FAITH & FREEDOM OF BELIEF-2019

FAITH & RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
in West Africa and the Lake Chad basin, where
the Boko Haram Islamist terrorist group is
implanted and also in the Central African
Republic, where a religious war broke the
country since 2013. Another terrorist group, the
Al Shabab is implanted in the eastern region of
Africa. The religious intolerance in Africa is not
only the fact of terrorist groups (either Muslim
and Christians), but also caused by different
restriction of religious freedom by religious
rules; it’s the case of the Maghreb region where
the offense of blasphemy has been adopted in
criminal law, like in Algeria (2012) and recently
in Morocco.
In all these cases, the violation of religious
freedom is generally caused by exacerbated
conservatism or nationalism (I) and a religious
radicalism with an unpredictable future.
I. Exacerbated nationalism in Africa
It is a strategy of some governments to
control religious movements essentially in
Muslim African countries. Draconian rules
passed in different parliaments and close
control of religious institutions decided. In
Sudan and Eritrea for example, religious
minority movements are harassed, and police
raids and incarcerations have become regular.
The introducing of blasphemy and apostasy in
different African criminal law is the illustration of
the religious situation of countries where Islam
is the majority. In 2017, the Islamic Conference
Organization (ICO) took distance from the
United Nations Human Rights commission, by
adopting a resolution condemning “the offense
of defamation of religion”. The same year, the
American federal of religious freedom report
listed over 70 countries in the world where
apostasy and blasphemy offenses are practice
and among them, twenty African countries are
concerned. In 2006, the Algerian parliament
took a prescription introducing a penalty for
all religions reaching out. The same Algerian
parliament prescription reserve Algerian
citizenship to only Muslims. The penalty is more
violent in Mauritania, Libya and Egypt where
the criminal law predicts a death penalty to all
religious proselytizing and where intolerance
towards religious minorities is a current fact.
The violation of freedom of religion in
Africa is also a consequence of a religious
radicalization of some African societies.
Guy Bucumi
Lecturer at the
Faculty of Law
of the Université
de Sherbrooke.
Researcher at the
Research Chair
in Law, Religion
and Secularism of
the Université de
Sherbrooke.
However, despite
these significant
legislative
evolutions,
religious freedom
is being tested in
several African
countries.
II. Radicalization as a religious freedom
violation cause
Religious radicalization in Africa is a fact
of many Islamist and Christians groups or
movements. It is the case of Islamist groups like
Boko Haram in Western and Central Africa, Al
Shebab in Eastern Christians radical groups like
Anti Baraka in Central African Republic or the
Lord Resistance Army in Democratic Republic
of Congo and Uganda. All those radical groups,
both Christians or Muslims, are responsible
for many religious intolerance acts in their
influence area and occupied regions. Their
only presence provokes massive movements
of non-tolerated religious groups.
The pregnancy of religion in African societies
needs a particularly careful monitoring of
question from African authorities because of
its sensibility. The religious war in the Central
African Republic since 2013 is the object lesson
of the importance of the religious question in
the African continent.
OUR WORLD| 2019
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