Labour Union leaders still in police detention

By Tichaona Sibanda
10 November 2005

Up to 160 Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions activists, including its two top leaders are still languishing in police cells two days after being arrested for staging protests against the country’s worsening economic situation.

ZCTU spokesman Mlamleli Sibanda said 120 activists were picked up in Harare as soon as the protest got underway, while forty more were arrested in the eastern border town of Mutare on Tuesday.

Labour officials are worried about the inhuman conditions the activists are being held under at the Makoni police cells in Chitungwiza. The town has had no water for almost a month now and conditions there have been described as horrible.

‘Imagine a police holding cell with 120 people without water. Although they are keeping their spirits high by singing revolutionary songs, one cannot undermine the mental torture they are going through’ said Sibanda.

Among those still in detention is National Constitutional Assembly chairman Lovemore Madhuku, who was arrested on a separate charge but on the same day as the ZCTU protests.

Madhuku is being held at another filthy police cell in Mbare together with the Mayor of Chitungwiza Misheck Shoko. Police spent most of Tuesday taking fingerprints and getting warned and cautioned statements from the activists.

However, the 48-hour period they are allowed to detain people has since elapsed and the ZCTU has asked its lawyers to seek an urgent chamber application to inform the High Court to compel the police to either release them or take them to court.