brother Gibbs kept a pistol in the house for protection because of the threats he was getting. When the people demanded that we come out of the house with hands raised my brother led us out and fired four warning shots in the air. However, ZANU-PF militia continued to advance. Three of the militia then fired at my brother and shot him in the left shoulder and both legs. He collapsed. They also shot me in the left thigh and I fell. We were all ordered to lie down and they begun to beat us on the shoulders, back and buttocks with wooden sticks. Before beating us they dipped the sticks and tree branches into an herbicide known as paraquat, which is used to kill weeds in tobacco fields. Then they used the wet sticks dripping poison to beat us. They were shouting that we were “traitors” and they beat us all up, including my 70-year-old mother.21 The group of ZANU-PF supporters and “war veterans” later took the five victims to a ZANU-PF rally and paraded them before the crowd. One of the ZANU-PF leaders allegedly asked for a volunteer in the crowd to get a gun and execute Gibbs Chironga as an example to “all traitors of how MDC dogs were treated.” Hilton Chironga told Human Rights Watch: Immediately some youths started beating us with iron bars and my mother passed out. A member of the group volunteered to execute my brother. He took a rifle [identified by Hilton as an AK-47] and forced my brother to sit upright before shooting him seven times in the chest and head. I fainted and my mother fainted again.22 Hilton Chironga also witnessed the execution of two other MDC activists by ZANU-PF supporters at the same time as his brother. He identified one of the victims as Hama Madamombe, a well-known MDC activist in the area. 21 Human Rights Watch interview with Hilton Chironga, Harare, June 30, 2008. 22 Ibid. 11 Human Rights Watch August 2008