Tanzania: On Human Flourishing - Magufuli's Call for World Leaders to Bring Faith Into the Real World, Crucial

opinion By Dr Alfred Sebahene

TOMORROW the year 2020 will come to an end.

I hope my reader will agree with me that 2020 has been a whirlwind of a year. For me, it is hard to

believe that we have come to the end of this very trying year. Well, we cannot ignore the fact that in some many cases, 2020 has also been a year of joy for many.

But as we enter 2021, and recall what 2020 was to the world, let the year 2021 be a year for us to remain vigilant, act wisely and responsibly. This I say because covid-19 has changed, or rather turned the world upside down.

Let's hope for the better despite the ongoing economic and societal disruption caused by the pandemic and the possibility that it may continue to worsen.

Amidst the ongoing covid- 19 challenges, and now a new coronavirus discovery, a reflection on the current dynamics of political and economic contexts, our world leaders' traits, leaders' relationship with followers, and the political time in which our political leader operates is important.

My point aims at interpreting a leader's national message. Last week during his eloquent Christmas speech, President John Joseph Pombe Magufuli urged fellow political leaders across the globe to return to faith. At the core of his speech, one realises that for Magufuli, world leaders' religious beliefs and the demands of office are not only together but joined at the hip, as the Brits would say.

Once again President Magufuli is calling the global leadership to remember practical implications of religion's increasingly prominent role in world politics. His entry point to this wise and timely call springs out from his experience in handling Covid-19, a pandemic that continues to challenge both global health and religious practice in profound and still evolving ways.

For him, beliefs, leaders, and practices have vital roles to play in the ongoing coronavirus crisis and response. For JPM, though the year may be ending, the unprecedented challenges that have made life desperately difficult across the globe this year still remain.

He acknowledges that the Covid-19 pandemic is far from over, and that is why he brings in the importance of faith in God, a value which helped him manage to stay the course in his country.

Well, although it has now become evident that political leaders' beliefs affect their political and policymaking behaviour, especially in times of crisis, the bold step Mr President has taken to call and admonish fellow leaders to return to faith is not only unique and important, but new and rare.

Mr President's counsel is coming at the right time because the current increasing visibility of religion on all levels of political, economic and social activities in the world cannot be overlooked or by any means snubbed. By and large, the role of religion in the global engagement is an important condition for relief in the world crunch.

What Mr President is reminding fellow leaders is that as it is for the people they lead, political leaders are sense-making machines and it is therefore a common scenario that when faced with a situation that threatens them and their people, many will turn to their personal beliefs which tend to inform and shape, among so many government matters, their policymaking.

What Mr President is suggesting is that he is aware of fellow leaders' diverse preferences, pressures, and priorities. He knows the challenges they are facing. He therefore brings to them new and unprecedented ideas he strongly believes in. It is faith in the Almighty God.

For him, this faith has the power to help them in their sense-making and meaningmaking activities, including how they deal with Covid-19 in 2021. This idea can be difficult to understand.

But what Mr President strongly suggests is real, even though many, especially those who believe that religion and politics have never mixed as polite dinner conversation, may ask; can really faith in God have the potential to guide and therefore add value to the current serious combination of limited or lack of an established institutional response and the diverse economic and political contexts in which world political leaders operate?

I know there are also those who would strongly advocate that religion has no place in the political or the public sphere. Well, this is their position, and they should be respected.

That said however, for JPM and indeed for many, private individual faith that calls him as a Christian to political action and public citizenry is something which he would like to see fellow leaders respect, based on their religious affiliation and inclination, to connect what they are doing for their people and their sole belief in the supernatural power many call God.

And he is confident in what he suggests because he knows, in the context of Covid -19 on how it reminded us very starkly of the limits of human government. At Chamwino, JPM declared; the pandemic has shown us that, even with the best of intentions, the power and wisdom of humans, any government is very limited.

So his position is clear; he calls his colleagues to use the strengths of their faith in conjunction with, and not against, other communities in addressing Covid-19 and other world's ailments.

What Magufuli is communicating to fellow leaders is what a Public Theologian would actually stand for, that is - to bring together insights from the gospel, or rather Holy Books, with initiatives from wider political movements in world governments, economic structures and civil society for the benefit of all citizens.

Magufuli knows that wananchi live into their responsibilities to help collectively build a better society for the benefit of all. For those who have faith must enter into the public and political realm informed from their beliefs and values as instilled from their holy books and formed in a faith tradition - obviously with a set of values and ethics that presupposes and informs their actions.

What Magufuli said during his Christmas message is meant to cement the current significant development at the world stage, of the joining together of faith, office and institutions as leaders seek to provide clearer accountability and responsibility for their nations while addressing poverty and other development issues.

Mr President is right. Faith engagement in the public square today has lend immensely in contributing to the war against Covid-19 and its associated challenges well evidenced in, among others, health systems overwhelmed, economies and livelihoods destroyed, and in many parts of the world, kids still out of school or struggling to learn online.

Indeed, leaders' religious beliefs and the demands of office cannot and should not be separated. My conclusion to this article today will be rather uncommon. Indeed, special because even though more articles from me for this column will come in the New Year 2021, this is my last article for 2020.

So let me take this opportunity to wish my reader good health and success. Thank you for your interest in this column. Have a sparkling New Year 2021.

Cheers!

Dr Alfred Sebahene, PhD Social Ethics Specialist and Anti- Corruption Consultant St John's University of Tanzania Dodoma, Tanzania