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Zimbabwe's
human rights record
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Weekly Media Update 2006-45
Monday November
6th 2006 – Sunday November 12th 2006
THE private media
continued to expose the country’s poor human rights record. This
week they carried 15 stories on rights violations in which they
recorded four new incidents. These comprised the arrest of university
students and retribution against MDC activists who contested in
the October rural district council elections. In one of the incidents,
SW Radio Africa (7/11) reported that one of MDC’s losing candidates
in Mhondoro was summoned "to stand in a kangaroo court
for defying an order by a local traditional chief not to contest
against a ZANU PF candidate". Subsequently, the station
and Studio 7 (10/11) reported similar cases of reprisals in Beitbridge
where they alleged some MDC activists were ejected from an irrigation
scheme for supporting the opposition during the polls.
However, the reports
largely relied on the MDC claims and lacked independent corroboration.
Earlier, the two
stations (9/11) and The Standard (12/11) revealed that Arthur Mutambara
led-MDC’s director of elections Paul Themba Nyathi and another faction
official were charged with breaching the Criminal
Law (Codification and Reform) Act by allegedly distributing
"subversive material" likely to incite
the army to rise against government. Reportedly, the State alleged
that the two’s calls to the public to "help"
their relatives in the army and police to "do the right
thing" and have the "courage
to say enough is enough" was meant to "induce
members of the police and army to withdraw services, loyalty and
allegiance" and encourage them to join labour protests
against rising poverty.
But it emerged
that despite widespread condemnation of Zimbabwe’s human rights
record, the authorities still find their actions justifiable. Studio
7 (6/11), for example, reported Labour Secretary Lancaster Museka
defending the police’s brutal assault of Zimbabwe
Congress of Trade Union leaders in September on grounds that
the unionists wanted to overthrow government. This was in response
to the International Labour Organisation criticism of the attack.
The private Press carried Museka’s open defence of police brutality
the previous week.
Typically, the
government media ignored these issues.
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