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Rights abuses: political arrests
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe
Extract from Weekly Media Update No. 2003-02
January 13th - January 19th 2003

General Comment
Since the promulgation of the repressive Public Order and Security Act (POSA), the police have selectively used it to curtail the freedoms of the opposition and civil society through summary arrests. Those arrested are usually taken to police stations unknown to their lawyers and families. Some have been assaulted and others even tortured. In most cases, the accused are either released without charge or have their cases dropped due to lack of evidence.

It is in this context that Judge President, Justice Paddington Garwe, deplored this unprofessional conduct by state security agents when he opened the 2003 High Court legal year in Bulawayo.

Justice Garwe (The Daily Mirror, 14/1) said: "Brutalizing an accused person at the investigation stage creates a very negative attitude towards the criminal justice system. In terms of our law an accused person is presumed innocent until proven guilty". The Chronicle of the same day, buried Justice Garwe's important observations at the tail end of its report, which largely quoted him criticizing lawyers for allegedly failing to prepare cases before going to court. In fact the paper's stance amply demonstrated the public media's timidity in exposing the unprofessional conduct of state security agents. Their coverage of arrests and alleged torture of opposition party members is characterized by omissions and failure to criticize such gross violations of human rights by the police, whose role is to uphold the rule of law and protect every citizen of the country, regardless of their political affiliation. It was only through the private media that the public got details of the blatant abuse of power by the police.

Detail
The week witnessed continuing human rights violations in the country. These abuses took different forms ranging from abuse of police powers, politicization of food, and politically motivated violence perpetrated by ZANU PF militia. However, it was the police's abuse of power under the cover of the draconian Public Order and Security Act that hogged the limelight. The private media, led by The Daily News, diligently exposed such excesses whilst the public media mentioned them in passing, censored or ignored them altogether. The following table shows the number of stories (incidents and follow-ups) on police arrests of journalists, MDC and civic leaders:

• The Daily News 13
• The Daily Mirror 8
• The Herald 5
• Chronicle 4
• The Zimbabwe Independent 2
• The Weekly Tribune 2
• The Financial Gazette 1
• The Business Tribune, The Sunday News and The Sunday Mirror ignored the incidents.

More telling was The Daily News (17/1) which sought to expose the extent to which opposition members were being harassed by the police and graduands of the infamous national youth service. The paper reported that "throughout Manicaland, over 1 000 MDC members, including Roy Bennet, the MP for Chimanimani, and other senior officials in the province, have been arrested and charged with various alleged politically motivated crimes " since the June 2000 parliamentary elections. The article further noted that "most of the arrested were released without being charged, whilst others who appeared before the courts were acquitted for lack of sufficient evidence." MDC Manicaland provincial chairman, Timothy Mabhawu, was quoted as warning the police and youths from the Border Gezi training centre with unspecified action if they continued to arrest MDC leaders on "trumped-up charges".

Similarly, The Zimbabwe Independent (17/1) quoted MDC spokesman, Paul Themba-Nyathi, saying that in the past 18 months, 42 senior members of his party were arrested and arraigned before the courts. "Of all the cases that have been finalized in the courts, our officials have either been acquitted or the cases have been thrown out for lack of evidence," he said. The arrest and release of the Harare mayor was a classic example of the total abuse of power by the police.

The Daily News (13/1) reported that the police had ignored a High Court order to release Harare mayor, Elias Mudzuri from their custody. He had been arrested for allegedly addressing an illegal gathering in Mabvuku. Notably, The Herald report of the same day merely announced that the mayor was still in police custody without highlighting the blatant contempt of a court order by the police. Instead, its comment, Dignity of mayoral office eroded, presented the mayor as having invited trouble on himself. It claimed: "After last week's failed demonstration, which the police didn't arrest him for even though everyone knew that he was behind it despite his vehement denial, the mayor should have changed tact"(sic).

The following day The Daily News (and The Daily Mirror 14/1), reported that Mudzuri had been released as the state had "failed to substantiate allegations" against the mayor. Although The Herald also reported the release the same day, it did not inform its readers there was no evidence linking the mayor to the charge. The paper then conveniently quoted police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena as saying the police "don't know why the High Court judge dismissed the case".

In an attempt to buttress the notion that Mudzuri's release was a mistake on the part of the courts and not necessarily the police's failure to provide evidence, the paper (15/1) quoted senior Assistant Commissioner Faustino Mazango complaining that the High Court "had not given the police a chance to present their case".

Similarly, ZBC (14/01, 8pm) quoted Mazango as having defiantly said, "police are still charging the mayor under POSA and will summon him to court when the docket is ready".

Mazango then alleged that the meetings Mudzuri was having with Harare residents were part of an MDC plot to stop the World Cup cricket matches from being played in the country saying, "through these meetings, the mayor of Harare Mr. Elias Mudzuri was taking a lead in organizing the intended demonstrations".

ZBC did not question why Mudzuri had been arrested and spent the weekend in jail if the docket was not ready or why the High Court had ordered Mudzuri's release if they had such information.

In the same bulletin, ZTV however quoted Mudzuri as having said the Mabvuku meeting was "the 19th he has held to update the public on various issues including the city's water problems". ZBC did not reconcile this with Mazango's comment that police had not arrested Mudzuri "on the spur of the moment" but had been monitoring his meetings "in which civic issues were to be discussed". The public broadcaster did not find it strange that after monitoring these meetings, the police still failed to give admissible and incriminating evidence against the mayor.

The Daily News (13/1 and 14/1) also reported that MDC MP Paul Madzore was arrested and taken by police to an unknown destination for demonstrating in Glen View in solidarity with Mudzuri.

Meanwhile, the public media further exposed their bias in covering the harassment of opposition members by ignoring death threats allegedly made to Mudzuri by a suspected state agent, while in police custody. This only appeared in The Daily News and The Daily Mirror (15/1). Similarly, The Herald initially ignored the torture of MDC MP Job Sikhala and human rights defender Gabriel Shumba by the police. The paper only made reference to these in its January 18th edition. Even then, it merely stated that the two claimed to have been assaulted by the police, noting that Sikhala had "burns on both arms, genitals and bruises" without explaining how he got them.

It was through The Daily News (17/1) that the public got to know of the severe torture suffered by Sikhala. Both the public and private Press (18/1) reported that medical reports confirmed allegations of assault and torture. In another case, The Daily News (18/1) also reported that Khetani Augustine Sibanda, an MDC member accused of murdering war veteran leader, Cain Nkala, had survived two attempts on his life while in custody. His lawyers said he survived poisoning and strangulation.

The public media ignored the report as they also did the arrest of the Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) officials, who were allegedly assaulted by ZANU PF supporters for urging Kuwadzana residents to vote peacefully, The Daily News and SW Radio Africa (17/1). Just like the private Press, SW Radio Africa (16/1) observed that the arrests of MDC officials and activists was a broad "campaign which seeks to thwart opposition".

And to support its claims, the private station reported on the arrest, harassment, beatings and torture by the police of 13 people. These included Sikhala and his co-accused, MDC MP Paul Madzore, Mudzuri and the interrogation and release of another MDC legislator, Trudy Stevenson. The station (16/01) then used the arrests as evidence that "the police have become the perpetrators of violence".

To its credit, the private radio station sought comment from Bvudzijena who reportedly refused to comment, prompting its newsreader to call for his resignation.

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