Police fail to take detainees to court despite High Court ruling

By Tichaona Sibanda
30 March 2007

Police in Harare on Friday failed to comply with a High court order to take all those arrested in the latest crackdown to court by 2pm, the MDC reported. The number of those in police cells is estimated to be above 200.

Jessie Majome, the MDC’s deputy secretary for Legal Affairs, said they don’t know the exact number of people who have been abducted by the security forces, adding that only a handful were taken to court Friday while the rest are still being detained. High court Judge Joseph Musakwa ruled in an urgent hearing Friday that police should ensure every detainee arrested during the crackdown must be taken to court by 2pm.

‘Only high profile activists of the MDC have managed to appear in court and about 5 have been taken to hospital suffering from injuries inflicted in police cells. This is a justice system that is failing to serve any purpose. The police can’t cope, court officials can’t, everything is just crumbling,’ Majome said.

She said nine of of their activists have already been charged with attempted murder in connection with a string of alleged fire bombings, illegal possession of a firearm and of explosives, charges the MDC insist were invented in an attempt to demonise their party.

‘We sincerely don’t know how many have been abducted but reports we are getting say among the detainees are MDC employees, students, members of civic groups and leaders of the Combined Harare Residents Association. To make matters worse, the detainees are not getting any food,’ Majome said.

Meanwhile Human rights Watch has released a statement accusing Mugabe’s regime of permitting security forces to commit serious abuses with impunity, against opposition activists and ordinary Zimbabweans alike.

Tiseke Kasambala, an official with Human Rights Watch, said the country’s security forces have been responsible for arbitrary arrests and detentions and beatings of opposition MDC supporters, civil society activists, and the general public.

Kasambala who was in Zimbabwe compiling cases of abuses said what she saw shocked her. She told Newsreel the government has intensified its brutal suppression of its own citizens in an effort to crush all forms of dissent.

‘Witnesses and victims we interviewed told us that security agents have been patrolling many high density suburbs, randomly and viciously beating people in the streets, shopping malls, in bars and beer halls. Security agents are also going house-to-house beating people with batons, stealing possessions and accusing them of supporting the opposition. The terror caused by the police has forced many families in the affected areas into a self-imposed curfew after dark,’ said Kasambala.