Litigants and Litigators: Women HRDs 11 saying that “they were not in a classroom and that they could not read, and that they were not going to obey any court orders as they are acting on orders from above”. After the evictions started, an interdict was obtained from the Norton Magistrates Court to try to stop the evictions.11 This interdict was also ignored. It is alleged that three, or possibly four, people died at the Porta Farm as a result of the evictions. A pregnant woman allegedly died when she fell from a truck which was taking her away, a five-year-old boy was allegedly run over by a truck, and a terminally ill woman allegedly died when being bundled into a moving truck.12 After the police had acted in violation of the court orders, the lawyers for the residents sought to obtain an order holding the police and the City Council Commission and the Ministry of Local Government in contempt in yet another case Chinyuku v Minister of Local Government, Minister of Home Affairs, Commissioner of Police & Chairperson, Harare Commission. Without giving any reasons, the judge refused to grant this order.13 After the authorities bulldozed their houses, many of the evicted people had nowhere else to live so they started to return to Porta Farm, and a large number of people were living among the ruins of their demolished houses. Right to education, freedom of religion: In March 2014, the High Court ordered a school headmaster to reverse the expulsion of an 11-year-old pupil who had been removed from John Cowie Primary School in Rusape for wearing long plaited hair in the case of Madziva v Minister of Education.14 Authorities had arbitrarily barred Ruwarashe Rebekah Madziva from attending lessons on the basis of her hairstyle, which they argued contravened the school’s rules and regulations. Ruwarashe had been enrolled at the school since Grade Zero and had never cut her hair. She belongs to Bible Believers Church, where female congregants grow their hair as a manifestation of the family’s religious beliefs. The High Court interdicted the school authorities, the headmaster Garikai Nyawo, and the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education from negatively interfering in any way with Ruwarashe’s educational pursuits and ordered them to readmit Ruwarashe in order to enjoy her right to education unhindered. Right to health: Between January and March 2014, ZLHR initiated interventions that would have eventually led to litigation to compel authorities of two of Zimbabwe’s largest referral hospitals to release three different patients who had been detained at the health centres for failing to settle medical bills. In the first case, authorities at Harare Central Hospital (HCH) had detained Cynthia Kunaka after she had given birth to her child. Kunaka was barred from leaving the hospital until she settled her $512 medical bill. Following the intervention of Kunaka’s lawyer from ZLHR, challenging the detention,15 she was released after the hospital agreed to a monthly payment plan. 11 Norton Magistrates Court case 376 of 2005. Report by Zimbabwe Peace Project 1 July 2005. See also Zimonline 8 July 2005. See also the appeal of the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights to other medical associations relating to Operation Murambatsvina. 12 Chinyuku v Minister of Local Government, Minister of Home Affairs, Commissioner of Police and Chairperson, Harare Commission High Court Harare unreported case 3225/05. 13 14 High Court Harare unreported case 1839/14. 15 A letter of demand for the release of Cynthia was delivered at the hospital which led to her release by authorities who then agreed on a payment plan.