Journalist attacked

Chengetayi Zvauya, a journalist from ‘The Standard’ newspaper, was on Saturday attacked by Zimbabwe’s liberation war veterans while covering the launch of the land acquisition programme of the ruling ZANU-PF party of President Robert Mugabe in the capital, Harare.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) said on Monday that Zvauya, who was sitting with other journalists at the launch, was singled out by a group of war veterans who accused him of being “unpatriotic” and claimed he worked for ‘The Daily News’.

MISA said Zvauya was punched in the mouth and stomach. This prompted the bodyguards of Chenjerai Hunzvi, the leader of the war veterans, to rush to Zvauya’s rescue. The bodyguards were, however, pushed away by the group and the war veterans took the journalist’s pen and notebook.

Zvauya was then taken away by the group and was detained for about two hours. He was only released after the meeting at the ruling party headquarters and was told to leave the premises and never to come back. MISA added that Zvauya was further told to tell his colleagues to be positive when reporting about the war veterans.

The newspaper’s editor, Mark Chavunduka, told MISA that a formal complaint of the assault has been lodged with the Harare police and the matter has also been handed to the paper’s lawyers.