Zimbabwean activists on run as protests crackdown raises spectre of Mugabe era

Security forces arrest hundreds since ‘stay-at-home’ protest called by unions

Jason Burke Africa correspondent
Fri 18 Jan 2019 17.27 GMT

Hundreds of activists remain in hiding in Zimbabwe, on the fifth day of the worst government crackdown since the ousting of Robert Mugabe.

Soldiers and unidentified armed men conducted door-to-door searches in poor areas of cities on Friday, dragging “random” residents out of homes to be beaten and often detained, activists said. The Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights said it had treated 68 cases of gunshot wounds and 100-plus other cases of “assaults with sharp objects, booted feet, baton sticks” and more in recent days.

Security forces have arrested between 400 and 600 suspects since Monday, the start of a national “stay-at-home” protest called by unions after a massive increase in the price of fuel began on Monday, well-informed NGOs estimate. Twelve people are thought to have died after being shot.

“I’m just moving from house to house every day, trying to limit my contacts, telling no one where I am. I’m trying to keep ahead of the intelligence services and the spies … It’s a very tough period,” said one activist who publicly backed the protests, speaking by telephone from an undisclosed location in Zimbabwe on Friday evening.

Many of those detained are being held without charge in overcrowded prisons and police cells. Some may face new fast-track trials, ordered earlier this week, on charges that could bring long prison sentences. Four hundred detainees, largely charged with public order offences, were produced in batches of 50 before magistrates in Harare on Friday afternoon and denied bail.

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