specify which article had attracted their attention. Last week’s front page story, headlined “ZNA top brass slam corrupt ZRP” outlined the tensions between the army and the police after the arrest of a former colonel for alleged corruption at the state grain monopoly, the Grain Marketing Board.
The detectives took away documents pertaining to the importation of the weekly newspaper from South Africa, where the southern African edition is printed.
“We will not be intimidated by any bully-boy tactics on the part of the police or anybody else,” said UK-based publisher Wilf Mbanga.
“Our mandate is to be a beacon for freedom of expression and of the press in Zimbabwe and we intent to continue doing that, no matter what.”
Meanwhile, government has stepped up its crackdown against perceived opponents, ransacking the offices of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) and the Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) reportedly on the hunt for firearms and weapons of war.
The search on CHRA’s Daventry House headquarters and the ZCTU’s Chester House headquarters in central Harare over the past week followed mass protests organized by the two civic groups against government’s ruinous handling of the economy.
Plain-clothes secret police spent the whole of last week at the CHRA’s head office, monitoring the movement of people in and out of the building. – Own correspondent