They came in the dead of night. Job Sikhala was woken by a phone call from a neighbour warning that vehicles were approaching his home shortly before 4am. Sikhala knew he was in danger: as an opposition MP with Zimbabwe’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), he was a prime target for Robert Mugabe’s secret police.
Yet the politician had made precautions. Snatching up a few possessions from his room, Sikhala hurried to the cellar and the secret tunnel he had built under his home. He escaped. But Mugabe’s spies are everywhere in Zimbabwe today. Sikhala was picked up by police at a hotel later that day. His nightmare was about to begin.
He was taken to Harare Central Police station before being put on an unmarked minibus and driven for an hour. Blindfolded and terrified, Sikhala was led down three flights of stairs by his police guards. He could see nothing and his interrogators would not tell him where he was. But Sikhala knew what awaited him. In Zimbabwe, those arrested in the middle of the night always expect the worst. ‘I knew it was a torture chamber. I knew something terrible was about to happen,’ he said.
The secret police beat him on the soles of his feet with wooden sticks. His torturers took it in turns as they demanded details of how the MDC works and what plans it had for the coming months. Then they tied an electric wire around a toe on each foot and electrocuted him, burning his flesh. ‘They did that for 10 minutes and one of them said ”You haven’t even started talking”,’ Sikhala said.
Wires were attached to his penis and testicles. The current was turned on. Another wire was clipped to his tongue. They shouted the same questions, over and over. What was the MDC doing? Who were its supporters? Why was he with them?
He tried to answer them, but could barely speak. Another wire was attached to his left ear and more shocks sent down the cables. Then one of the torturers urinated on him. ‘At that moment I urinated myself also. Then they made me wriggle in it and said I had to pretend to swim,’ Sikhala said.
‘I had given up life. Whatever the outcome, I had given my life to God at that point. I cried about never seeing my two kids again. Would they know that their father had been killed by these people? That I had died in this way?’
He was vaguely aware of his torturers talking about drowning him in a nearby reservoir. They drove him back to Harare police station, where he was charged with plotting against the state. As soon as he was released, supporters took him away to a secret location for hospital treatment.
Sikhala’s arrest and torture was only one of dozens in recent weeks. A huge and brutal crack down is underway, aimed at crushing any form of opposition to the regime of President Robert Mugabe and his ruling Zanu-PF party.
The reason is simple: in a few weeks’ time Zimbabwe will host six international matches of the Cricket World Cup. The event will provide a perfect opportunity for Mugabe to present a sanitised view of Zimbabwean life to the world.
But the event will also attract scores of foreign journalists, who are currently banned from entering Zimbabwe. Mugabe is determined that by the time they get here the opposition will be in no condition to create trouble. The main focus of the crackdown is the MDC, whose leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, goes on trial for treason next month.
In the past three weeks MDC activists, councillors, MPs and sympathisers have been arrested and jailed. Some, like youth leader Fanuel Tsvangirai, are missing. One MP, Tafadzwa Musekiwa, has fled abroad. But it is not just the MDC. So desperate is the ruling party to ensure that the cricket matches pass off peacefully that any form of opposition is ruthlessly crushed.
Zanu-PF’s youth wing, the so-called Green Bombers, have been sent into opposition areas to terrorise and intimidate the locals. They have set up camps and any whiff of dissent is dealt with brutally. Journalists have been beaten and the sight of a white face — especially that of a foreign journalist — is an invitation to arrest and torture.
Even as police were preparing Sikhala’s arrest on 14 January, four activists for the Combined Harare Residents Association were being tortured by the Green Bombers, named for the green uniforms they wear. The four were touring the crowded township of Kuwadzana on a ‘familiarisation’ trip ahead of a by-election there, which the CHRA wants to ensure is fair and open. But their presence was too much for the Green Bombers. They were frogmarched into a militia base, one of four that have been set up in Kuwadzana.
‘There was no lighting and it was getting dark. I heard one of them call the police and he told the others that the cops had said they could ”work” on us first and they would come over later,’ Barnabas Mangodza, one of the victims, said.
The ‘work’ soon began. Some of the youths scrolled through the address books on the group’s mobile phones and found numbers for MDC activists. One of the militia said: ‘Now we are going to beat you. Who is going to be first?’
Mangodza stood up. Eight people held him while six others hit him with whips, sticks and their fists. Similar treatment was meted out to the other three: Jameson Gazirayi, Joseph Rose and Richard Mudehwe. The ordeal lasted two hours. Finally, the police came and the Green Bombers left. Despite their wounds, Mangodza and the others were arrested and fined $5 000 Zimbabwean dollars. Their crime was ‘behaviour likely to disturb the peace’.
Zimbabwe is a country gone mad. A stolen election last March and the disastrous confiscation of the country’s white-owned commercial farms have triggered complete economic collapse.
Starved of foreign currency and in the grip of 500% hyper-inflation, all basic commodities have run out. In the cities people queue for entire days to get fuel, bread, salt and cooking oil.
The countryside is the worst off. Drought has gripped the land, withering crops and killing cattle. An estimated seven million people are facing starvation in a country that used to be an exporter of food. But the ruling elite still prosper. Inflation has created two economies. Those with foreign currency can afford anything. Those without can afford nothing.
Both Mugabe and his reviled Information Minister Jonathan Moyo recently travelled abroad to buy their own supplies. Mugabe flew first class to Singapore, returning with 15 boxes of goods. Moyo travelled to South Africa by convoy, where he loaded up with canned food, rice, sugar and bread. The hypocrisy has shocked many. ‘Don’t send us cricketers, send us food,’ Wilfrid Mhanda, head of the Zimbabwe Liberators Platform and a former black liberation fighter who now opposes the government, said. ‘When the English cricketers come here they will do just as Mugabe does. They will eat and drink well, while we are starving.’
For most Zimbabweans — 70% of whom are unemployed — life is spent in a desperate search for enough to eat. Yet even in buying food, Mugabe’s grip on power is tight. Zanu politicians are given food to distribute. Party cards must be shown to receive it. The Green Bombers loot shops of food, which they sell for a profit. In Chitungwiza, their actions sparked ugly riots two weeks ago.
There are now 1 500 of the militia in the township, which has an MDC mayor. More are coming. The son of one local councillor was injured so badly he was taken to hospital — because he wore an MDC T-shirt. ‘The Green Bombers made him try and eat his own shirt,’ the councillor, who was afraid to give his name, said.
The MDC is reeling under the pressure, but plans are still being drawn up for protests inside and outside the six matches to be played. The government is gearing up too. It has set up a special police taskforce to crush any dissent near the games. ‘We will be in full force,’ police commissioner Augustine Chihuri said last week.
But amid the chaos and violence there are signs of hope. Zimbabweans can turn the tide. One such is Chitungwiza shopkeeper Lloyd Moyo (28). The Green Bombers had stolen so much bread that he stopped selling it. But local people begged him to carry on. They promised to protect him from the militia. So far, they have. Standing in front of his ramshackle grocery store, Moyo raised a brave voice of challenge. ‘I am not afraid,’ he said.
Behind him, stapled to a wall, was a photograph of him taken on the day his shop opened. Above it was a proud handwritten message. ‘Life is full of problems,’ it read. ‘But we shall have victory in the end.’ – Guardian Unlimited Â