MDI Comment: This article below highlights the plight of the Muslims in the Central African Republic, who suffer atrocities from mass scale of ethnic cleansing by self-identified Christian militias. Although the ‘Anti-Balaka’ terror group is a combination of Animist and Christian members, Christians constitute the majority and pseudo-Christian slogans predominate the rhetoric of the group’s spokesmen.

The purpose of drawing attention to this article is not to show that Christianity, or an interpretation of Christianity, has led to the Anti-Balaka campaign of genocide and violence. Rather, the article shows how the horrible actions of terrorism and violence can arise in people of any faith (and none). And when it does arise, the perpetrators unfortunately always justify it by (false) appeals to their local culture and values (whether it’s nationalism, Christianity, Islam, Communism or Secular Liberalism) irrespective of what those values or beliefs actually say. In essence, a terror group that arises from a Christian locality will profess Christianity, and a terror group that arises from an Atheist/Secular locality will profess nationalism, Communism or some other secular set of beliefs.

It is a shame that when anti-balaka ‘Christians’ commit acts of terrorism, and invoke the Bible and demand people ‘convert or die’, no Western politician or pundits will claim that there is an ‘ideology behind this terrorism’. However, when it comes to criminal elements like ISIS, who commit similar atrocities as their ‘Christian’ counterparts in CAR, Islam (or an ‘interpretation’ of Islam) is blamed. Furthermore, Terrorists in the Muslim world will receive vastly more coverage in the Western media than Christian/Secular ones. This selective and disproportionate reporting of world events skews people’s understanding of human phenomena, and leads them to demonise Muslims for a criminal problem that afflicts all people in the world.

Pastor Koudougeret, a Baptist priest in Bangui said of the conflict in CAR: ‘The ultimate cause of our instability is not religious but political, because whoever comes to power makes his entourage commit abuses to stay in power’.

The Guardian Newspaper reported that the conflict is related to foreign interference funding competing groups in order to access CAR’s lucrative timber and diamonds.

For more of the latest MDI news and topical commentary relating to intellectual debates, please ‘like’ our MDI Facebook Page.

Convert or die: Ethnic cleansing in CAR