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Police
fail peace test
Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA)
September 20, 2013
One thousand
five hundred Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) members participated
in peacefully marching to hand over a list of demands
to local and national government on Thursday 19th in Harare and
in Bulawayo on Friday 20th September. These peaceful protests were
met with the arrest and brief detention of nine members, and over
30 members are nursing wounds inflicted with police baton sticks.
Ten of these members had to be taken for medical attention and 3
underwent X-rays to verify level of injury. WOZA leaders, Jenni
Williams and Magodonga Mahlangu were arrested on both days in both
protests.
The consultation
to determine key demands took place as the new cabinet and council
began to take oath and begin to work. After compilation of these
views, WOZA leaders then planned the launch protests to coincide
with the United Nations declared International Day of Peace commemorated
on 21st September. Over ten thousand members provided their demands
for WOZA to submit and follow up in terms of lobby and advocacy
engagement.
WOZA has commemorated
International Day of Peace in preceding years, however, this year,
WOZA members wanted to bring a deeper understanding of the kind
of peace required as it has been a word too cheaply used in the
last year. WOZA decided on peaceful protest as the means to launch
their demands so as to test the new government and police commitment
to new constitutional clauses. A test failed by 100 percent.
The 600 members
marching in two formations, found it hard to start their procession
as police officers quickly beat them. The few who managed to regroup
and marched to the Parliament
of Zimbabwe found that police officers still blocked access to parliament
and did not respect member’s right to petition. When the activists
tried to disperse, orders barked in the Shona language to ‘bata
munhu’ (grab that person) resulted in violent use of force
to arrest three WOZA leaders curtailing their right to assembly
outlined in the new constitution. As Magodonga Mahlangu tried to
climb over the closed tail gate of the police Landover. She asked
for it to be opened so she could better enter the gate and the response
from the senior ranking officer was to bark the order for them to
‘kanda munhu’ (beat the person). Police officers then
beat her on her head and back further defeating her attempt to climb
in. When she objected four police officers roughly picked her up
handling her all over her body and threw her into the vehicle.
For the next
3 hours, the drama shifted to the Harare Central police station.
The trio were repeatedly asked why they had been arrested and different
police departments refused to ‘process’ the trio for
formal charges or detention. Most of the blame was heaped on the
police reaction group who had arrested the trio without considering
if any offence had indeed been committed. After a tour of several
offices and hours of waiting, a law and order police officer politely
asked the activists and their two lawyers to accompany him. Arriving
at the front entrance of the station, he merely pointing outside
and said please go.
In Bulawayo
the 10 am protest at the offices of The Chronicle newspaper in 9th
Avenue was the venue for over 1000 WOZA members. Marching in 10
different formations all converged at the public media outlet and
sang songs and chanted slogans in line with the objective of describing
the kind of peace needed in Zimbabwe. As the protest program was
coming to an end, the police reaction group swooped trying to beat
members causing chaos. WOZA leaders managed to pull the members
back to the Chronicle entrance trying to calm members down so as
to disperse the protest peacefully. As the protest was dispersing
some police officers demanded the members sit back down. Senior
officers then attended and contradicted this order causing more
chaos and delaying the protest dispersal. As Jenni Williams and
Magodonga Mahlangu tried to explain to the senior officers that
their junior officers had blocked the dispersing process by threatening
to beat anyone who did not sit down, an order was given for Jenni
Williams’s arrest. Magodonga Mahlangu and 4 other members
then got into the police vehicle and hundreds of members followed
to the police station.
As had happened
in Harare, the activists arrival at the police station brought a
contradiction. The officer commanding Bulawayo Central Chief Inspector
Musvuti said he had merely wanted to discuss with Williams the need
for WOZA to apply for permission to conduct a protest. Although
the Chief Inspector now seemed to be genuine about engagement, Williams
refused to allow the meeting to continue citing the forceful manner
she had been brought to the station and the scenes of police violence
visible from the Chief inspectors office balcony. The hundreds of
members, who had followed the arrested leaders, had thronged the
vicinity of the police station and were being beaten with over 50
police officers indiscriminately wielding their baton sticks. One
member collector Mutete was violent beaten on the head and pushed
in front of an oncoming vehicle by and officer who shouted in the
Shona language ‘uraya munhu’ (kill that person). In
a clear case of gender discrimination, police commanders had stationed
two groups of police officers at the road corners and their task
to ban the free movement of any woman to the police station entrance.
The majority
of bystanders applauded both protests. In Bulawayo a man was overheard
commenting. "Amapholisa kawekele omama laba abakwenzayo kuhle
kakhulu. Akakho olesibindi sokutshela uHulumende ngesikufunayo,
yekela basikhulumele (The police force should leave these women
because what they are doing is good. No one is brave enough to tell
the Government about our demands, let them do it for us)
WOZA recognize
that it is positive that the police have not charged or detained
in police cells members arrested during the last five protests.
It is unfortunate that despite this positive development, the police
reaction group continue to beat and arrest members casually bringing
them to the police station and presenting them for detention. WOZA
call for the urgent retraining of members of the police reaction
group in respecting human and constitutional rights when dealing
with crowd control situations. WOZA call on police command to audit
the methods under which orders flow through command channels and
on too many occasions’ orders and contradictors as officers
seek to throw their superior power and egos around.
WOZA declare their peace day campaign a victory. Many police officers
took time to read the Woza Moya (Come Holy Spirit) newsletter reflecting
the demands and the placard messages. The Police officers will have
discovered a very relevant demand for ‘A public plan of action
as to how the police force will be transformed into a police service
and the setting up of the independent police complaints mechanism
as stated in the constitution.’
Visit
the WOZA fact
sheet
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