By Lance Guma
28 June 2011

Every Tuesday SW Radio Africa looks back at some of Zimbabwe’s unsolved cases of political violence, torture, murder and other forms of abuse, by people in positions of authority. Today we look back at the horrific massacre, 3 years ago, of over 8 villagers in the Chaona area of Chiweshe in Mashonaland Central.

On the evening of 5th May 2008, three days after Mugabe’s regime finally released the official results of the March 29th election, over 200 ZANU PF militias rampaged through the Chaona village, killing 8 perceived opposition supporters. It was to be one of the bloodiest scenes of political violence in the past decade and some commentators believe there may have been more than 8 deaths.

ZANU PF militants and men in army uniform, led by Major Cairo Mhandu and Major Maravadza, brutally beat to death Tapiwa Meda, Joseph Madzuramhende, Alex Chiriseri, David Tachiwa Mapuranga, Arthur Matombo, Patson Mudzuramhende and Jeff Jemedze and others. Women were stripped and beaten so viciously that whole sections of flesh fell away from their buttocks.

The militias also resorted to genital mutilation in their attacks. The postmortem report for Chiriseri for example listed, ‘crushed genitals’ as one of the causes of death. The militia and soldiers inflicted serious injuries by dipping their knobkerries and sticks into paraquat, a deadly herbicide, before beating their victims. This meant the wounds did not heal and many died months later, in agony.

In the same area another 3 MDC-T members were shot dead at point blank range, bringing the total number killed to well over 11 within the same week. We spoke to local MP Shepherd Mushonga who reminded us that Councillor Chironga and his two brothers were shot in front of a crowd in the area while three other family members were seriously injured.

When Mushonga was addressing mourners at the funerals in 2008 he noted the gruesome condition of the corpses and said he believed soldiers trained in torture were behind the killings and not the less sophisticated militias or war vets.

Mugabe and his ZANU PF party faced the humiliation of losing to the MDC-T in the March 2008 harmonized presidential and parliamentary elections. A group of over 200 senior army officers deployed to the provinces later coordinated a murderous campaign of retribution where, according to the MDC-T, over 500 supporters were killed, tens of thousands tortured and hundreds of thousands displaced.