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NCA
catches police napping
National
Constitutional Assembly (NCA)
September
27, 2004
More than 100
NCA members today took to the streets and peacefully demonstrated
against the gazetted Non Governmental Organisations (NGO) Bill -
which seeks to restrict operations of NGOs in Zimbabwe- for the
third time this month.
Waving placards
and wielding a banner, the demonstrators marched from corner Angwa
Street and Nelson Mandela Avenue and then went to Parliament, where
they distributed NCA pamphlets. Members of Parliament who were coming
from a workshop in Nyanga on the Bill were caught unawares.
Police which
normally brutally thwarts demonstrations staged by the NCA, only
arrived at the Parliament Building about 30 minutes later when the
demonstrators had dispersed on their own.
  The
NGO Bill - which seeks to forbid foreign funding of NGOs, among
other things - will be tabled in Parliament when it resumes sitting
next week on Tuesday.
The demonstration
was staged without notifying police as required by the draconian
Public Order and Security Act (POSA). POSA stipulates that police
must be notified at least four days before the day of the demonstration.
"We did not
notify the police because in the past when we notified it, it interpreted
the notification as an application," said Jessie Majome, the NCA
spokesperson. "Demonstrations will remain as part of our programmes
until our goal as been achieved."
The NCA staged
two peaceful demonstrations on the 1st and 2nd of September started
at the South African Embassy where it presented a petition to the
South African Embassy It called Pretoria to intervene in the Zimbabwean
crisis.
The demonstrations,
turned nasty as police brutally assaulted NCA members and arrested
39 people. It subsequently arrested Lovemore Madhuku, the NCA chairperson
for organising the demonstration.
Visit the NCA fact
sheet
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