In Harare, Redias Musoni (7) of Budiriro was hit by missiles from looters and was rushed to Harare hospital where he died. The missiles were mainly stones and bottles. Calisto Tawanda (30) sustained a broken leg after falling into a disused pit latrine and was conveyed to Parirenyatwa Hospital where he died on admission as a result of excessive bleeding. Overview The press reports do not really provide a very good picture of the events, and there has been no subsequent detailed overview of the Food Riots. The press reports have many contradictions and repetitions that make it difficult to get a clear picture. For example, there are very conflicting reports of the number of persons killed and injured, and equally conflicting reports of the numbers of arrests and the damage caused. Given the scale of the disturbances, the calls for a commission of inquiry that could produce accurate documentation of the Food Riots have great significance. The need for accurate documentation is given added impetus by the ZRP report. The ZRP report attempts to provide an overview of the events, and conforms to the general picture given by the press, but is very unhelpful in its brevity, quite apart from making some assertions that definitely require support. For example, the report claims that businesses were threatened by gangs without stating any justification for this view, and, furthermore, claims that other business received threatening faxes from “pressure groups”: the nature of these pressure groups is unspecified and needs to be if the ZRP report is to have any real value. Most disappointingly, the ZRP makes no reference to deaths or injuries, which clearly are of extreme concern to all. The report also makes reference to the deployment of the army, “as provided by the Defence Act”, which says very little about who or how this decision was made. It is of paramount importance to understand the decision-making behind the deployment of the army, and civil society would wish to know whether this decision was made by the Minister of Defence, the President, the Vice-Presidents or whoever. Finally, the section on the police reaction is wholly unsatisfactory. The report asserts that the situation was brought under control “through extensive use of minimum force”, which is clearly at variance with all other reports. The lack of reference to deaths and injuries is unsatisfactory to say the least. The reference to the number of arrests and the value of property recovered is also interesting. The ZRP report claims that property to the value of Z$4 billion was recovered, which needs to be matched with insurance claims and estimates of damages generally. 4. Analysis of Arrests, Charges and Convictions after the Food Riots This section outlines the findings from an investigation of the legal proceedings taken against rioters in the Harare and Chitungwiza Magistrates’ Courts. It is thus necessarily a select group and cannot claim to be wholly representative of the legal proceedings that took place throughout the Food Riots, and does not include any data from other areas of the country, but the data does cover the areas in which the disturbances were arguably the worst. It is worth recapping here on the reports emanating from the press. The reports show very conflicting numbers of arrests. According to the Herald (22 January 1998), a police spokesman reported that 2,300 person had been arrested in Harare and Chitungwiza alone. A court official (Herald, 22 January 1998) reported that over 1,000 persons had been arrested in Harare alone. No Government official has indicated subsequent to these newspaper reports what the final figures were. The ZRP report indicates that 3,000 persons were arrested, but gives no indication of the number finally charged and sentenced. Harare