Update on Zimbabwe Treason Trial

southern africa | repression / prisoners | non-anarchist press Tuesday March 08, 2011 21:29 by Ashley Fataar - Keep Left

The campaign around the Zimbabwe activists has borne some results. The good news is that yesterday 39 of the 45 activists had their charges dropped by the Magistrate court. The Magistrate judge (Mutevedzi) said the arrest of the 45 people was “a dragnet arrest by the police who didn’t verify or attach criminal conduct to each of the accused persons”. The judge also stated that there “glaring weaknesses” in the State case and that it wasn’t “clear what the rest of the accused persons did to deserve to be arrested and charged with treason”.

The campaign around the Zimbabwe activists has borne some results. The good news is that yesterday 39 of the 45 activists had their charges dropped by the Magistrate court. The Magistrate judge (Mutevedzi) said the arrest of the 45 people was “a dragnet arrest by the police who didn’t verify or attach criminal conduct to each of the accused persons”. The judge also stated that there “glaring weaknesses” in the State case and that it wasn’t “clear what the rest of the accused persons did to deserve to be arrested and charged with treason”.

  But the remaining 6 are still being detained. They are:

  -Gender activist Antonater Choto
-Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) leaders Welcome Zimuto and Eddson Chakuma
-Labour activist Tatenda Mombeyarara
-International Socialist Organisation co-ordinator and labour lawyer Munyaradzi Gwisai
-Anti-Debt Campaigner Hopewell Gumbo
 
The legal rights of the six are already being violated and they are being severely punished before the court has ruled guilt or not. The men have been placed in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day and are allowed out in two 30 minute sessions a day. The women are being subjected to hard labour. Even the state prosecutor conceded that solitary confinement and hard labour were a serious violation of the activists’ rights (but denied the allegations).  

  But the state itself is showing signs of the campaign’s pressure. The magistrate has said of the remaining 6 that the discussion by Gwisai, Choto, Gumbo, Zimuto, Mombeyarara and Chakuma focusing on the possibility of doing what had been done in Egypt in Zimbabwe was not just “idle talk” but there was a conspiracy. Yet the Magistrate said the report of the State’s one witness (a police officer who attended the meeting surreptitiously and who had allegedly observed all the 45 suspects committing the offence) was fictitious.  

While a victory has been won for 39 of the accused, 6 activists remain detained in appaling conditions (see extracts of an article below).  

Activists around the world will be continuing with protests to demand the release of the remaining 6. A message came from socialists in the U.S.:

“In the U.S., we are organizing pickets at the Zimbabwean Embassy and Mission (Washington, DC and NYC) this Wednesday, March 9, to demand the immediate release of the remaining 6. Thanks so much for the updates and for those organizing solidarity actions elsewhere, please feel free to contact me directly. In solidarity-Sherry” (email: sherrywolf2000@yahoo.com)  

** PS – Anyone can also follow messages posted at: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/home.php?sk=group_178601402184959  (you do not need to be on facebook to be able to follow)  

Conditions in Zimbabwe’s Jails

The toilet system is run down. When the water in the pipes comes for it, it comes at a trickle.