News / Local
Bulawayo police harass residents under unofficial ‘curfew’
22 Dec 2010 at 09:40hrs | Views
Bulawayo police have been accused of harassing and intimidating innocent city residents in what is being called an undeclared 'state of emergency'.
According to the Matabeleland Civil Society Consortium the police have been rounding up, beating and arresting people in Bulawayo. But while police officials say they are just tightening security, the Consortium says people are living in fear as a result of the police's actions.
The 'tightened security' has come in the aftermath of a shooting earlier this month during an armed robbery, which resulted in the death of a police chief. The death saw Defence Force Commander Constantine Chiwenga announce that the army would be sent into Bulawayo to deal with the scourge of armed robberies in the city. The result has been a clamp down on the public and reports of police brutality.
The Civil Society Consortium has since challenged the police to come out in the open and declare that Bulawayo is now under a 'curfew'. The group's Dumisani Nkomo said it was as if Bulawayo was under a "state of emergency or curfew" which has not been declared.
"If the police want to impose a curfew for the purposes of hunting down criminals, then they should do so and if that is the real intention I do not see any law-abiding citizen objecting to that," he said. "What is obviously wrong is for the police to work as if there is a curfew when they have not declared any."
Some residents agreed that there was an undeclared curfew, explaining that road blocks are being set up every evening on the main roads leading out of the city. They said the public are being heavily monitored and some have even been forced to undergo strip searches on the streets. There have also been reports of assault at the hands of the police, if anyone tries to resist being stopped and searched.
There is widespread fear that the army's deployment to Bulawayo is a "decoy," ahead of elections next year. The public are afraid that the machinations of violence, seen during the 2008 election period, are beginning to re-emerge.
There is also concern, because of the history of genocide in Matabeleland. There is a lot of fear that this could be the second wave of the Gukurahundi, because this is how it all started originally".
According to the Matabeleland Civil Society Consortium the police have been rounding up, beating and arresting people in Bulawayo. But while police officials say they are just tightening security, the Consortium says people are living in fear as a result of the police's actions.
The 'tightened security' has come in the aftermath of a shooting earlier this month during an armed robbery, which resulted in the death of a police chief. The death saw Defence Force Commander Constantine Chiwenga announce that the army would be sent into Bulawayo to deal with the scourge of armed robberies in the city. The result has been a clamp down on the public and reports of police brutality.
The Civil Society Consortium has since challenged the police to come out in the open and declare that Bulawayo is now under a 'curfew'. The group's Dumisani Nkomo said it was as if Bulawayo was under a "state of emergency or curfew" which has not been declared.
"If the police want to impose a curfew for the purposes of hunting down criminals, then they should do so and if that is the real intention I do not see any law-abiding citizen objecting to that," he said. "What is obviously wrong is for the police to work as if there is a curfew when they have not declared any."
Some residents agreed that there was an undeclared curfew, explaining that road blocks are being set up every evening on the main roads leading out of the city. They said the public are being heavily monitored and some have even been forced to undergo strip searches on the streets. There have also been reports of assault at the hands of the police, if anyone tries to resist being stopped and searched.
There is widespread fear that the army's deployment to Bulawayo is a "decoy," ahead of elections next year. The public are afraid that the machinations of violence, seen during the 2008 election period, are beginning to re-emerge.
There is also concern, because of the history of genocide in Matabeleland. There is a lot of fear that this could be the second wave of the Gukurahundi, because this is how it all started originally".
Source - ByoNews
