillings (US$12,750) with the seller to purchase the land, but Muslims have offered 50 million schillings, the pastor said, and therefore the land is likely to be sold for the construction of a mosque.
Pastor Mfundo said this is one example of how difficult it is to buy land for churches in Pemba.
Pemba has a population of about 500,000, and Zanzibar island’s population is estimated at 700,000. There are only 60 Christian congregations on the archipelago, according to Operation World.
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