JUSTICE IN ZIMBABWE 14 ____________________________________________________________________ Also on 16 September, the Trustees of the Legal Resources Foundation issued a statement in which they said: “In an action chillingly reminiscent of the tactics of the apartheid régime, the Hon Mr Justice F C Blackie, a recently retired judge of the High Court, was arrested at his home at 4 a.m. on Friday 13 September by law enforcement agents. … Despite an order being given by a High Court judge for him to be brought immediately before the High Court, the police at several stations refused to accept the order, claiming that they did not know his whereabouts. He was only brought before the court the following day. Even if there is evidence to support the allegations against him, the arrest of Mr Justice Blackie raises serious concerns. In the first place, it was not necessary to arrest him at all on such a charge. It would have been quite sufficient to have issued a summons. The courts in this country have repeatedly stated that arrest should only be resorted to when it is necessary. Secondly, the time and manner of his arrest, and the subsequent attempts to con ceal his whereabouts and to prevent him from being brought to court, are regrettably typical of the way in which perceived opponents of the government are treated. On more than one occasion people have been arrested and so treated and later released without any charge being brought. In more general terms, it seems to be increasingly common for people to be arrested on a Friday so that the police can detain them for the weekend before bringing them to court. This appears to be no coincidence, but deliberate policy. It is wholly indefensible. We wish to place on record our increasingly deep concern at the sinister manner in which law enforcement agents regularly flout their obligations to the people of Zimbabwe, whose constitutional rights are being eroded as a result.” The Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights issued the following statement: “The detention of former Justice Blackie smacks of outright retribution by the government for his judgment against the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Patrick Chinamasa, in which the minister was sentenced to a three-month term of imprisonment and a fine for two instances of contempt of court. The judgment was subsequently nullified in a procedurally questionable manner by the High Court in Harare. Although the police were obliged to imprison Mr Chinamasa by order of court,