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1.
Background
The violence that has afflicted Zimbabwe since the Constitutional referendum has received
considerable international attention, mainly due to remarkable documentation from the press, the
media and human rights groups. The findings of the human rights groups, and particularly the
Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum, have additionally been corroborated by a number of the
reports from international human rights groups. Finally, there has also been corroboration from a
large number of election observer groups. However, despite sustained international pressure,
organised violence and torture continues in Zimbabwe, and the violence associated with militia
groups continues today.
The President and Government have made no credible attempt to end the violence, with the only
defense being that this is either violence provoked by the original violence of the MDC and other
groups, such as white commercial farmers, or, that the violence is due to the frustrations
expressed by ordinary Zimbabweans in their quest to acquire land that is rightfully theirs. At best
the President and the government condone lawlessness and violence, but, at worst, they are
guilty of planning, orchestrating, and implementing this violence against their own people i. It is
relevant to point out that the situation today is little different to that pertained in May 2000 when
a group of ZanuPF militia attacked the “Peace March” in the middle of Harare.
The violence began with the use of militia, both against the peaceful demonstrators in Harare and
in the invasions of the commercial farms, and militia continued to be deployed in the 2000
Parliamentary Elections, the various by-elections in 2001, and the Presidential Election in 2002.
The militia continues to be a significant factor in the violence to date, with reports from Zimbabwe
continuously demonstrating the many ways in which militia are involved in both the violence and
the ordinary lives of Zimbabweans. For example, a report in the Zimbabwe Independent recently
shows militia imposing dusk to dawn curfew on the residents of Kuwadzana, the latest
constituency to face a by-electionii. This curfew is imposed by a group that has no power to do
this, in the absence of any declaration of martial law or the imposition of emergency powers, and
without any interference by the police. Finally, there have been some of the worst human rights
violations seen to date occurring in the aftermath of the nationwide stay away called by the
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and this did seem to provoke some regional comment.
The use of militia has been a cornerstone of the campaign by Robert Mugabe and ZanuPF to
maintain political power, but, to date, this not been carefully investigated against the background
of an enormous amount of documentary material. As will be seen from the following analysis, the
evidence suggests a well-worked out strategy on behalf of the State, and this strategy has
involved the use of both militia and the State security agencies, mainly the CIO and the Zimbabwe
Republic Police, in complementary roles. Against this onslaught, the supporters of the MDC and
the ordinary people of Zimbabwe have been victims on a very large scale. This is a factual
assertion based on the evidence, which quite clearly shows who have been the primary targets,
but this evidence cannot show the scale. However, some inferences can be drawn regarding
scale, and one estimate put the number of victims of torture in 2000 alone somewhere in the
range of 200,000 personsiii.
The present paper is a summary of a number of previous papers examining perpetrators, the
militia, and crimes against humanityiv. The analyses drew upon all the publicly available reports
on the organised violence and torture over the past three years. They also drew upon a number
of private sources and interviews that will remain anonymous for obvious reasons.
2.
The Strategy for maintaining political power
A key to the Mugabe strategy was contained in the draft constitution; the controversial land
clause that was inserted after the constitutional process was completed and the acrimonious
meeting to agree the final draft. Bemused Zimbabweans saw in the final draft a clause requiring
The Perpetrators of Gross Human Rights Violations in the current violence in Zimbabwe.