Mpuuga called for a collective voice against what he termed as misrule and gross human rights violations by the regime.

The Leader of Opposition in Parliament, Mathias Mpuuga, has written to all church leaders countrywide, urging them to speak out against acts of human rights violations in the country.

In his message, Mpuuga called for a collective voice against what he termed as misrule and gross human rights violations by the regime.

"We need to have a collective voice that shall bear the collective disgust of the citizenry to the regime and rollback its rehearsal at usurping the power of the people," Mpuuga wrote.

The development comes against a backdrop of the collapse of talks between the Opposition in Parliament and the government from which the opposition leadership had hoped to get the truth about dozens of their supporters who have been missing for almost two years.

"We have hundreds of innocent people languishing in various illegal detention centres and many whose whereabouts remain unknown and unaccounted for," Mpuuga noted.

"It is a sacred duty of the partially free to fight for the remaining space for themselves and the rest without such freedom," he added.

He attached a list of some 25 people who the opposition says have been missing without trace since their abduction by state security operatives.

"We now contend that some of them were murdered in cold blood by the powers that be because their whereabouts cannot be explained," Mpuuga said.

Mpuuga asked the church leaders to use Christmas and make for them special prayers.

He has also dispatched MPs to carry a similar message to the different churches where they will pray from.