/ 7 February 2005

Vandals raid Zanu-PF offices in Johannesburg

Members of Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF party were attacked by a group of opposition supporters in their offices in Johannesburg on Sunday, the party’s district chairperson said.

Bigvai Gumede, chairperson of Zanu-PF’s Johannesburg branch, said about 17 people wearing Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) T-shirts broke into their meeting room and started throwing furniture around and pulling down posters of Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe.

”They started beating us up. They told us, ‘Why do you support the president [Mugabe]?”’ Gumede said.

No one was seriously injured, and the vandals soon ran away.

Johannesburg police spokesperson Amanda Roestoff said police would investigate the incident.

Tensions are running high between the two parties in the run-up to the election on March 31, which the MDC claims will not be free and fair.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions tried to send a delegation to Zimbabwe last week, but they were refused entry at the Zimbabwe International airport, and put back on the plane to Johannesburg. – Sapa