Mujuru followers targeted in arson attacks

By Staff Reporter

Former Vice-president Joice Mujuru must be ruing the day she was kicked out of Zanu PF as members of her nascent Zimbabwe People First (ZimPF) are increasingly targeted in the ruling party’s anti-opposition crackdown.

While in the past, the wrath of the characteristically violent Zanu PF in collusion with sections of suspected state security agents, was preserved for the Movement for Democratic Change led by Morgan Tsvangirai, lately, new evidence shows members of  Mujuru’s ZimPF have also been on the receiving end of the ruling party onslaught.

A just-released November report of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Forum, a non-governmental organisation involved in researching and documenting cases of politically motivated violence and torture reveals increasing cases of attacks of ZimPF supporters.

Its update on organised violence and torture during the month of November, Human Rights Forum says 31 cases of politically motivated violence were recorded from victims who received medical treatment for injuries sustained in the incidents across the country. 

“Zanu PF supporters and mixed groups of suspected state agents continue to account for the larger share of violations that were recorded during the period,” the NGO said in its report.

It noted that cases of targeted arson for political affiliation were reported in Mt Darwin district, home to  Mrs Mujuru, widow to  liberation war Hero and  Commander of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, the late Solomon Mujuru who died in mysterious inferno at his farm  five years ago.

Still, while ZimPF activists are being singled out for retributive attacks for abandoning Zanu PF to join the new party, traditional enemy MDC continues to bear the brunt of the unrelenting  onslaught on opposition activities.

Of the 31 recorded incidents, at least five specifically targeted ZimPF supporters while the rest saw scores of MDC activists being subjected to beatings, torture and wanton abductions. Reports of the attacks to the Zimbabwe Republic Police have yielded no results, says  the report.

In Mt Darwin, Mashonaland Central Province,  property worth thousands of dollars went up in smoke  as homesteads belonging to ZimPF activists were torched  in what is seen as a campaign of arson by Zanu PF supporters.

While in Mhondoro Mubaira constituency, Mashonaland  West, two brothers, both members of ZimPF,  were severely assaulted  by Zanu PF supporters  who accused them of disrupting  Zanu PF activities in the area.

Mujuru was expelled from Zanu PF in 2014 amid allegations of attempting to assassinate President Robert Mugabe in order to seize power from the nonagenarian leader.

In Harare and other urban centres around the country several  incidents of assault, torture and abductions  allegedly perpetrated by  Zanu PF and suspected state security agents have left scores of opposition and civil society activists nursing  serious injuries.

And in a bizarre incident in the capital, Harare, a lone pastor reportedly held a one-man demonstration by locking himself in a cage near the Zimbabwe Parliament building.

His preaching from the cage about the evils of the Zimbabwean government and president  only invited vicious attacks by the police who detained him for three days, according to Human Rights Forum. Nehanda Radio