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Kunda listens to Fr Umberto’s homily in Chifubu

Kunda listens to Fr Umberto’s homily in Chifubu
By Misheck Wangwe in Ndola
Mon 02 Aug. 2010, 04:01 CAT

CHIFUBU Catholic Church Parish Priest Fr Umberto Davolli has observed that government is just looking at the sufferings of the poor as if it is not its responsibility to alleviate poverty.

And Fr Umberto said Zambia does not qualify to be called a Christian nation, looking at the high levels of immorality and irresponsibility of leaders and the people who have the moral obligation to promote common good.

In his homily during Mass at Chifubu Parish that was attended by Vice-President George Kunda yesterday, Fr Umberto said there was need for government to do more in uplifting the living standards of the majority poor in Zambia. He said the high poverty levels that the country was experiencing were due to the fact that successive governments had failed to attend to the plight of the poor.

“When I came to Zambia in 1966, there were only 3.5 million people with abundant land and natural resources. As the time went by, the living standards of the people and the economy started deteriorating; even today, it is deteriorating,” Fr Umberto said.

“After Kaunda, Chiluba came. He also failed to address the issue of poverty. Even today, people are going through misery. We need leaders to work hard, to unite with everyone to fight poverty in this country.”

Fr Umberto said the current living standards had revealed that leaders did not care about the majority people.

He said God never created people to be suffering, to be living in abject poverty, but to enjoy life for the glory of His name.

He said the failure by the government and other leaders in society to help the poor was regrettable and a great shame in the eyes of God.

Fr Umberto said in the world today, statistics showed that every minute, 30 children died of hunger, and world leaders were busy spending over one billion dollars on weapons instead of concentrating on programmes that would better people’s lives.

“We are lucky today we have the Vice-President in our midst. I want to say that we are not doing enough to help the poor. We are just looking at the oppressed and people who are crying every day and we are doing nothing. It is a responsibility of everyone who is capable of extending a hand to do so because that’s what God wants. That’s the greater gift of love we can give to our neighbours and every human being who is in need,” Fr Umberto said.

He said the government was expected to come up with laws that would enable the country to attain meaningful development, and not laws that would oppress people.

Fr Umberto added that leaders were expected to be sincere with the people and to govern in a transparent manner.

“Some years back, I was fighting for the people of Sabina area, whom government wanted to displace from their small farms. The then Minister of Lands Gladys Nyirongo promised that those people would not be displaced but would be given four hectares each. But to the contrary, the people were displaced after some time. That’s not the kind of leadership Zambians deserve,” said Fr Umberto.

Labels: GEORGE KUNDA, POVERTY, UMBERTO DAVOLI

posted by MrK @ 3:20 PM