JUNE
2.3 Season of senseless arrests, abductions?
Following their abduction, the three MDC officials, Joanna Mamombe, Netsai Marova and Cecilia
Chimbiri were re-arrested, this time being accused of ‘faking their own abduction.’ The three spent
10 days in detention after being initially denied bail. They have not been given a chance to tell their
own side of the story as government suspiciously keeps a lid on the case.
On June 22, Zimbabwe National Students Union (Zinasu) Vice President Talent Madava and
Lionel Shayahama, Chinhoyi University of Technology (CUT) students, were briefly held by CID
officers at Chinhoyi Central Police station, three days after students at the university had displayed
placards in a lecture, demanding the release of the three MDC youth leaders.
This, together with the arrests and abduction of human rights activists, lawyers and opposition activists,
escalated in the month of June.
During the Constitutional Amendment Bill public hearings, police arrested human rights activists
Namatai Kwekweza together with her colleague, Vongai Zimudzi on June 19 after they went to
Ministry of Justice holding placards denouncing the amendment.
More than ever before, Zimbabwe was under a darkening sky, and exercising one’s Constitutional right can
land them in the hands of the police, or worse, abductors.
REPORT
HUMAN RIGHTS
VIOLATIONS TO
+263 77 488 3406
+263 77 488 3417