The Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) called on the regional Southern African Development Community (SADC) and African Union (AU) to urge President Robert Mugabe to stop political violence that the group said had continued despite ongoing talks between Mugabe’s ruling ZANU PF and the opposition MDC parties.
Zimbabwe is in a complex state of emergency where the government has declared war on its people. We are being arrested, tortured and taken to Chikurubi (prison) where there is no food and water, said WOZA coordinator Jenni Williams, during the launch in Johannesburg of a report on harassment of the group’s members.
The report titled Counting the Cost of Courage details cases of illegal arrest, abuse and torture that WOZA says were committed against its members by the police and other state agents.
Williams, who was speaking ahead of an expected visit to Zimbabwe this week by SADC chairman and South African President Thabo Mbeki, said: SADC and AU should pressure Mugabe to stop the political violence and disband militia camps in all areas of the country.
Mbeki is expected in Harare possibly today to try one more time to push Mugabe and MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai to agree to share power after a regional summit last weekend failed to bring the two rivals to agree to form a government of national unity.
A power-sharing government is seen as the most viable way to end Zimbabwe’s long-running crisis that is marked by the world’s highest inflation of 11 million percent, severe shortages of food, jobs, foreign currency and deepening poverty.
Williams urged African leaders to pressure Mugabe to allow non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to resume delivery of humanitarian aid to hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans facing hunger.
The government should immediately lift the current ban on organisations providing humanitarian assistance and allow a United Nation team to address the humanitarian crisis and widespread hunger without political interference, she said.
Mugabe’s government last June banned all NGO field operations after accusing relief agencies of using aid distribution as a pretext to carry out political work for Tsvangirai and the MDC.
Zimbabwe, once a regional breadbasket, has grappled with severe food shortages since 2000 when Mugabe launched his haphazard fast-track land reform exercise that displaced established white commercial farmers and replaced them with either incompetent or inadequately funded black farmers.
A shortage of seed and fertilizer hampered planting while erratic rains for most of the 2007/2008 farming season has meant yields will be much lower again this year and international relief agencies will have to step in with food aid. – ZimOnline
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