Tue, 18 Nov 2003 14:10:06 +0200
Breaking News -ZCTU national protest latest
At least 50 ZCTU leaders and activists have been arrested by heavily armed police details at around 1pm today, Tuesday, November 18.
Those arrested include the ZCTU top leadership - the secretary general, the president including the vice president, Lucia Matibenga, and several leaders of affiliate unions. Other activist from Crisis Zimbabwe a pressure group comprising civic organisations was were also among those arrested.
The protest was organised by the labour body to pressure government to reduce taxation ahead of the announcement of the national budget on Thursday. The protesters wanted to march along the capital and hand over their petition outlining their demands to the Finance Minister Herbert Murerwa. Zimbabwean workers are among there highest taxed people in the world.
However before the march could begin police descended on the protesters and loaded them in four defender trucks and some of them were severely beaten.
Journalist from the independent media were also beaten and they were taken to the Central Police Station. There are fears that they might be detained over night and they can be detained in different police Stations where we can not rule out the possibility of them being tortured as before.
In other town and cities arrests started as early as 8 am today. There are indications that several hundreds of people are in police custody. In Bulawayo one protester was knocked down by a lorry while fleeing from riot police and his condition is not known.
Produced by ZCTU Information Department.
Contact numbers 705602 / 702474 / 70251
Zimbabwe Information Centre Inc, PO Box K824, Haymarket NSW 1240, Australia. http://www.zic.com.au; info@zic.com.au Committed to democracy and genuine development in Zimbabwe.
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