Zimbabwe: Rights Group Offices Raided After Demonstration
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SW Radio Africa (London)
10 October 2008
Posted to the web 10 October 2008
Lance Guma
The offices of a human rights pressure group were raided by police on Friday, immediately after the group held a demonstration around 11am.
About 200 members of Restoration of Human Rights in Zimbabwe (ROHR) took to the streets of Harare marking what they called a campaign for democracy and justice in Zimbabwe. The demonstration itself was without incident as the police were taken by surprise and only deployed after it had ended. According to ROHR Information Director Edgar Chikuvire, riot police patrolled the Harare city centre before some of the officers raided their Alexandra Park offices, looking for the leaders who organized the march.
Chikuvire spoke to Newsreel while in hiding and says several other members of the group have also gone underground. ROHR feels the power sharing accord signed by the MDC and ZANU PF sets a very bad precedence for human rights in the country because people are being denied the chance to get a government of their own choosing. 'Our hopes are underpinned in the need for people to embrace and feel passionately for the need to be ruled by a government that will be accountable to them simply because they chose it into power,' ROHR said in a statement.
The group also pointed out that despite the deal being signed the country's crisis, 'continued unabated.' The group further argues that, 'Zanu-PF is making frantic efforts to retain the power that it lost to Morgan Tsvangirai and the MDC during the March 29 election, a situation that is a direct assault on the people's power and constitutional right to choose the leader they want.' ROHR says it's campaign will encourage Zimbabweans to demand free and fair elections, whose outcome will reflect the people's will.
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ROHR is led by the former MDC Chairman for the UK province, Ephraim Tapa. Several activists run the Zimbabwe office. Last month it sponsored a High Court application by Rodgers Chigwededza, Tinashe Gotora, Jackson Mabota, and Precious Mateyeni, demanding that the central bank scrap cash withdrawal limits. Justice Joseph Musakwa ruled the case was not urgent and had to wait in line like all the other court cases. ROHR slammed the decision saying, 'in other words we are supposed to join another queue to stop the cash queues.'
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