Police assault Bulawayo journalist

Zimbabwe Union of Journalists has condemned the assault of Bulawayo based freelance photographer, Chrispen Ndlovu by police on Thursday.

Ndlovu was, beaten by police in Bulawayo as he was  taking photographs of running battles involving police and kombi touts when he was pounced upon and beaten despite producing his accreditation card.

ZUJ Secretary General, Foster Dongozi condemned the police behaviour of beating up journalists.

"On Monday they were arresting journalists in Harare. Today they were beating up a journalist in Bulawayo. We are beginning to suspect that contrary to some wild allegations that journalists want to tarnish the image of the country; it is the police doing that."

Bulawayo traffic police yesterday launched a blitz on commuter ominibuses which saw a number of kombis being impounded thereby leaving commuters stranded.

Some of the kombis were dropping commuters on the city's periphery in order to evade arrest and scores of commuters could be seen walking to the Central Business District.

The kombi crews claimed that the blitz was sparked by the kidnapping and assault of a police officer by kombi crews at Basch Street terminus popularly known as Egodini.