One of Zimbabwe's most outspoken church leaders called for a peaceful uprising against President Robert Mugabe's autocratic rule, just days before a parliamentary election that rights groups say is already tainted from years of violence and intimidation.
Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube, of Zimbabwe's second city, Bulawayo, said he was willing to put on his vestments and lead a march to Mugabe's residence himself, but feared: "If I do it, I do it alone."
"The people are so scared," he said Sunday in an interview. "You are not going to get that where people are so cowardly."
Mugabe, a former guerrilla leader, has led Zimbabwe since the end of white rule in 1980.
Ncube believes Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front party will easily win Thursday's poll, which he said will be overseen by the military and is certain to be rigged.
"I hope that people get so disillusioned that they really organize against the government and kick him out by a nonviolent, popular, mass uprising," Ncube said. "Because as it is, people have been too soft with this government. So people should pluck up just a bit of courage and stand up against him and chase him away."
Calls for unauthorized protests are punishable by up to 20 years in jail under the country's harsh Public Order and Security Act.
While this year's election has been less violent than previous ones, Ncube said "a kind of tacit violence" persists. He accused the government of denying desperately needed food aid to opposition supporters in rural centers such as Filabusi, where he said over 200 hungry families were turned away.
Ncube was also critical of opposition leaders, who have been at pains to avoid bloodshed since at least 200 people were killed during the government's often violent seizure of thousands of white-owned farms for redistribution to black Zimbabweans.
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