Why were you the first person from the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) to have his passport seized?
You have to speak to those who drew up the list to know why, but I suppose it has a lot to do with using me as an example to intimidate others. This is how the regime operates. They are saying if you are an outspoken critic … you will lose your passport. People are not going to be intimidated by this tactic. There are more serious issues at stake and taking away a passport won’t change anything.
What are you going to do about it?
I have lodged the matter with my lawyers. We are going to avail to ourselves of every avenue of contestation available. This is about denying me the right to movement. It is not enough for the government to say it is a privilege — they might as well say the right to life is a privilege.
How will this affect your work as the MDC’s spokesperson?
It will not affect me at all. There are other ways of communicating. You can’t shut down ideas — they have a way of travelling across borders. The majority of the three million Zimbabweans in South Africa are as informed of what is happening here as those who are here. Taking my passport without dealing with the three million Zimbabweans there is a waste of time.
The law that empowers the state to seize the passports of critics was passed at the same time as the legislation that created the Senate. Don’t you feel the anti-Senate camp has been vindicated?
This is a government with a predilection for anti-people laws, but there is a world of difference between opposing a piece of legislation and obeying the law. For instance, we oppose the electoral laws of Zimbabwe, but that didn’t stop us from participating in the elections.
In the face of these clampdowns, what do you consider to be the most appropriate response?
It doesn’t matter what one thinks of the legal system in Zimbabwe, we have to use it. We have a legal system and we have always gone to the courts each time we feel we have been wronged.