200 trade unionists held
News24 (SA)
Date posted:Thu 9-Oct-2003
Date published:Wed 8-Oct-2003
Arrested for protesting against soaring prices and high taxes
Harare - At least 200 trade union activists were arrested on Wednesday for participating in protests against soaring prices and high taxes in the latest crackdown on dissent in the troubled southern African country. Police blamed white factory owners for supporting the protests called for by the Zimbabwean Congress of Trade Unions, the country's 100 000 member umbrella body of trade organisations.
In the capital Harare, leaders of the ZCTU were arrested along with 49 supporters marching through the downtown area. Scores of riot police in combat fatigues patrolled the capital wielding batons, tear gas canisters and riot guns and were seen loading those arrested onto trucks.
Elsewhere in the country, at least 41 trade unionists were arrested in Zimbabwe's second largest city of Bulawayo, and 100 were arrested in the eastern border city of Mutare. Several others were arrested in the towns of Chinhoyi, Gweru and Masvingo, said John Mawire, a lawyer for the ZCTU.
Those arrested had violated the sweeping Public Order and Security Act, said police Assistant Commissioner Wayne Bvudzijena. Mawire said he expected they would be held in police cells overnight and brought to court on Thursday.
Under the Public Order and Security Act, all public gatherings must be approved in advance by authorities, and Bvudzijena said the trade union did not seek permission for the march. The charges carry a maximum sentence of five years in jail under the new security laws, which critics say are the latest example of President Robert Mugabe's efforts to hold onto power by creating a police state. Meanwhile, Bvudzijena blamed some white factory owners for facilitating the protest action.
"Investigations have revealed some white factory owners have closed their work places and urged their employees to go and demonstrate," he told state radio. One trade unionist was injured when riot police suppressed a protest in Gweru, said Mlamleli Sibanda, a union spokesperson. The extent of the protester's injury was not immediately known.
In Harare, despite the trade union's call for workers to take to the streets to protest the country's crumbling economy, only several dozen turned out, all of whom were promptly arrested. In June, opposition-led street protests were crushed before they started by a massive show of military and police force. "There will come a time when people have to react," ZTCU President Lovemore Matombo said, speaking from his cellphone while being arrested. "People are saying enough is enough."
The opposition-alligned trade unions blame Mugabe for plunging the economy into its worst crisis, with 70% unemployment and acute shortages of food, gasoline and medicine. A state program to seize thousands of white-owned farms for redistribution to blacks has crippled the agriculture-based economy in the past three years.
Inflation has soared to 420%. Mugabe's government has in recent years stepped up its crackdown on the opposition. Investment and foreign aid have dried up in protest of human rights abuses and last year's tainted presidential elections. The opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has been charged with treason, and last month the country's only independent daily newspaper, The Daily News, was shut down by the government.
Zimbabwe Information Centre Inc, PO box K824, Haymarket NSW 1240, Australia. www.zic.com.au; info@zic.com.au
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