Source: Police ‘unaware’ of MDC demo – DailyNews Live
Blessings Mashaya 12 July 2017
HARARE – Police yesterday said they had not cleared today’s planned
demonstration by MDC youths – setting up a potentially explosive
confrontation with the organisers who said they will resist any attempts
to stop them from holding their protest march.
“I don’t know about the demonstration, we never cleared it,” police
spokesperson senior assistant commissioner Charity Charamba told the Daily
News yesterday.
But MDC youth assembly chairman Happymore Chidziva vowed to go ahead with
the demonstration as planned – describing attempts by police to stop them
as inconsequential and an attempt to frustrate political freedom.
“We will defy if the police try to block our demonstration. We will
never fold our hands to cry victims. We will fight them till they reform.
“We can’t allow our generation to be a generation of rigged elections. We
are Zimbabweans and it’s our right to uphold the values of the liberation
struggle that aimed to have one-man, one-vote, which Mugabe is denying
Zimbabweans,” said Chidziva.
“We don’t condone violence, we are not a violent movement,” added
Chidziva whose wing has organised today’s demonstration in a bid to put
pressure of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) to institute reforms
before next year’s elections are held.
The opposition has long alleged that the Zec is biased in favour of
President Robert Mugabe and Zanu PF and accuses its secretariat of being
packed with their functionaries.
In the past, police have ruthlessly crushed opposition protests.
Apart from using excessive force, the authorities have had to resort to
imposing bans in the Central Business District by using sections of the
draconian Public Order and Security Act.
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