The Zimbabwean health minister armed himself with a Kalashnikov and threatened to kill opposition supporters forced to attend a political meeting unless they voted for Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe in a second round of the presidential election, witnesses said.
The accounts of the incident involving David Parirenyatwa and witness reports of other forced meetings at which ZANU-PF members of parliament and senior military officers oversaw the beating of people who voted against Mugabe in last month’s elections, establish a direct link between the highest levels of the ruling party and what the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) described yesterday as a “war” against the people.
Other witnesses confirm the account by the opposition activist.
PHOTO : AP
Another witness at the meeting said: “These MPs had guns, they were intimidating people. They said ‘this city is ours. There is no room for sell-outs to the whites. If you support the opposition you must leave or we will kill you.’”
At least one shot was fired into the air to intimidate people.
Meanwhile, an opposition leader appealing for international intervention said Zimbabwe resembles a war zone, with thousands of people displaced, hundreds injured and 10 killed by postelection violence.
MDC secretary-general Tendai Biti said violence since March 29 elections had forced 3,000 families out of their homes. Hundreds of people had been hospitalized with injuries and 10 people killed, he said.
Biti said UN organizations present in Zimbabwe must be mobilized as the situation had escalated from a political crisis to a humanitarian one.
“They should move as a matter of urgency. They should move because Zimbabwe is a war zone,” he told a news conference on Sunday in Johannesburg, South Africa.
He said key members of the opposition’s administration had been arrested, along with more than 400 supporters.
“We are not able to function because of those arrests,” he said. Biti and Tsvangirai say they cannot return to Zimbabwe as they face immediate arrest.
The Mugabe government has accused Tsvangirai of treason and plotting a regime change with former colonial power Britain.
Biti said the recount was rigged and the ruling ZANU-PF had tampered with tally sheets and ballot boxes.
In related news, the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) said yesterday it was mobilizing against a ship carrying arms from China destined for Zimbabwe from offloading in any African harbor.
“Our objective is to mobilize and organize unions in Africa to take a firm stand and try to stop the ship from offloading these dangerous weapons which could be used to kill Zimbabweans,” said Sprite Zungu, ITF spokesman in Durban, South Africa.
The South African Transport Workers’ Union is affiliated to the London-based ITF, a federation of more than 650 unions representing 4.5 million transport workers in 148 countries across the world.
“I am not sure of exactly where the ship is headed. I am still seeking tangible information on the destination of the ship. As soon as I get the exact information today or tomorrow, I will travel to the country and ensure I mobilize workers not to offload it,” Zungu said.
The Chinese ship, An Yue Jiang, left South Africa on Friday after a court barred its cargo from being transported to the border.
The vessel, anchored off the port of Durban, sailed to an unknown destination.
“We have heard some information that the ship might berth either in Mozambique or Angola. We are following up, even up to Nigeria,” Zungu said.
The high court in Durban had ruled earlier Friday that the ship could be offloaded in Durban but barred its cargo from being transported to the border with landlocked Zimbabwe.
Three million rounds of AK-47 ammunition, 1,500 rocket-propelled grenades and more than 3,000 mortar rounds and mortar tubes were among the cargo on the Chinese ship, copies of the inventory published by a South African newspaper showed.
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