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Continued harassment of members of the legal profession
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR)
May 09, 2008

The recent spate of arrests of journalists, human rights defenders, women activists, legitimate political players has seen an equally increasing trend of targeting, harassment and arrest of members of the legal profession while carrying their duties and functions.

1. Mr Harrison Nkomo, a partner in the firm Mtetwa & Nyambirai Legal Practitioners was on 7 May 2008 visited by two detectives from CID Law & Order Section at around 14:00hrs. Detective Chirimuuta and another advised Mr. Nkomo that he was being invited to Harare Central CID Law & Order for inquiries in connection with a case wherein it was being alleged that he contravened section 33 of the Criminal Code, 'undermining the authority of or insulting the president' alternatively contravening S 41 of the Criminal Code, 'disorderly conduct in a public place'.
2. The summary of the case being that on 2 May 2008 and at the High Court of Zimbabwe's Court 'O', Mr. Nkomo is alleged to have said 'Shamwari enda unoudza baba vako kuti vabve pachigaro, vatadza kutonga uye futi tatambura muno munyika' (which means ' friend go and advise your father to step down , he has failed to rule and we are suffering in this country'). These words were allegedly directed to one Michael Rutendo Mugabe, a law officer in the Attorney general's Office' who allegedly made a formal complaint of his free will and laid the charges as against Mr. Nkomo.
3. As of 1500hrs on 7 May 2008, a warned and cautioned statement had already been recorded from Mr. Nkomo and he was eventually detained at the filthy Harare Central Police Station Holding Cells on the strength of a complaint made by Mugabe.
4. It was anticipated that he would be brought before the courts on the morning of 8 May 2008 but nothing materialized as the police continually dragged their feet. As of the afternoon of 8 May 2008, Mr. Nkomo had to be removed from the Police cells to a hospital after he had developed some as yet undisclosed medical complication obviously owing to the inhuman conditions within the Harare Central Police station holding cells. It is now anticipated that should the police remain eager to prosecute, Mr. Nkomo will have to be remanded from his hospital bed.

ZLHR further recalls that Mr. Nkomo was assaulted by police officers at Machipisa Police Station in March 2007. Mr. Nkomo was attending to activists that had been arrested during the violently aborted and repressed Save Zimbabwe Prayer Rally at Harare grounds. He is obviously not new to this nature of victimization and harassment which is repeatedly cushioned by notions of enforcing law and order and preserving state security. The harassment continues unabated and in the backdrop of the ongoing trial of another senior lawyer Mr. Innocent Chagonda who is on trial for allegedly uttering statements likely to cause disaffection among members of the Police Force.

Meanwhile Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) President Lovemore Matombo and Secretary General Wellington Chibhebhe who had been summoned to the same Law & Order Section were on 8th May asked to return again late in the afternoon. It seems the police are bent on detaining them overnight on again trumped up charges that they uttered statements likely to cause disaffection among the people when they addressed the 1st of May Workers' Day celebrations at Gwanzura Stadium in Harare

This is once again a restatement of the continued erosion of the operating space for ordinary persons, activists, human rights defenders all the spectrum and including lawyers that, Zimbabwe continues to pose unique and unusual threats to their activities. ZLHR urges the state institutions not continue with this type of unwarranted harassment through arrest of human rights lawyers and human rights defenders.

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