Human rights pressure group, Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) says the month of November was characterised by partisan distribution of agricultural inputs under Government’s Pfumvudza input program.
In a monthly report for November titled ‘Height of Intolerance’ ZPP said there was also continuation of bias in court processes and a heightened stifling of alternative voices in various sectors.
“In November, there was a continuation of partisan distribution of agricultural inputs under the government’s Pfumvudza input scheme, biased hand-out of food aid from the government’s social welfare department as well as the open bias in court processes and the escalation of the stifling of alternative voices, in politics, media and civil society and other spaces.” read the report
ZPP said they recorded more than 220 case of human rights violations with the Zimbabwe Republic Police among the list of perpetrators.
“To buttress this are the statistics of human rights violations, where, out of the 226 incidents recorded, the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) contributed 30.65 percent of the perpetrators while Zanu PF accounted for 18.48 percent, followed by the municipal police at 8.7 percent and five percent by the
“Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA). The affiliation of 34.75 percent of the perpetrators remained unknown, raising fears over the non-existence of a sense of personal security in the country, where the ordinary people are vulnerable, with no effective protection from human rights violations.
“The two factions, which are in a State-aided, bitter fight over the control of the biggest opposition political party, the MDC, contributed a combined 2.17 percent of the violations whereas the war veterans contributed 0.43 percent of perpetrators recorded.” said ZPP
The report adds “It must be noted that entities linked to the State and the ruling party, which are, the ZRP, Zanu PF, ZNA, war veterans, and municipal police, contributed a combined 63.26 percent of perpetrators of human rights violations recorded in November.
“Topping the list of incidents were 118 cases of intimidation and harassment attributed largely to the police and the army, followed by 45 cases of discrimination during aid distribution and 21 cases of assault and eight cases of unlawful detention.”
The pressure group bemoaned the lack of commitment by the Government to address the issues and concluded that country need collective efforts from human rights defenders both local and international to address the issues.
“Throughout the year, ZPP has recorded cases of partisan aid distribution, human rights violations perpetrated by state security agents, the assault on the judiciary, among other things. These have not been resolved, and worse still, government has not shown interest or will-power to address them.
“Based on the above, and considering that the pattern of human rights violations continues unabated, ZPP concludes that Zimbabwe is in urgent need of collaborative efforts by all pro-democracy and human rights actors to lobby and advocate, locally, regionally and internationally, for the return to constitutionalism.” said ZPP
