Police in Harare arrested at least 13 people including labour leaders for organising work stoppages to protest soaring food prices and economic hardship, a representative said on Tuesday.
”At least 13 people have been arrested for barricading roads, stoning buses and organising the stayaway,” said Assistant Commissioner Wayne Bvudzijena.
An official of the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), the organiser of the strike, meanwhile claimed six members of his association were arrested in the southern city of Masvingo, but Bvudzijena could not confirm this.
Late on Monday a labour leader and other union officials were arrested ahead of the protest which had the blessing of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
Wellington Chibebe, the secretary general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), was still in custody late on Tuesday for allegedly organising the strike.
The strike, declared illegal by police, failed to take hold.
The NCA, an alliance of rights groups, unions, opposition parties and churches, had intended Tuesday’s strike to also press for constitutional reform.
In Harare, businesses, including banks, supermarkets and manufacturing plants, were open for business as normal.
Many people appeared ignorant of the strike, while others said they could not afford to stop working when they were hard-pressed to buy even the most basic food supplies, as the cost of living spirals upward on a daily basis.
”Our assessment is that there has been about 20%-30%
response in Harare, but in other towns it has been quite poor,” NCA chairman Lovemore Madhuku said.
”We (however) are not disappointed, we are actually happy that some people took heed of our call, given the political culture of intimidation in this country,” he said.
Lawyers for the imprisoned union leaders were meanwhile frantically trying to seek their release ”because there is no case to answer”, according to ZCTU President Lovemore Matombo.
The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), based in Belgium, condemned the arrests of the ZCTU leaders as ”a chilling reminder of the repression and intimidation faced by all those who do not support the policies of President Robert Mugabe”.
Police representative Bvudzijena claimed police had evidence the main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) had supported ”criminal activities” during the strike.
”We have indications that some people were paid by the MDC to carry out those attacks,” he charged.
MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai has said he supports the work stoppage.
”The call by civil society for a day of protest … is a welcome move, which is long overdue,” Tsvangirai said in a statement.
”The deteriorating economic situation has reached alarming levels,” he added.
Zimbabwe’s economy has plunged into a deepening depression in recent years. At least 80% of the population now lives in poverty.
For nearly a year there have been critical shortages of basic commodities, resulting in a thriving black market where prices are anything up to 10 times the official rates.
Madhuku said there were plans to call for another strike before the end of the week.
Meanwhile, the Zimbabwe government, facing severe food shortages, has started to seize grain from white-owned farms, a farmers’ group said.
Justice for Agriculture (JAG) said in a statement that
government officials and soldiers had seized several tons of maize from farms in northwestern Zimbabwe.
A two-week deadline for farmers to deliver grain to depots of the state-run Grain Marketing Board (GMB) expired on Tuesday.
Farmers have been reluctant to hand over all their maize, partly because of controlled prices for the crop, and partly because they want reserves for their own workers and livestock.
The farmers’ group said 36 tons of maize had been seized from three farms in the Tengwe area of Mashonaland West province, a fertile maize and tobacco farming area.
The army was not available to comment on these allegations. Around eight million of Zimbabwe’s 12 million people are threatened with famine this year, due to poor rains that have affected crop production.
Aid agencies also blame diminished production on disruptions to commercial agriculture brought about by a land reform programme. – Sapa-AFP