ZANU-PF elements are still at it, with the partisan police out in full force harassing ‘opposition’ elements that include tertiary education students, teachers and MDC supporters.
The police harassed and arrested students Thursday on the heals of Robert Mugabe’s declaration live on ZBC Wednesday that “ZANU-PF was still in control…in charge” in Zimbabwe.
In Bindura, Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) officers invaded Bindura University campus, “armed to the teeth” as one student put it, and arrested students who were on protest demanding that the university administration provide them with a “conducive” learning environment.
Student leaders Chiedza Gadzirayi (22), Laswet Savadye (24) and Respect Mbanga (21) were beaten up while in police custody were among the ten students that the police arrested.
The students spent several hours in police custody and were later released after paying admission of guilty fines.
Over the last decade, at the instigation of ZANU-PF and fearing that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) would use university campuses as a hotbed for political activities, the police has broken into university campuses across the country, wantonly beating and tear-gassing students.
“We we given instructions to crush the demo,” a police officer who took part in the raid on the students told the Tribune by phone from Bindura Thursday night. “The chiefs were afraid the student demo would set a bad precedent.”
There is fear and uncertainity with ZANU-PF ranks that the MDC might hijack the GNU deal and use it as a launching pad toward sidelining GNU tenets.
The Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) said in a statement: “This is a negative development, taking into consideration that the deal was signed to bring sanity to the political terrain in this country.”
Observers say repression in Zimbabwe is now a political culture such that this ‘coalition’ has to put security sector reform and the judiciary as top on its agenda if it is to work.
Also Thursday the president of the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe
(PTUZ) Takavafira Zhou was arrested in Masvingo, accused by the police of being the brains behind the ‘illegal’teachers strike.
Zhou who was picked up by plainclothes policeman while in a bank, is being held at Masvingo Central Police Station. Majongwe said: “This is a clear case of political victimisation by police officers.”
The teachers, together with doctors across the country, have been on strike since schools opened early this month demanding salary increases that are commensurate with the hyper-inflationary environment.
The doctors are demanding that their salaries be paid in foreign currency to ‘cushion’ them against the rampant inflation that is estimated at 300 000 000 %.
Judging by the stance of the police, the GNU deal is paper thin, analysts said. Indeed the GNU deal hasn’t changed the mentality of people in ZANU-PF, starting with Robert Mugabe himself who delivered what amounted to a hate speech at the GNU signing ceremony on Monday.
The United States, aware that the possibility that the GNU deal would not succeed, joined other western nations Thursday in pledging to keep the sanctions on ZANU-PF in place.
US sanctions would only be lifted once Washington saw the deal “truly implemented”, US under-secretary for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer said in an interview.
“We will certainly keep the sanctions on until we see real performance. we will move very slowly to remove the sanctions.”
The holistic picture on the ground here in Zimbabwe is that the GNU deal by die a pre-mature death, or rather, it won’t succeed.
ZANU-PF, up to its old ways, is professing its commitment to the deal one hand, while on the other hand it is promoting activities that are bent of undermining the GNU deal, analysts warned Thursday.
Harare Tribune