Displaying items by tag: Politics

After months of unrelenting demonstrations led to the fall of President Omar al-Bashir last year, Sudan entered a three-year transition towards democracy with a new cabinet in September. Hope accompanies this situation as people look for a fresh approach that will respond to their needs. Many believe only time will show whether this hope will stand. Pray that the preliminary peace deal with the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement will stand and end 9 years of fighting in the Blue Nile and South Kordofan areas. Meanwhile, efforts to conclude a peace agreement with rebels in Darfur and Eastern Sudan are also under way. Important progress was made this month when Sudan announced that it was willing in principle to hand over ousted President Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court over alleged war crimes and genocide in these areas.

UK Christian politician Jeremy Hunt read Brother Andrew’s book ‘God’s Smuggler’ in his youth. This gave him a lifelong prayerful concern for the persecuted church. When he was appointed foreign minister, he looked into what the foreign service was doing to help persecuted Christians worldwide. What he discovered made him uncomfortable: there had been very high-profile interventions supporting Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, Bahai in Yemen, and Yazidis in Iraq - but little UK and international diplomatic assistance for suffering Christians, even though NGOs and churches were advocating on their behalf. Mr Hunt identified possible blind spots for persecuted Christians by his staff: awkwardness about bringing God into politics, post-colonial guilt, and fearfulness of being seen to impose our faith on others. He called it ‘misguided political correctness’ in his independent review. Now Boris Johnson has appointed a special envoy on freedom of religion or belief to head up the process of dealing with Christian persecution. The UN and the EU have similar envoys.

Sajid Javid has shocked Westminster by quitting as chancellor of the exchequer in the middle of Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle. He rejected the prime minister's order to fire his entire team of aides, saying no self-respecting minister could accept such a condition. He has been replaced as chancellor by chief secretary to the treasury Rishi Sunak - who just seven months ago was a junior housing minister. Mr Javid’s resignation follows rumours of tensions between him and the prime minister's senior adviser Dominic Cummings. He said his advisers had worked ‘incredibly hard’, and he could not agree to them being replaced. ‘I felt I was left with no option but to resign’, he said, adding that Mr Sunak and the rest of the government retained his ‘full support’. Downing Street said there would now be a joint team of economic advisers for both the chancellor and prime minister. For full details of Mr Johnson’s cabinet reshuffle, see

The Commonwealth faces uncertainty over its leadership after its heads of government rejected the secretary-general, Baroness Scotland, being given an automatic second term. Her four-year term of office comes to an end next month. The Commonwealth comprises 53 countries, encompassing almost 1/3 of the world’s population. There is disquiet among some member states about how its secretariat has been run. New Zealand has recently stopped giving funds to the institution. As long ago as 2017 the Government drafted in senior officials to support it amid concerns over the way it was being run. Senior diplomatic and political sources are accusing Lady Scotland of poor leadership and underperforming. Also, internal auditors found she awarded a lucrative £250,000 consultancy contract to a company run by her friend Lord Patel, ‘circumventing’ usual competitive tendering rules. The committee report found his firm was insolvent, with debts worth over £40,000. See 

Let us pray that, as the Commonwealth members enter a new season of advancement, the ‘wealth of these nations’ will be revealed and released in God’s own timing. May He reveal His Isaiah 60 glory in the Commonwealth, and draw on all righteous heritage in the spiritual, governmental, and economic dimensions. May new trade partnerships as well as new quangos be formed to expedite heaven’s plan, and new interdisciplinary committees formed to develop areas of growth, with national governments working together. May this be a new day for the nations of the Commonwealth as a group and as individual nations: not empire-building as in the past, but growing healthy, interdependent partnerships which benefit each member nation. For the full text of Passion for the Nation’s declaration for the Commonwealth, click the ‘More’ button.

Ireland needs to form a new government after election results showed Fianna Fáil winning 38 seats, Sinn Féin 37, and Fine Gael 35. The numbers indicate that negotiations to establish a government could be prolonged. The prospect of the left-wing, nationalist Sinn Fein entering Ireland’s government looks likely. This could make some people uncomfortable when they recall all the ‘Troubles’ of the past. In a world of fragmenting politics with Ireland’s Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, onlookers say it was only a matter of time before Sinn Fein found a route to power. Before the election, both the other parties had ruled out forging a coalition with Sinn Fein, citing its tax policies and IRA past as deterrents. Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald has said she would ask the EU to support Irish reunification if she was part of the next government.

Newly-elected Conservative MP Stuart Anderson explained in his first Commons speech how going to church and finding faith helped him ‘see light out of the darkness’. He said he considered taking his own life after he was left ‘broken’ by his time serving as a rifleman for the Royal Green Jackets in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and Kosovo. He finished his compassionate speech by saying, ‘When I was trying to do something right by my family, I found faith. For the first time in many years, I could see hope and a future.’ Danny Kruger, in his maiden speech, told listeners, ‘Look to Britain’s Christian past to address future problems. We are children of God, fallen but redeemed, capable of great wrong but also of great virtue.’ See

Britain has legally entered a 'transition period', and is free to pursue trade deals with other countries immediately while hammering out terms of future EU relationships. Boris Johnson said that Britain will not obey Brussels rules to get a trade deal while Brussels demands that the UK give access to fishing waters. They are on another collision course. Before trade talks can begin in earnest they must agree a negotiating mandate, spell out their red lines and be finalised by early March. Meanwhile, trade tensions rise as the UK hires more patrol boats to keep out EU fishing fleets ahead of a potential showdown over access. Pray for the 40 officials, called 'Taskforce Europe', leading negotiations for the UK. They are led by one-time business lobbyist and diplomat David Frost, who will negotiate directly with Michel Barnier. In April/May UK trade talks with the EU and other nations are expected to intensify even more. See also

When their tents were burned, Iraqi protesters replaced them with concrete structures. When influential cleric Muqtada al-Sadr withdrew his support, even more protesters turned out despite fears of a crackdown by security forces. On 1 February al-Sadr ordered his followers back to Tahrir Square, where they clashed with demonstrators and forcibly took over the main part of the square. The nomination of Mohammed Tawfiq Allawi as the new prime minister has been received negatively by the protesters, who see his choice as a plot by al-Sadr and his Iran-backed allies to end the protests in Baghdad. The parliament needs to hold a session to vote on the nomination. The Sadrist group is now cooperating with the security forces to end the sit-in at the square.

Thousands of Salvation Army members, officers and supporters are joining forces to warn the Government that, unless urgent action is taken, it is on course to break a manifesto pledge on rough sleeping. The pledge was to end rough sleeping by the end of this Parliament, but since 2010 there has been a 165% increase in people sleeping on the streets. The church and charity has called on its members, officers, employees and supporters in England to ask their local MP to lobby Government to prioritise funding to tackle homelessness. The campaign coincides with a recent poll which found that 68% of the public did not think the Government would deliver on its commitment to end rough sleeping. Anyone can take part in the campaign by going to the Salvation Army campaign page: