A growing spiral of violence

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in Zimbabwe on Friday accused the government of President Robert Mugabe of orchestrating a brutal, countrywide campaign of intimidation and violence against anyone deemed to be an opponent of his ruling ZANU-PF party.

In a seven page review documenting the violence since the beginning of March, it said 19 people had been killed. Fifteen of them were MDC supporters or sympathisers, and they were beaten, strangled or shot. Eight women had been raped, and 1,012 people had sustained injuries from gunshots, whippings, burns and attempted strangling.

A total of 417 homes had been destroyed, while other violations included daily threats of violence, interference with freedom of movement, speech and association. There was also widespread refusal to register voters.

“What is happening is not chaos - it is carefully organised state-orchestrated violence,” the MDC statement said. “The violence has little to with land, legitimate issue though this is. The violence is about the destruction of the first real threat to ZANU-PF in 20 years - the MDC. The violence must be put in the context of President Mugabe’s threat made several weeks ago that opponents would face death and that white farmers were the ‘enemies of the state’. The violence is a direct result of these statements.”

The MDC said it was now clear the necessary conditions for free and fair elections did not exist. The major challenge was to try and salvage what courage and resilience still remained among ordinary Zimbabweans, so that they would have “at least some space” in which to cast their votes without fear, regardless of which party they choose to support.

“There is a clear strategy behind these events, which has seen the government shifting its targets over time, from peaceful occupations of farms, to violence on farms, first against the farmers themselves, then against their workers,” it said. “The strategy then shifted to encompass civilians in rural areas, rural business centres, rural-based black businessmen and their enterprises, MDC candidates and their communities, and now to large rural industries. The violence is designed to look like the spontaneous uprisings of land or resource-hungry peasants, but is in fact reported as being overseen by a Third Force of hard line army, police and CIO (Central Intelligence Organisation) staff, headed by and answerable to President Mugabe.”

It was concerned that “daily brutal intimidation is taking place” throughout the country including in remote rural areas, where the victims had no access to human rights organizations or other safe parties to whom they can turn. It said the psychological threats were “silencing and terrifying” given ZANU-PF’s campaign of murder and intimidation in Matabeleland in the early 1980’s.

“Merely to threaten to make people disappear, is a powerful weapon against defenceless people who have personal memories of witnessing executions and of being tortured by this government in the recent past. Psychological torture of this nature is widespread and underestimated in its power to reduce entire populations to silence,” it said.

Further information on Zimbabwe can be found on the MDC website

http://www.in2zw.com/mdc/ and the government website http://www.gta.gov.zw