A statement issued by the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum

A statement issued by the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum

2 August 2024

The Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum (the Forum) is gravely concerned with the deteriorating human rights situation in the country ahead of the 44th Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit to be held in Harare on 17 August 2024. The intensification of the crackdown on opposition party supporters, civil society organisations, general citizens and perceived dissenting voices at the instigation of the state is unacceptable, and the Forum condemns this behaviour in the strongest terms. The unwarranted escalation in violence and targeted attacks against well-meaning Zimbabweans raises fears that the country could slide to the 2018 and 2019 human rights violations that left 23 people dead, and thousands maimed and displaced.

Sustained attacks on civil liberties through arbitrary arrests, assaults, torture and detention of citizens incomunicado have become commonplace. Such examples include the forcible removal of four pro-democracy campaigners (Namatai Kwekweza, the leader of WeLead Trust, Robson Chere, the Secretary-General of Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (ARTUZ), Samuel Gwenzi, a former Councillor for Harare Ward 5 and Vusumuzi Moyo) from a plane at the Robert Mugabe International Airport after which they were held incommunicado for several hours before their legal practitioners eventually located them. Chere sustained injuries pointing to evidence of torture, allegedly through assaulting him with planks and an iron rod. it was reported that unknown assailants stormed the plane and forcibly ejected them without producing any form of identification. The quartet was heading to Victoria Falls to attend the 5th African Philanthropic Conference, an annual gathering of civil society policy influencers and other stakeholders.

Before the arrest and torture of the four, the atmosphere in Harare had been growing tense, with the heavy deployment of armed police officers at every street corner who were harassing civilians and inflicting various degrees of injury to vendors and informal traders. The Forum also notes the arbitrary arrest of 70 Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) supporters including infants and minors in Harare on 16 June who have been denied bail for over six weeks. Bail is a constitutional right for every accused person. The arrest is an affront to the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of association.  The Forum has also noted the arbitrary arrest of five National Democratic Working Group supporters for holding an “unsanctioned gathering” and “agitating for criminal acts in the country” on 29 June, a day before the police disrupted a memorial event for an opposition supporter killed in 2022 and arrested several participants. On the same day in Mutasa District, 3 human rights defenders from the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) working on a livelihoods program were brutally assaulted and detained for more than 2 hours. As a result of the assault, the trio sustained injuries emanating from falanga and other medieval torture tactics. Just two days ago, Kariba Member of Parliament John Houghton and 13 other individuals were arrested in Kariba for staging a peaceful demonstration against the continued incarceration of CCC faction leader Jameson Timba and 77 other party activists.

Citizens, CSOs and student unions have been subjected to various degrees of brutality including the arbitrary arrest of 44 students from the Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) which left 10 students with various degrees of injury. The Forum reiterates that the right to freedom of assembly, association and free speech is guaranteed in our constitution, and regional and international human rights standards to Zimbabwe is party to. As such, the wilful attacks against these rights as demonstrated by the government do not instil confidence and commitment to safeguarding the rights of citizens. Sadly, however, the situation continues to be volatile as the summit draws closer.

The acceleration of the crackdown on opposition supporters and members of the civic society is driven by hate speech and systematic intimidation by high-level government officials, including the executive. This comes after President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Minister of Home Affairs Kazembe Kazembe and Minister of Information and Broadcasting Services Jenfan Muswere have issued threats against any potential protests ahead of the SADC Summit. On June 27, President Mnangagwa said he was “aware of certain rogue elements within the nation who are bent on peddling falsehoods and instigating acts of civil disorder, especially before, during, and after regional and world stage events.” President Mnangagwa’s sentiment was echoed by ministers Kazembe and Muswere who highlighted that the security was on high alert to decisively deal with the so-called rogue elements.

The Forum reminds the government that, while it is important to maintain peace and order, the Constitution provides for the freedom of association, assembly as well as freedom of speech. It is the right of every citizen to protest peacefully. The Constitution also provides for the right to bail, as such, the government should protect and not persecute its citizens.

Since President Mnangagwa took power in November 2017, the country has witnessed a rise in State-sponsored human rights violations. Violence, intimidation, harassment, and repression aimed principally at opposition members and civil society activists have restricted civic and political space. Several activists have been abducted and tortured in his six-year-old which is characterised by the weaponisation of the criminal justice system against the ruling party’s political opponents. Opposition politicians like Job Sikhala, Jacob Ngarivhume, and journalist Hopewell Chin’ono have been held in prolonged pretrial detention or convicted on baseless, seemingly politically motivated charges.

The Forum, a coalition of twenty-one human rights NGOs in Zimbabwe mandated to end organised violence and torture, implores the government to:

1. End repression of citizens by respecting their fundamental rights to freedom of expression, association as well as the right to protest peacefully
2. Ratify the UN Convention against torture
3. end impunity and the weaponisation of the law to thwart dissenting voices

1. To promote respect for human rights by calling on Zimbabwe to end arbitrary arrest of its citizens, torture and persecution of opposition and civil society members
2. to engage the African human rights systems like the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, to force Zimbabwe to fulfil its obligations to protect its citizens’ human rights in line with the demands of the by the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.