One for home, the other for the guillotine

ess to food,
legal and medical assistance.
HARARE
Inscribed on the door of cell C6 at Harare Remand Prison is a simple message
in Shona: “Zvichapera boyz dzangu” (it will come to an end my boys) – a
telling reminder that this suffering will eventually come to an end. I
walked out of the prison gates at exactly 1933hrs on Thursday, 7 June 2007,
after a three month-stint as a guest of the state. In the glaring moonlight,
I turned my back to the dilapidated two-storey building that constitutes the
D-class section of this cursed and unimaginative piece of architecture.
I painfully walked the final 10 metres to the prison fence and jumped into
the crushing embrace of my wife, Susan. I ordered that we quickly drive
away, never again to look back to the dingy prison buildings where I had
seen over 10 people succumb to various diseases related to malnutrition.
The D-class section, reserved for “dangerous” suspects, was my home for 71
dark days. It was a place where one had to adjust to tough conditions such
as leg irons, dirty khaki shirts and shorts, sub-standard food, tight
security, the company of hardened criminals and scowling prison officers.
Harare Remand Prison was a potpourri of the genuinely guilty and those whom
the tyrant wanted to torment and intimidate. It was a waiting room of
extreme fortunes, where two cellmates could part to go to contrasting
destinations: one for home and the other for the guillotine.
My ordeal started on a sunny Wednesday afternoon on 28 March 2007. Over 500
armed policemen descended on Harvest House, the national headquarters of the
MDC. From 1215hrs to 1530hrs, an assortment of visibly drunk policemen
wrenched open doors and seized party equipment, from documents to computers
and laptops. They stole people’s mobile phones, prised open cabinet drawers
and stuffed money, passports and other valuables into their pockets.
Everyone was ordered to lie down while the sadists among them
indiscriminately battered our backs with batons.
Mugabe’s merchants of death had come to Harvest House ostensibly to recover
“weapons of war” which they said were hidden at the MDC headquarters. The
following day, Mugabe was due to leave for Dar es Salaam to explain his
recent crackdown on the opposition, during which his police officers had
shot dead an MDC activist, Gift Tandare, beaten to a pulp MDC president
Morgan Tsvangirai and other senior opposition party officials, and abducted,
beaten and dumped in far-away places several MDC executives and party
members.
Mugabe had to have a plausible explanation for the SADC leaders in Dar es
Salaam and the prospect of an arms cache at Harvest House would give him a
credible story to justify the violent crackdown on a legitimate opposition.
The cops were obviously disappointed when they failed to find even a box of
matches at Harvest House. They ordered everyone in the building, including
tenants and their clients, to get into the police vehicles. About 100 people
were taken to the infamous Room 93 of the Law and Order section at Harare
Central police station, where the nights of terror immediately commenced.
That night, we were severely assaulted. One by one we were called into
another office where all sorts of wild allegations were made against us. We
were part of the MDC thugs that had “petrol-bombed” police stations, the
police alleged. We worked for a puppet opposition party. We wanted to hand
the country back to the white colonialists and any such drivel associated
with a regime that is fast accelerating the nation towards an inevitable
implosion. The following day, the number of suspects was trimmed down to 23
and eventually to seven. No charge had yet been preferred against us. For
three nights, we were tortured and brutally assaulted with a baseball bat,
clenched fists and batons. Ian Makone and Paul Madzore came out the worse
for wear in the sordid ordeal.
We were denied access to food, legal and medical assistance. On March 31, we
were finally told that a court order had been obtained that we should go
home because the police had detained us for more than 48 hours without
preferring any charge against us. It was then that an official whom I
suspect to be a member of the dreaded state security Central Intelligence
Organisation (CIO) called me to a private room.
He said I worked in the MDC’s information and publicity department and I was
responsible for the “Roll of Shame”, a column in a local weekly where the
department named and shamed all government and Zanu (PF) personalities who
were committing human rights abuses. He referred to what he called
“anti-government speeches” that I made five years ago when I was
secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists.
He accused me of writing for “anti-government” on-line publications. He said
I had retained my news editor’s position at the banned Daily News and I was
responsible for co-ordinating the pool of former Daily News reporters to
write for anti-government on-line publications. For my alleged “crimes”, the
officer said I was going to be imprisoned. – ZimOnline. Tamborinyoka, a
former secretary general of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists, now works as
technical head of the MDC (Tsvangirai)’s information department.