APRIL2018
HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
One hundred and two cases were recorded across the country in April, remaining
the same from the previous month (101). Twenty three of the cases related to
general intimidation and harassment as members of the public were being forced to
attend party meeting, mainly ZanuPF meeting; being threatened not to support the
opposition or to attend opposition rallies; or being intimidated into supporting
ZanuPF.
Eighteen other cases of intimidation and harassment, associated with the
Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) process, were also recorded. In these cases,
members of the public were being forced to provide their voter registration
particulars to ZanuPF officials. Beyond intimidation the motive remains unclear,
and suspicious. A leaked audio between an officer of the police and a ZanuPF
official in Buhera, Manicaland where the police officer was stating the illegality of
demanding voter registration information demonstrated how some elements in
ZanuPF still lived in the past. The ZanuPF official was livid on realising that the
police officer did not wish to entertain his standpoint on the demand for voter
registration information
Twenty cases of coercion, mainly forced donations for the Independence Day
celebrations, and some cases of forced attendances of ZanuPF rallies or forced
participation in the party’s primary elections, were also recorded. Of concern in the
primaries among many incidents was the firing of gunshots by a sitting MP Dexter
Nduna in a bid to break a fight between his supporters and those of another
contestant at a polling station in Chegutu West and another sitting MP accused of
possession of filled in ballot papers in Buhera.1 Twenty cases of intraparty
squabbling and occasional violence, mainly within ZanuPF, were also recorded and,
as indicated earlier, could be traced directly to the ruling party’s primary elections.
By comparison, only 5 cases of interparty violence, mainly pitting ZanuPF and the
MDC-T, were recorded.
Five cases of assault, four of which involved the police or the army, were also
recorded in what appears to be growing indiscipline and unruly conduct in the
security sector. Two incidents of hate speech were recorded and one case of
1
ZPP is compiling a report on the incidents around the Zanu PF primaries and the cases could change the number of cases noted
in this report
3